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posted by chromas on Wednesday September 19 2018, @01:28AM   Printer-friendly
from the just-a-reminder dept.

Submitted via IRC for Fnord666

In this day and age ownership of digital media is often an illusion. When you buy a book or movie there are severe restrictions on what you can do with these files. In some cases, purchased content can simply disappear overnight. These limitations keep copyright holders in control, but they breed pirates at the same time.

[...] Millions of people have now replaced their physical media collections for digital ones, often stored in the cloud. While that can be rather convenient, it comes with restrictions that are unheard of offline.

[...R]esearchers examined how the absence of the right to resell and lend affects people's choice to buy. They found that, among those who are familiar with BitTorrent, roughly a third would prefer The Pirate Bay over Apple or Amazon if they are faced with these limitations.

These rights restrictions apparently breed pirates.

"Based on our survey data, consumers are more likely to opt out of lawful markets for copyrighted works and download illegally if there is no lawful way to obtain the rights to lend, resell, and use those copies on their device of choice," the researchers concluded.

The paper in question is two years old by now, but still very relevant today. While we don't expect that anything will change soon, people should at least be aware that you don't always own what you buy.

Source: https://torrentfreak.com/you-dont-really-own-that-movie-you-bought-but-pirates-180915/


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  • (Score: 4, Informative) by maxwell demon on Wednesday September 19 2018, @05:56AM (1 child)

    by maxwell demon (1608) on Wednesday September 19 2018, @05:56AM (#736923) Journal

    When you buy a book or movie there are severe restrictions on what you can do with these files.

    No, when I buy a book, there is no file. Just a bunch of paper sheets with stuff printed on them, glued together on one side, and with a more or less fancy cover. And the only restrictions books have are the restrictions the physical media impose.

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  • (Score: 1) by Myfyr on Wednesday September 19 2018, @07:34AM

    by Myfyr (3654) on Wednesday September 19 2018, @07:34AM (#736942)

    And the only restrictions books have are the restrictions the physical media impose.

    True. But keeping it that way sometimes requires doing things like taking the fight all the way to the Supreme Court. [wikipedia.org]