Man charged for giving away his "screener" copy of "Million Dollar Baby,"

[ecstatic]

U.S. Attorney also charged Ronald Redding, 37, of Linthicum Heights, Maryland, with misdemeanor copyright infringement for giving away his "screener" copy of "Million Dollar Baby," which was sent to him for Academy Awards voting. He agreed to plead guilty, the U.S. Attorney said.

http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20050928/en_nm/media_starwars_dc_1

Does this bother anyone else? Doesn't that prosecutor have WAY too much time on his hands?

[davidinalameda]

1. he GAVE it away?

he didn't make any money on the transaction

why is this illegal?

[GreenPartyVoter]

2. Technically we are not supposed to get rid of the ARCs we

receive as book reviewers either, but we do.

[davidinalameda]

3. no duh

I wouldn't have a good chunk of my library if it weren't for ARCs

[GreenPartyVoter]

5. I won't sell them though. I draw the line there. I also keep the ones

that are autographed to me because that's just cool.

[charlie]

4. Recipients

sign a consent not to give away their copies.

[Somawas]

6. Waaay too much time on his hands.

That's the kind of thing you get agitated with when all the murderers, robbers, rapists, etc. are in jail.

[stopbush]

7. Copyright infringement is a big deal and a hot issue right now.

The music industry is getting killed with this and the film industry is acting pre-emptively to avoid it happening to them. Good luck.

In my past career, I received tons of promotional copies of CDs and videos. They make up most of my collection. I never received a vid from the Academy because I don't vote on the Awards. That said, I was always very careful about giving away promo discs. Maybe too careful...when I moved from NJ, I tossed tons of them in the trash. I suppose I could have given them away, but I played it safe.

BTW - most promo discs clearly state that they're not for sale. Most vids have a disclaimer stating they're the property of the studio and that the studio can ask you to return them at any time. I asked a studio pal about this once and he laughed...said to trash them. He said the last thing a studio wanted was thousands of promo vids coming back to their offices.