Legal Free Movie Downloads
In 1999 an event happened that would transform the entertainment world forever. That event was the start of the free media download company called Napster. Napster dramatically changed the file sharing industry and were instrumental for the astounding popularity increase of peer to peer services. The sharing of music files soon caught on in the movie industry. Soon after Napster's appearance movie lovers began using movie sharing services to download free movies. Although the music and movie industry has tried to fight this juggernaut, they have failed and today the technological pace has become an unstoppable force. You can now get free movie downloads for almost every new entertainment gadget that comes on the market. You can now get free movie downloads for Zune, Video iPods, PSP and Video MP3 players as well as your PC and other gadgets. It happens so fast that not long after the release of the iPhone, people were downloading loads of free iPhone movies to it.
While there are many people downloading free movies today, there are many others who are worried about the legalities of it.
If you are among those who would like to get free movie downloads but are unsure if it is legal or not, then this article should answer your questions. I'm sure you are aware that there has been a number of lawsuits targeting file sharing software. But lawsuit after lawsuit has shown that the file sharing software itself isn’t illegal at all. As a matter of fact, the Spanish court has stated that downloading media from the Internet is legal as long as it's for "personal" use. Let's look at the whole picture, okay? Here are some more landmark cases:
USA Federal Court Rules File Swapping Tools Legal
Decentralized File-sharing Tools Ruled Legal
Streamcast and Grokster have won a major court decision in Los Angeles, shifting the tides of the on-line P2P legal war. Federal court Judge Stephen Wilson has dismissed much of the studios' claims in their lawsuits against them, stating that Morpheus and Grokster were not liable for copyright infringements that took place using their software.
The ruling stated loud and clear that innovating decentralized peer-to-peer Gnutella-like software is perfectly legal, and shouldn't be deemed illegal in the courts. The courts compared the technology with the innovation of the original Sony videocasette recorder (VCR).
Fred von Lohmann of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) stated the case is far from over, but that the case sends a "strong message to the technology community that the court understands the risk to innovation" the case could represent
The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) and Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) offered no comment, but are of course issuing an appeal to the ruling already. Published By Mike Darrah - April 25, 2003
European Court Decision
The Supreme Court of the Netherlands has thrown out an appeal by music industry lobbyists who wanted the popular Kazaa file-sharing software to be ruled illegal.
The victory for Kazaa, which follows similar US rulings in favour of peer-to-peer (P2P) software firms Grokster and Morpheus, is a huge blow to the music industry. It has fought a long battle to close down file-sharing networks and criminalise the software that makes file swapping illegal.
The Dutch decision means that the developers of the software cannot be held responsible for how individuals use it.
Canadian Court Decision
Canada's Federal Court has ruled against a motion which would have allowed the music industry to begin suing individuals who make music available on-line. He said that downloading a song or making files available in shared directories does not constitute copyright infringement under the current Canadian law.
"Justice Konrad von Finckenstein ruled Wednesday that the Canadian Recording Industry Association did not prove there was copyright infringement by 29 so-called music uploaders. Without the names, CRIA can't begin filing lawsuits against the alleged high-volume music traders, identified only as John and Jane Does. It also reaffirms what the Copyright Board of Canada has already ruled -- downloading music in this country is not illegal. Von Finckenstein said that downloading a song or making files available in shared directories, like those on Kazaa, does not constitute copyright infringement under the current Canadian law. "No evidence was presented that the alleged infringers either distributed or authorized the reproduction of sound recordings," he wrote in his 28-page ruling. "They merely placed personal copies into their shared directories which were accessible by other computer users via a P2P service."
With all of the usual cavets about appeals, this decision makes it practically impossible to prosecute file sharers in Canada. von Finkenstein has gone well beyond the idea that downloading is legal in Canada. By expressly mentioning "merely placing personal copies into their shared directories" does not constitute distribution he has blown a huge hole in the arguments which swirled around the whole question of the legality of uploading in Canada.
Most free movie downloads services are using a free movie download method called decentralized peer to peer file sharing. This means that the software the free movie download services are using is absolutely legal.
What's more, this also implies that if the free movie downloads service decides to distribute it there won't be any illegal ramifications from it. With that said, why are some people still running into needless legal trouble for file sharing? I'll explain why and how to fix it so your free movie downloads will be totally legal.
The folks that are running a foul of the law are joining a network of thousands of users who are indiscriminately sharing millions of different free movie files along with other types of media files such as games and music. That my friends is the illegal way to download your free movies. Why is it illegal? Because, you are allowing thousands of people free access to all the copyrighted media or material located in your "shared folder" which is distributed from your IP address. Here is an unbelievably easy way to fix this and make getting all of your free movie downloads completely legal! To make downloading free movie downloads or any other type of free media downloads, all you need do is disable your file sharing.
If the program you are using doesn't allow that, then all you need do is go into Windows Explorer and move the free movies you downloaded from the shared file folder into a directory folder that isn't shared. That way others won't be able to download free movies from your IP address, which makes your free movies legal. Just make sure you do this every time you finish downloading all of your free movies for the day. Talk about being both easy and simple!
Personally, I favor unlimited free movie downloads membership sites that don't require you to share your free movie downloads at all. Plus, for just a one time small fee of about $35-$50 you get a lifetime of free movies to download along with free games, free music, free music videos, free wallpaper, free software, free ringtones, free TV shows and a lot more. You can find unlimited free movie downloads membership sites for your PC, Mac and DVD player, your iPhone, your Zune Player, your Video iPod and Video MP3 players. I would suggest visiting an unlimited free movie downloads membership review site and read their reviews to find the best free movie membership site online.
Please put into practice what I have told you, that way you can be assured that all of your free movie downloads are legal. So go ahead and download all of the legal free movies you want and watch them without any worries.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Neil Gerstein is an expert author who writes about multiple topics. You can read some of his articles here:
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