south africa view

[Bent_Metal]

Letter to the editor

LETTER 2 - SA's view on RIAA

What’s South Africa’s view point on what the RIAA & MPAA are doing in America concerning file sharing and taking the people who share files to court? I thought to contact you as I'm hoping that this is something you would know about or perhaps could look into and let me know. Basically what I want to know is, is it ok to download and share files as long as they are for personal use and not going to be sold for profit? Please if you have any news on this I would love to know as I cant find anything about it online.

Thank you very much for your time.

Best wishes,

Bruce.

Dear Bruce,
It is only okay to do so if the artist or label that owns the music allows it. There is tons of free music available for download that you can share and listen to at your leisure. However, if the music has been copied from a retail CD or tape, placed in a file sharing environment and you download that song, you're effectively stealing, and that's not cool. Many have said there is no legal issue involved when one is simply downloading this material rather than uploading it yourself. After all, you're not the one sharing the content. This is a nice justification that people make, but legally it is not correct. You cannot legally download copyrighted digital content that you did not actually pay for. Now, in reality, you're not likely to have any copyright police knocking down your door if you download a song, but know that you are breaking the law. Also, when you are online downloading this kind of material, you are not as anonymous as you think. Your IP address can be used to determine all kinds of things.

Generally though, I think the problem in SA in terms of lost revenue for the industry is far more centred around pirate CD's and tapes being sold by informal traders. But, as a result of your query, we're doing a full feature on RISA (the SA equivalent of RIAA in the US) early in 2004 - so watch this space.

If anyone else has light to shed on this issue from a legal perspective, or you know someone who has details, please contact us!

- Ed.

i found the above in this site

i'll be keeping my eye on that and for further developments.

[Malicious Intent]

Sounds like you are still safe for a while. He says that you wont be busted for downloading, but never that you will be for uploading. Like the BPI, the focus is on people doing it for a profit.
It appears that Europe will be the next battle front.

[Bent_Metal]

yip seems soo