Charlie Primero
Active Member
I think streaming licensed content is illegal unless the stream comes from a licensed provider like Netflix, Hulu, your cable provider, et al.
I know downloading movie torrents is illegal.
What is a Kodi Box?
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I think streaming licensed content is illegal unless the stream comes from a licensed provider like Netflix, Hulu, your cable provider, et al.
I know downloading movie torrents is illegal.
It's certainly gray.
Buy unless you're hosting/ storing copyrighted content, there's nothing to really prosecute against.
Problem is, the repositories also have a lot of legal content. So merely having Kodi (or a bit torrent program) isn't illegal.
It's what you do with it, and how the laws are currently written prosecute against illegal activity.
That's why you can legally buy something like a StreamSmart box, or a hacked Fire stick. So far anyway LOL
And also how companies have brought suit against people who downloaded/stored actual media, but can't really do anything about streamed content at this point.
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Good article here:
https://www.cloudwards.net/is-kodi-legal/
Quote:
In the U.S., laws are not so clear-cut as the UK.
In general, streaming licensed content breaks the law on two fronts. First, when you download some or all parts of a copyrighted content, it is illegal. Second, if you show this copyrighted content to a large gathering, outside of your close family circle, it’s illegal.
Other than these two cases, accessing copyrighted content is legal. This means, it’s perfectly legal to watch copyrighted content online, without downloading or sharing it with anyone. On the other side though, it’s illegal to upload or post licensed content anywhere.
Essentially this means, you can watch content through online websites, but can’t upload or download them. This explains why online streaming sites don’t host content on their servers, but merely act as search engines to give you content from other sites. This makes accountability tough, so it’s hard to enforce punishments.
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https://www.cloudwards.net/is-kodi-legal/
Quote:
In the U.S., laws are not so clear-cut as the UK.
In general, streaming licensed content breaks the law on two fronts. First, when you download some or all parts of a copyrighted content, it is illegal. Second, if you show this copyrighted content to a large gathering, outside of your close family circle, it’s illegal.
Other than these two cases, accessing copyrighted content is legal. This means, it’s perfectly legal to watch copyrighted content online, without downloading or sharing it with anyone. On the other side though, it’s illegal to upload or post licensed content anywhere.
Essentially this means, you can watch content through online websites, but can’t upload or download them. This explains why online streaming sites don’t host content on their servers, but merely act as search engines to give you content from other sites. This makes accountability tough, so it’s hard to enforce punishments.
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro
Executive Summary - Pirate/steal/stream/torrent all you want. It's actually good for the industry.
Long version -
In the real world, none of that matters. Content producers know that the best way to get word-of-mouth advertising for streaming content is for it to be pirated. People who see something they like will buy it. In my case, for example, I have bought redundant box sets as well as books for Game of Thrones even though I've never seen an episode in a legal manner. The folks behind that series are happy for it to be pirated because pirating creates fans who spend money. God knows, they've made a heck of a profit off me.
I've pirated movies and, if I like them, I buy the box sets. I have all of Firefly plus Serenity, for example. I don't need the physical discs; it's always streaming somewhere. But I love it so much that I bought the BluRay discs so I could see it better on my big-screen TV.
I can easily think of a dozen more DVD or BR discs that I've bought simply because I pirated the content first, liked it, and wanted to own it in a hi-rez format that I could always lay my hands on because it's on a physical disk in my house.
The examples are legion and that's generally how the industry works. Pirating is free and unbelievably effective advertising. Yes, the production companies put up "wink-wink-nod-nod" anti-piracy warnings on everything but, for the most part, they don't want anyone to pay attention to those notices.
Of course, there are always exceptions. The biggest is movies prior to official release. When someone takes a video camera into a theater and records off the screen then burns a pile of crappy DVDs or, more likely, CDVs, studios lose money. People like me, for example, have to keep track of the release dates for DVDs and BRs because we know that if someone is selling them early, it's a pirated copy. Those pirated copies are always terrible quality and that's what we're paying to own - the best possible quality. In light of the timing issues and even though it wasn't a question of pirated physical media, I frankly wasn't upset with the way the owners of The Hurt Locker went after downloaders. I found their methods questionable (and probably illegal) but I understood the motivation.
The other big exception I can cite is the adult industry. The quality production houses were nearly killed by piracy some 20 years ago because they relied on DVD sales. However, they adapted. Now, they actually sponsor piracy in the form of the various tube sites which serve as free or cheap advertising for an industry that, being much more adaptable than most, has switched to a distribution model that's almost exclusively online.
The bottom line is that people who pirate, as has been repeatedly shown, actually spend more and make more profits for content creators. We get exposed to things we like and want to own them so we pony up the bucks for the real thing. Where there are market disruptions, pirates may cause short-term losses but content creators inevitably adapt and eventually wind up making more money than ever before. Ever notice how even though movie companies have been screaming that piracy is killing their industry their profits continue to grow? It's exactly that same thing that happened to the music industry a generation prior - piracy gave them a wake-up, they adapted, they made more money, and almost everybody was happier just ignoring the technically illegal activities of most hobbyists. And that's a mirror image of what happened a couple of generations earlier when home taping and the VCR were supposedly killing music and movies. Remember Jack Valenti's ridiculously overblown and frankly offensive testimony to Congress? Yep, piracy was surely going to kill all Hollywood profits before the 1970s ended if you believed their hype. But what happened? They adapted, grew, and became much more profitable specifically because of those disruptive technologies.
Heck, I pay for CBS All Access even though I really don't need to; I just want to get my Star Trek: Discovery asap. If that doesn't prove pirates are at least as willing to pay as "law abiding" users, I don't know what does.
Our willingness to pay is profit for the creators and they really don't want the ecosystem to change, even if the law says something quite different from what happens in the real world. The few outlying cases where the economics are pretty different and piracy really hurts the creation industry are just that: rare outliers.
The Grateful Dead model of supporting tapers (the pirates of their day) because they are the most rabid, most evangelical, and therefore most profitable fans has gone mainstream. It's only taken ~50 years but I'm glad to see it's here.
Long version -
There's more than a little controversy on that. It's a legal grey area. In fact, there have been cases (not concerning merely copywritten material but concerning obscenity) where judges have ruled that viewing online and possession are not the same thing and that actual possession is the thing that's illegal. NOTE: IANAL, standard disclaimers apply, and jurisdictions differ.
In the real world, none of that matters. Content producers know that the best way to get word-of-mouth advertising for streaming content is for it to be pirated. People who see something they like will buy it. In my case, for example, I have bought redundant box sets as well as books for Game of Thrones even though I've never seen an episode in a legal manner. The folks behind that series are happy for it to be pirated because pirating creates fans who spend money. God knows, they've made a heck of a profit off me.
I've pirated movies and, if I like them, I buy the box sets. I have all of Firefly plus Serenity, for example. I don't need the physical discs; it's always streaming somewhere. But I love it so much that I bought the BluRay discs so I could see it better on my big-screen TV.
I can easily think of a dozen more DVD or BR discs that I've bought simply because I pirated the content first, liked it, and wanted to own it in a hi-rez format that I could always lay my hands on because it's on a physical disk in my house.
The examples are legion and that's generally how the industry works. Pirating is free and unbelievably effective advertising. Yes, the production companies put up "wink-wink-nod-nod" anti-piracy warnings on everything but, for the most part, they don't want anyone to pay attention to those notices.
Of course, there are always exceptions. The biggest is movies prior to official release. When someone takes a video camera into a theater and records off the screen then burns a pile of crappy DVDs or, more likely, CDVs, studios lose money. People like me, for example, have to keep track of the release dates for DVDs and BRs because we know that if someone is selling them early, it's a pirated copy. Those pirated copies are always terrible quality and that's what we're paying to own - the best possible quality. In light of the timing issues and even though it wasn't a question of pirated physical media, I frankly wasn't upset with the way the owners of The Hurt Locker went after downloaders. I found their methods questionable (and probably illegal) but I understood the motivation.
The other big exception I can cite is the adult industry. The quality production houses were nearly killed by piracy some 20 years ago because they relied on DVD sales. However, they adapted. Now, they actually sponsor piracy in the form of the various tube sites which serve as free or cheap advertising for an industry that, being much more adaptable than most, has switched to a distribution model that's almost exclusively online.
The bottom line is that people who pirate, as has been repeatedly shown, actually spend more and make more profits for content creators. We get exposed to things we like and want to own them so we pony up the bucks for the real thing. Where there are market disruptions, pirates may cause short-term losses but content creators inevitably adapt and eventually wind up making more money than ever before. Ever notice how even though movie companies have been screaming that piracy is killing their industry their profits continue to grow? It's exactly that same thing that happened to the music industry a generation prior - piracy gave them a wake-up, they adapted, they made more money, and almost everybody was happier just ignoring the technically illegal activities of most hobbyists. And that's a mirror image of what happened a couple of generations earlier when home taping and the VCR were supposedly killing music and movies. Remember Jack Valenti's ridiculously overblown and frankly offensive testimony to Congress? Yep, piracy was surely going to kill all Hollywood profits before the 1970s ended if you believed their hype. But what happened? They adapted, grew, and became much more profitable specifically because of those disruptive technologies.
Heck, I pay for CBS All Access even though I really don't need to; I just want to get my Star Trek: Discovery asap. If that doesn't prove pirates are at least as willing to pay as "law abiding" users, I don't know what does.
Our willingness to pay is profit for the creators and they really don't want the ecosystem to change, even if the law says something quite different from what happens in the real world. The few outlying cases where the economics are pretty different and piracy really hurts the creation industry are just that: rare outliers.
The Grateful Dead model of supporting tapers (the pirates of their day) because they are the most rabid, most evangelical, and therefore most profitable fans has gone mainstream. It's only taken ~50 years but I'm glad to see it's here.
In other words, "it's complicated" LOL
Like Ben, I'll pay to watch a quality picture and Dolby Digital sound.
I don't want to see a "dude with a handycam" recorded movie.
I will say that live PPV is where pirate boxes really do hurt content producers.
on the flip side, I wouldn't pay to watch Mayweather and MacGregor fight, but I'd watch it for free LOL
Like Ben, I'll pay to watch a quality picture and Dolby Digital sound.
I don't want to see a "dude with a handycam" recorded movie.
I will say that live PPV is where pirate boxes really do hurt content producers.
on the flip side, I wouldn't pay to watch Mayweather and MacGregor fight, but I'd watch it for free LOL
Every time I watch something on Netflix, it says something like "downloading" prior to starting.
Is that something different?
Just found this, probably old news for some ...
http://koditips.com/kodi-usa-live-tv-spotlight-ustvnow/
http://koditips.com/kodi-usa-live-tv-spotlight-ustvnow/
That is just your Netflix device preloading a portion of whatever you’re watching.
There's another big use of Kodi - location or media shifting of purchased, licensed content. Certain studios have claimed to be "against" it, because someone "could" be pirating content, while others fully support it by providing a "digital copy download" right in the package. Regardless, the courts have sided with consumers in several challenges when it started becoming "a thing."
james.long48
Active Member
- Apr 5, 2015
- 392
- 11
Or you could just stream content and not buy it... And say screw the liberals in Hollywood. I would say most that stream do not buy as much as they would have.
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Most everyone I know uses Kodi. I use it for things I can' find on netflix, hulu and prime. It can be a hassle trying to find working links at times. I primarily use exodus or primewire for streaming. Now if I could just find a good live sports host I'd be all set. As far as stealing from the industry. I completely support it. **** em.
Try doing a YouTube search for installing maverick tv. It installs lots of sports and live tv repositories.
james.long48
Active Member
- Apr 5, 2015
- 392
- 11
We use DirectTV now for streaming sports and news. Not free but the cost is around 30 bucks a month. Allot cheaper than the 150+ cable bill we had in the past. They even had deal where they handed out Fire sticks in the beginning.
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It's a freaking side hustle around here. Neighbor bought a tv box with kodi installed. Uses the Wi-Fi off his phone to run it. He paid $70 for it. (Same thing can be had online for about $30). So instead of someone selling the bootleg movies with Russian subtitles. Now they sell the tv boxes with Kodi. Jailbreak and all.
Lolololol, I'm really behind the times. Everybody is using the tv boxes while I'm puttering around with a Roku.
