ITALY: “Downloading okay if not trying to make money”

Sharing music, movies, and software from P2P and file-sharing networks is now "legale" in Italy so long as you’re not making a "profitto" from it.

It was recently disclosed by sources in the Italian media.that Italy’s Highest Court has ruled in favor of allowing people to share and download over the internet so long as there is no financial gain.to be made.

"I consider this sentence as a very intermediate step in clarifying what is legal and what is not legal," said analyst Carlo Alberto Carnevale Maffe, the president of Assodigitale, a think-tank on digital technology.

"This sentence marks an important step in that peer-to-peer per se is not an illegal activity. What stays and remains illegal is copyright infringement by cracking copyright files, and distributing it for commercial purposes."

The decision arose from the appeal of a case from 1994 in which 2 people were convicted of "illegal duplication" after setting up a P2P file-sharing network. They were originally given a nine-year sentence, which was later reduced to 3 months but, this ruling erases those convictions.

The court decided that it was not illegal to share or download content from P2P and file-sharing networks so long as is there is no financial gain to be made by the user.

What this means is that it is only when a user cracks the DRM with which a piece of media is encrypted in order to make it available for download can a user be found guilty of violating copyright protection laws.

Sharing and downloading content is "legale."

The win may be short-lived however, as the European Parliament still has pending legislation which would deem the sharing or downloading of copyrighted works and material as a "heavy criminal offense."

Current proposals include as follows:

1. Member States shall ensure that the intentional infringement of an intellectual property right on a commercial scale is treated as a criminal offence.
1a. Member States shall ensure that intentional copyright infringements are treated as criminal offences, if the following elements are fulfilled cumulatively:
(a) commercial activity with a view to earning a financial profit;
(b) the aim of causing significant direct financial loss for the rightholder; and
(c) deliberate and conscious infringement of the copyright involved.
1b. Member States shall ensure that intentional trademark infringements are treated as criminal offences, if the following elements are fulfilled cumulatively:(a) use of a sign which is identical with the trademark in relation to goods or services which are identical with those for which the trade mark is registered.
(b) commercial activity with a view to earning a financial profit;
(c) the aim of causing significant direct financial loss for the rightholder; and
(d) deliberate and conscious infringement of the trademark involved.

The Italian agency that monitors copyright issues, the SIAE, also agreed that the ruling may be short-lived, saying in a statement that the ruling did not bring any ‘revolutions’ in terms of author’s rights because the case predates current legislation calling for a fine for anyone who shares protected material over the Internet, even without financial gain.

In the meantime however, all bets are off in Italy, and I’m sure people are maxing out their internet connections while they can.

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