From: Adam L. Beberg (beberg@mithral.com)
Date: Mon Apr 24 2000 - 11:34:39 PDT
On Mon, 24 Apr 2000, Kragen Sitaker wrote:
> Tom Whore writes:
> > As the law stands now if you pass along a Lyle Lovete mp3
> > to a lover you are comitting a crime.
>
> According to what I remember of the No Electronic Theft act (the only
> law that makes not-for-profit copyright infringement a crime) it's only
> a crime if the value of that mp3 is greater than $10,000 or if you make
> more than ten copies of it.
>
> Otherwise it's civil copyright infringement, not a crime.
http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d105:h.r.02265:
Dec 16, 97:
Signed by President.
Became Public Law No: 105-147.
``(a) Criminal Infringement.--Any person who infringes a copyright
willfully either--
``(1) for purposes of commercial advantage or private
financial gain, or
``(2) by the reproduction or distribution, including by
electronic means, during any 180-day period, of 1 or more copies
or phonorecords of 1 or more copyrighted works, which have a
total retail value of more than $1,000,
...
So it's 1 coppy and $1000, and the penalties escalate fast at 10 copies
and $2500.
Running napster/gnusteal puts you over that 1 copy mark fairly quickly,
and $1k probably isn't too far off either.
The $1,000 limit could also be triggered if an artist set the price of a
song to say $2,500 and allowed a 10 year rental for $1 or uses other
methods to not actually sell the content.
- Adam L. Beberg
Mithral Communications & Design, Inc.
The Cosm Project - http://cosm.mithral.com/
beberg@mithral.com - http://www.iit.edu/~beberg/
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