Is downloading TV content an act of piracy?

[megabyteme]

Gee. Brilliantly argued.

I say nothing

Care to expand on that?

[Night0wl]

For me it's a lack of missing options. Most of the shows I watch I wouldn't be able to watch otherwise, either due to availability or time restrictions, unless buying the DVD when available (maybe) often many months later. And lets face it, most aren't worth paying money for.

BTW there is no law or regulation for or against it where I live.

[xJohnxSmithx]

I figure, if you pay for cable. It's no different than DVRing it. I highly doubt that would hold up in court though.

[InTheBasement]

I say nothing

Care to expand on that?

He's Not-Care to explain it to us.

[a7x]

http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/argue

(intransitive) To have an argument, a quarrel.

You work as a lawyer?

[Xbox_360]

I think for 1 if you can view it on the networks site for free I guess it should be alright I mean you can see if for free in crappy flash. 2 if you pay for cable/Sat and have a DVR I can't see why not? you can record the show like xJohnxSmithx said. In reality it is probably illegal to download, that and any copyright stuff unless you own a copy or the rights to the item itself and even then it would depend on your local laws, things are different everywhere.

[phrenzy]

I got a DCMA violation email from my old ISP cox for downloading a TV ep in 2004... From NBC studios.... According to them is it was piracy...lol.... Though I did download it from a public tracker....

[mjmacky]

Though I enjoy the spirit of the argument, I want to ask are you guys all retarded?

Content license holders do not care about logical equivalence. They care about licensed distribution. As in, the cable company is allowed to feed you the program that you record on your DVR, the DVD purchase/rental is giving you the right to view it on your DVD player, etc. There are lots of ways that the licensing gets violated outside of blatant piracy, including "public performance rights" (e.g. a teacher putting on a movie during exam week). They have injected into legislation enough diction to assert full control over the viewing experience of a movie/tv show.

So what I'm saying, is stop pussyfooting this issue and acknowledge that you are violating the copyright holder's protections through every download. I don't try to justify it, I admit it and say to the license holders, fuck you and your unreasonably corrupt measures. I want this oppositional force to cripple these industries until they rectify their consumer abusive practices. I won't be satisfied until all the media is in web available, reasonably priced, DRM free, and with impressive download speed. After all, piracy has been able to set up multiple systems that meet those conditions, either match it or improve upon it.

So yeah, downloading TV shows are illegal, own that shit like a man or woman, not like little kids. If you are a little kid, I'm sorry, don't play this game until you grow up.

[mrnobody]

"is downloading TV content an act of piracy?"

duh..

[managedhybrid]

It is an act of piracy I say. This is my opinion only. Because at the end of the day if people watched in regular times those shows would get more money from advertisement (which they need) to survive + make money from. If someone downloads series off one DVD how will someone get paid for their part?