A relative came from oversees and gave my family fifteen bootlegged kid's movies (all from the past few years).

Just wondering, is possessing them technically illegal?

Or is the making and selling of them the part that's illegal? What about knowingly buying them or buying them oversees and returning to the US with them? (not that I did buy them, they were a gift)

I would say yes...however, most of the law regarding bootlegs seems to deal with the actual production, distribution, and sales of the boots. I have seen many arguments back and forth about this but from the texts that I have read, it seems congress was more concerned about crooks profiting from boots than about the people who own them.

that would be unfair due to the fact that people are stooped into buying bootlegs through ebay trickery.

Tough call. Slightly off topic, if you own a DVD, are you allowed to make a backup copy of it?

yes you are

Fair use says yes, however, if the DVD has CSS encryption and you break the encryption to copy it you are violating the DMCA making your backup illegal. No one has tested this in court that I am aware of and until someone does the DMCA will always trump fair use which isn't a true law just a court precedent.

this discussion reminds me of:

It breaks down like this: it's legal to buy it, it's legal to own it, and, if you're the proprietor of a hash bar, it's legal to sell it. It's legal to carry it, but that doesn't really matter 'cause - get a load of this - if you get stopped by the cops in amsterdam, it's illegal for them to search you. I mean, that's a right the cops in amsterdam don't have.

Yes, it is. People found guilty of possessing such material are shot. With rusty bullets.

I would say yes. However, the "punishment" for possession in this case would probably be simple confiscation of the bootlegs - since it would be obvious that you're not mass producing and selling them. Similar sentences are often considered for first time drug offenders caught with small quantities of controlled substances in amounts that are considered ample for "personal use" as opposed to enough for "distribution". In those cases as a first offense, the person would be released on probation. But like who's gonna catch you or turn you in to get you on probation for home kiddie DVD bootlegs?

Unless you plan to flaunt your discs in front of a Customs Officer or FBI agent, you have nothing to worry about.

As far as copyright laws, when you make a copy without the copyright owner's permission (studio, etc) or distribute a copy, you are infringing upon (violating) the respective rights of the copyright owner(s). The penalties imposed under the copyright statute are affected by knowledge of what you actually did, intent, etc. Nevertheless, once you make the copy, you have violated the law and are potentially subject to penalites. Same goes for distribution. Just the degree of the penalty can change depending on the circumstances. And as noted above, it hasn't been tested, but the fair use doctrine that US courts created in the 70s/80s, could get you off the hook for simply making a back up copy for yourself. While I'm no expert on the current status, as far as I know, simple ownership of a disc that someone gave you that is potentially infringing on copyrights is not illegal. It is subject to confiscation, but the person making the illegal copy and distributing it would technically be the one in hot water.

The DMCA may interplay with the copyright statute to make new prohibitions on ownership of infringing material, but I am not sure. . .

If you sell them you might get in trouble. Other than having posted on here about your large stash of bootlegs, who's really going to know. Uhh ohh, Police Police, this guy has 15 bootlegs!

They're more likely to go after the guy with say 1,000 copied DVDs who sells them to his buddies at work.

No you aren't.

OK, here's something I've always wondered about. Let's say you own a copy of a film on Laserdisc that is not available on DVD. You see a dvd of it on eBay and purchase it, even though you probably know it's a bootleg. Does the fact that you own a copy of a film in a legal format (and have therefore effectively licensed it for viewing in your home) allow you to own a bootleg copy in another format?

I don't know for certain, but I believe for the most part you can't get in trouble for possessing bootlegs, only for distributing or manufacturing them yourself. I don't think they'll waste their time on people purchasing bootlegs because I'd imagine it'd be rather hard to make a case against anyone. You can always plead ignorance unless they catch you knowingly purchasing them. If they just find some in your house you can say someone gave them to you and you didn't know. Why waste their time busting the people buying the bootlegs when you can go after the people making and selling them?

No. While it's legal to make a backup copy of a VHS tape, I believe that part of the DMCA (Digital Millenium Copyright Act) states that it is illegal to duplicate a DVD for any reason if you don't hold the copyright to it.

1) Court precedent is true law just as much as statutory law.

2) Fair use is covered under stautory law -- 17 U.S.C. 107

3) The DMCA provisions on circumventing copyright protection systems can be found at Title 17, Chapter 12 (17 U.S.C. 1201 et seq.). On its face, 17 U.S.C. 107 arguably only applies to actions for violation of copyright under 17 U.S.C. 106 or 106A. At the same time, 17 U.S.C. 1201(c) says the DMCA does not affect the fair use defense, so maybe fair use does apply.

Standard disclaimers apply (I'm not an IP lawyer, you should not rely on this as legal advice, consult your own lawyer with the facts of your specific situation, etc., etc.).

It's not illegal to own, but it is illegal to sell (and I'm not sure, but maybe purchasing them is as well). It's more or less the "let the addict go to get the dealer" mentality.

Well, strictly speaking, you'd be supporting illegal activity, because even though you may have purchased a copy of the movie on Laserdisc, it does not give anybody the right to make you a DVD of it. It'd probably depend on how much the phrase "receiving stolen property" can be stretched, I guess.

I have no problem with bootlegs as a concept, just the fact that people offer so many justifications and sincerely believe that what they're doing is legal. Once they understand that it is technically illegal, and how morally wrong it is depends on how unnecessary and deliberate their activities are, then I have no problem with it.

Really, it's as simple as actually reading the FBI warnings. If you're doing something that is described as beng prohibited (and note that they're now including "infringement without monetary gain" in the wording), then you are indeed breaking the law, no matter why you're doing it.

A couple of points

1) If the bootlegs were legal in the country of manufacture (due to differing laws about copyright or whatever) then personal importation is legal - mass importation with intent to resell is not legal.

2) In most cases, to copy a DVD you have to do two things - (a) circumvent the access control (DVD's use CSS) and (b) actually make the copy. Fair Use only applies to (b) and the DMCA only applies to (a). Thus the DMCA is effectively an end-run around the Fair Use defense when applied to the copying of any media with an access control system.

3) It is not "as simple as actually reading the FBI warnings" - they are put there by the studios who have every incentive to exaggerate and mislead. You wouldn't ask the salesguy at Target if you should buy an item at Wal-Mart instead, so why would you ask the studio what your legal requirements are? They are under no obligation to be honest at all.