Pay it forward - Donate Your Old Gear to a Newbie (no requests pls) (Page 12)

There have been several threads asking for copies of this, including someone offering to stream it on the web if a copy was provided to them.  I'm pretty sure if there was no issue with streaming it online, then giving away the few ratty copies I made while de-bugging my new DVD Burner would have been acceptable.  However because I love this site and would never do anything to hurt BT, Ron, or Marma I will NOT send any copies of this out until Marma clarifies.

If you have any left I would love to have one. PM sent withe adress...just in case.

 Not at all!

Sorry, but I can't give this an official or unofficial OK. I'm not a lawyer, nor have we consulted one on this issue. I am researching it though, in terms of what BT's potential liability could be. I do know that these broadcasts do become commercially available on DVD which makes it seem less likely that distributing them would be ok.

Ultimately, if you want permission to distribute copies of a broadcast owned by NBC, then NBC would be the people to ask. 

 But...I bet you slept at a Holiday Inn Express... 

In some of my business classes we were told that it was only illegal if you were distributing them for monetary gain.  Since that is not the intent here, in this thread, I believe we would be OK.  I know that, in a classroom, if we watch a movie there has to be lesson to follow it for it to be free from copyright laws.  It doesn't specify what type of lesson though which leads to lots of loopholes!!! Some teachers use movies when they don't feel well and the lessons are more along the lines of "Write a one paragraph summary of the movie ."  "(

As long as we aren't taking money for it I think we would be clear.  I have a friend here that does some of that work so I could ask him, if it's alright with Marma.

Then does that mean that if I buy a DVD movie and then invite friends over to watch it I am violating the copyright of the DVD?

After all I would be "sharing" my purchased copy of this movie with someone that did not pay to watch it.

I work as a college prof and for a publishing company and don't think this is correct -- there are only certain circumstances that count as "fair use" in the classroom, and if you illegally copy it in the first place, it's not fair use (copyright.gov has the laws).  This is a complex topic that is probably best discussed with lawyers and in another thread. 

How about we chalk this one up to experience and get back to our regularly scheduled program of giving away cool stuff? 

PM sent for VHS tape.

That's a good idea. 

And not to belabor it, but there's a lot of "advice" and opinions floating around here.  Doesn't matter what your business professor said, but you are in violation of federal copyright laws if you make a copy of a copyrighted broadcast and give it away.  Yes, people do it all the time.  Yes, people rarely get caught (see Napster).  Doesn't mean it's legal.  This is not legal advice - nor is any attorney-client relationship established with anyone, this is just offered for educational purposes.