Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> On Sat, 22 Aug 2009 15:06:48 -0400, Warp wrote:

> >   I don't think many countries have more draconian copyright laws than
> > Finland currently. (Although I hear that Canada is passing, or has
> > already passed, a copyright law that makes Finland look like the
> > promised land of global public domain in comparison.)

> I don't know about the laws in Finland, but have you looked at (in depth) 
> the US copyright laws?

  Not really. The only thing I have heard about the US is RIAA harassing
individuals with exorbitant fines for each illegally downloaded song,
making it a more severe crime than eg. murder.

  In Finland you won't get fined with 2 million dollars for 20 songs,
but you might get fined quite vast sums nevertheless (tens of thousands
of euros, which is way more than the average citizen owns). And this even
if the "Finnish RIAA" owns zero rights to those songs. It gets compensation
for music which it does not own in any way. (Yes, it has happened in
practice.)

  And in Finland if I tell you that you can bypass DVD copy protection by
using mencoder, at least in theory I could get jailed. Not only is the act
of bypassing copy protections illegal, but even discussing with someone how
to do it is illegal.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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