RE: [dvd-discuss] Movie Downloads, automatically illegal?

[Tim Neu <tim(at)tneu.visi.com>]

On Thu, 1 Aug 2002, Richard Hartman wrote:

> Well, that's different.   Your DVD, your laptop.  That's
> standard space-shifting & has been previously acknowledged
> as a fair use for other media (e.g. CD->cassette).
>
> Downloading over the internet, you're probably _not_ copying
> from your own DVD.

So if I give someone two identical DVDs (one from a friend, one that is my
own) to convert to VCD for me, and they pick the source DVD at random,
you would argue that the legality of the copy would depend on which they
picked?

What is the difference?  In either case, you're using the collection of
bits which you were authorized to use.  Why should where I get the bits
matter?

My source DVD is x, yours is y.  At the lowest level they are identical
collections of a long string of binary digits, which in either case I am
authorized to use because I purchased a copy.

Given that x=y,

Is not:

2x = 2y?
2y = 2y?
2x = 2x?

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