I am a new comer to your forum. However, I have been very successful with making avis and Mpegs. In fact is it so interesting it is almost addictive. The question I have is what is the moral and or legal implication of ripping DVDs and making personal (not for resale or profit) copies.

Every time I open a DVD for ripping I see that "FBI" banner etc.

I would be interested in anybody's legal opinion and or personal views.

I am not a moralist, but we each have the burden of responsibity of our actions and we ought to, at least, understand and accept what we do individually!

ask yourself! if you can make a dvd copy from say a rental that cost you 3.00 and a blank dvdr thats say 2.00. then why pay up to 20.00 in the shop.
if an original dvd were to cost 5.00 to 8.00 in the shop. i wouldnt be worth buying a dvd writer!

Without a doubt there is nothing obvoius to say that some great financail advantage exists in copying DVDs. In fact we all know indulgance in our pleasures always has a price. I also share ytour view on this topic.

What interests me is the legalities. Is it legal to copy in Canada???

Any thoughts???

it is not legal to copy anything with a copyright on it (for gain)
it is however (as far as i am aware) legal to make a backup of something that you already own and use the backup for personal use so that you do not damage the original that you have for the privelage of watching /litening to

If you are ripping dvd's to re-sell then Yes there is a moral decision to be made and it can only be made by oneself and possibly suffer the consequences . But if for personal use only then no harm done

Though I wrote a guide on how to do it, I very rarely make copies of anything. I made some backups for varoius reasons, but I owned damn near everything I did. I have a collection of roughly 500 dvd originals and maybe 10-20 copies (and thats probably high). I basically believe in paying for work that deserves money. On occasion I copy stuff I get from Netflix for no other reason then I can. :-)

It's funny how most people (myself included) don't give a second thought to copying a vhs tape but worry about the consequences of ripping dvd's. I guess the additional effort involved in ripping a dvd makes it seem more wrong. I only think it's wrong if your doing it for profit. Movies I really like I buy, and movies I like but wouldn't buy I make copies of. I feel (for me) creating a working copy is the satisfying part, having the movie is a bonus.

Originally posted by shingunn
creating a working copy is the satisfying part, having the movie is a bonus. nicely put shingunn, i agree completely :tup: