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Piracy Movies Music Software

Belarus Legalizes Piracy of Movies, Music and Software of 'Unfriendly' Nations (torrentfreak.com) 198

Posted by msmash from the how-about-that dept.
AmiMoJo writes: Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko has signed a new law that legalizes piracy of movies, music, TV shows and software owned by rightsholders from 'unfriendly countries'. The law also allows goods protected by intellectual property law to be imported from any country without obtaining permission from rightsholders.

Lukashenko's support for Russia's invasion of Ukraine led to new sanctions being imposed by the EU, U.S. and other countries. In common with Russia, Belarus relies on intellectual property owned by foreign rightsholders that are currently unable or unwilling to supply and/or license it. So, to ensure legal access to pirated movies, music, TV shows and software, the government drafted a new law to restrict intellectual property rights.
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Belarus Legalizes Piracy of Movies, Music and Software of 'Unfriendly' Nations More

Belarus Legalizes Piracy of Movies, Music and Software of 'Unfriendly' Nations

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  • Oh no! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Iamthecheese ( 1264298 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @12:09PM (#63192100)
    PLEASE don't do this, how will the Hollywood execs get a second yacht now? Who is going to pay the grandchildren of authors? Where will the money come from to fund the next big Microsoft acquisition? Do what you like but please don't stop enforcing IP laws.

    • Re:Oh no! (Score:4, Insightful)

      by fermion ( 181285 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @12:32PM (#63192208) Homepage Journal
      The Sonny Bono/Mickey Mouse protection act made copyright in the US untenable. That other countries are going to retaliate is predictable.
      • True, but look how effective the law has been in encouraging Zombie Walt of Waltsdeadnow Productions to keep producing fine new content. I hear Steamboat Willie II: Willie's Revenge, is due out any day now. So not mere corporate rent seeking at all.
    • Well, this is the last straw. I was on the fence about Belarus' participation in a war of aggression against Ukraine, targeting civilians & civilian infrastructure, crimes against humanity, etc., but this? Not enforcing US IP laws on their corporations' behalves? That's just going too far. They have to be stopped before it's too late!

    • Simple - the RIAA will hire hitmen to stop it.

  • What was their country code again ? (Score:3)

    by poptopdrop ( 6713596 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @12:11PM (#63192112)

    Asking for a friend.

  • Hope They Are Annexed by Ukraine (Score:5, Insightful)

    by BrendaEM ( 871664 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @12:22PM (#63192164) Homepage
    That would be some nice Karma, not so much for the piracy, but for helping launch the war against the Ukraine.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by quonset ( 4839537 )

      That would be some nice Karma, not so much for the piracy, but for helping launch the war against the Ukraine.

      It's not 'the Ukraine', it's simply Ukraine. Saying it the other way would be like saying the Germany or the France.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by chefren ( 17219 )
        "The Ukraine" is the name of a region. It's what Russians say if they want to imply that Ukraine is not a real country, just a region of Russia.

      • To be fair, it *was* "the Ukraine" when Ukraine was a territory within the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. When they gained their independence, it just became "Ukraine".

        There's old cold-warriors that are still stuck in that 1980s rut though.

        • No it wasn't. That was just an English mis-translation. It was always just Ukraine because Slavic languages don't have articles. But since Ukraine means "borderlands" some English speakers incorrectly put "the" in front of it.

        • No. There may be a few wannabe cold-warriors out there. But for the vast majority of people; it just means that they are old enough that their geography classes called it The Ukraine, just like Yakko Warner's Nations of the World still mentions Czechoslovakia as being a thing. In no way does a reflexive and accidental use of an obsolete name mean that someone is a "cold-warrior" who wants a return to that shit. It just means that every 2-3 years during K-12 it was drilled into our heads and we were test

      • Tell that to Californians who always add "the" in front of highway numbers...

  • There doesn't seem to be any mechanism for compensating authors of Free software for misuse of their works. The government will undoubtedly set the price of such software to 0, since that is the monetary cost outside of Belarus, and the only compensation seems to be reimbursement based on the amount users paid in to the government when they used the work.

    • There doesn't seem to be any mechanism for compensating authors of Free software for misuse of their works.

      Funny, I don't hear people complaining authors of non-free software not being compensated for misuse of their works. In fact, what we do hear is, "Steal it all! Fuck 'em! They don't need money!"

      So which is it? Compensation for all, or compensation for none?

      • There doesn't seem to be any mechanism for compensating authors of Free software for misuse of their works.

        Funny, I don't hear people complaining authors of non-free software not being compensated for misuse of their works. In fact, what we do hear is, "Steal it all! Fuck 'em! They don't need money!"

        So which is it? Compensation for all, or compensation for none?

        Non-Free software is sypically sold for money, with DRM to prevent non-payers from using it. Assuming the Belarus government sets a reasonable price for each piece of software, and users who break the DRM pay that price to the government, the rights holders can apply to the government for a part of that payment. That may sound far-fetched, but at least there is a possibility of reimbursement.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Bert64 ( 520050 )

      The text from the article says:

      If these are from foreign countries “committing unfriendly actions” against Belarus, “which forbade or did not give consent” for lawfully published items of intellectual property to be used in Belarus, their exclusive rights relating to specified product classes will be limited.

      The common Free Software licenses give consent to everyone, and do not have provisions to forbid consent to specific individuals. This ruling does not apply to free software under the most common license terms.

      • The text from the article says:

        If these are from foreign countries “committing unfriendly actions” against Belarus, “which forbade or did not give consent” for lawfully published items of intellectual property to be used in Belarus, their exclusive rights relating to specified product classes will be limited.

        The common Free Software licenses give consent to everyone, and do not have provisions to forbid consent to specific individuals. This ruling does not apply to free software under the most common license terms.

        You may be right, but consider this possibility: I write and publish some software and license it under the GPL. A company in Belarus includes that sofware in their proprietary product in a way that violates the license. I do not give them permission to do that. Doesn't this law permit them to ignore my license and misuse my software, with no compensation to me?

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by tragedy ( 27079 )

          If the disregarding of copyright laws is reciprocal, then it doesn't seem like there's much of an issue. If they make changes to the software and publish them, you can use their changes. True, they might not release their changes when they're legally required to, but that's hardly something new. Even if it's not reciprocal, there's the question of what a court in any jurisdiction other than Belarus is going to say if you incorporate their changes to the software into the original. I get the feeling most of

          • If the disregarding of copyright laws is reciprocal, then it doesn't seem like there's much of an issue. If they make changes to the software and publish them, you can use their changes. True, they might not release their changes when they're legally required to, but that's hardly something new. Even if it's not reciprocal, there's the question of what a court in any jurisdiction other than Belarus is going to say if you incorporate their changes to the software into the original. I get the feeling most of them will uphold the license terms regardless. If not, it still doesn't seem like it would be a very big deal to most free software authors. As for the distribution of the proprietary product incorporating your code, it would only be inside Belarus. Outside Belarus, the courts would still uphold your copyright and license terms. Let's also consider that this is Belarus we're talking about. They're really just formalizing what the population has mostly been doing for years there anyway.

            I wasn't assuming that the disregarding of copyright laws is reciprocal. I don't see anything in the article that says countries unfriendly to Belarus can ignore their copyrights.

            I agree that courts outside of Belarus would uphold the license terms, but those courts do not have jurisdiction inside Belarus and so would only be able to prohibit the export of infringing software. I expect they would do the same for a Belaus movie that included large parts of a Hollywood movie without permission.

            Does Belarus

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by tragedy ( 27079 )

              Does Belarus routinely ignore the license terms of Free software? I have not seen any evidence of that.

              Yes and no. Most people who use it ignore the license terms of free software. They're usually not even aware that it's free and what that actually means. Most people just use it and don't care. Of course, with free software, that doesn't matter, they're free to use it, copy it, etc. Most people in Belarus ignore copyrights in general. It's very poor and basically a giant suburb of Russia.

              • Does Belarus routinely ignore the license terms of Free software? I have not seen any evidence of that.

                Yes and no. Most people who use it ignore the license terms of free software. They're usually not even aware that it's free and what that actually means. Most people just use it and don't care. Of course, with free software, that doesn't matter, they're free to use it, copy it, etc. Most people in Belarus ignore copyrights in general. It's very poor and basically a giant suburb of Russia.

                As you point out, using and copying Free software does not violate the license. The license only gets restrictive when you try to make Free software non-Free. Do developers of commercial software in Belarus routinely do that?

                • Re: (Score:2)

                  by tragedy ( 27079 )

                  As you point out, using and copying Free software does not violate the license. The license only gets restrictive when you try to make Free software non-Free. Do developers of commercial software in Belarus routinely do that?

                  Well, developers all over the place, not just Belarus, do that quite routinely not even meeting the quite simple compliance requirements of the code. Most free software authors don't bother calling them on it though. Sometimes it happens. Generally, for free software, this is unlikely to create any significant change in the way free software is used in Belarus. People who respect the GPL and the concept of free software will share their changes and people who don't will not, which is probably exactly what t

                  • As you point out, using and copying Free software does not violate the license. The license only gets restrictive when you try to make Free software non-Free. Do developers of commercial software in Belarus routinely do that?

                    Well, developers all over the place, not just Belarus, do that quite routinely not even meeting the quite simple compliance requirements of the code. Most free software authors don't bother calling them on it though. Sometimes it happens. Generally, for free software, this is unlikely to create any significant change in the way free software is used in Belarus. People who respect the GPL and the concept of free software will share their changes and people who don't will not, which is probably exactly what they would do if Belarus wasn't officially disregarding copyright. The number of people who are going to say: "normally, I would share my changes as the GPL requires, but because my country is saying I can ignore copyrights, I'll just go ahead and not do that" is vanishingly small.

                    I hope you are right.

  • This changes... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by fbobraga ( 1612783 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @12:40PM (#63192242) Homepage
    ...nothing

  • Hah! (Score:5, Funny)

    by Lohrno ( 670867 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @12:42PM (#63192248)

    I will get my revenge by pirating all the uhh...cool...uhhh...Belarusian stuff...
    hm...

  • Now Lukashenko is gone... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Lavandera ( 7308312 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @12:51PM (#63192288)

    He may play with UE, NATO or White House....

    But Disney and Sony is another level - Lukashenko will be destroyed...

  • Getting ready before the sanctions (Score:3, Insightful)

    by digiital ( 943811 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @01:21PM (#63192394)
    They are getting ahead of the upcoming sanctions . Once they place troops into Ukraine . The world will be coming down Belarus neck like they did with Russia.

    • Belarus isn't putting troops into Ukraine, because Belarusians have already made it clear Lukashenko won't survive that scenario. Self-preservation is Lukashenko's one non-negotiable rule, and Putin would much rather have him there not helping than have another hostile neighbor.

      • Belarus isn't putting troops into Ukraine, because Belarusians have already made it clear Lukashenko won't survive that scenario. Self-preservation is Lukashenko's one non-negotiable rule, and Putin would much rather have him there not helping than have another hostile neighbor.

        Personally I think the whole situation is rather hilarious. Belarus is giving its equipment to Ruzzia while Russia is sending its troops and equipment to Belarus.

        Expect any day now for Putler to announce the discovery of a Nazi infestation within Belarus and the yearning of its people for "liberation".

    • Re:Getting ready before the sanctions (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @05:06PM (#63193424)

      Belarus attacking Ukraine? Veeeeery unlikely scenario. For more than one reason.

      First, he won't survive that at home. Lukashenko is already among his people as popular as foot fungus. He's propping himself on the army which, if used abroad, isn't available anymore to prop him up.

      And second, he sees how the war is running. You don't exactly join someone on his way into the abyss.

      • First, he won't survive that at home. Lukashenko is already among his people as popular as foot fungus.

        He hasn't been popular for decades. Didn't change shit. Even the protests a couple of years ago have been successfully suppressed - with Russian help, BTW.

        He's propping himself on the army which, if used abroad, isn't available anymore to prop him up.

        With riot police actually. The army is busy training russian conscripts.

        And second, he sees how the war is running. You don't exactly join someone on his way

  • This may backfire... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by wgoodman ( 1109297 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @01:24PM (#63192406)

    I get that they're trying to force concessions from "unfriendly" nations through MPAA bribes in those countries, but by making it easier for their population to pirate movies from a culture they dislike, their populace will be further indoctrinated into said culture.

  • IP like armored drones and other weapons technologies are all fine, I guess

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by tsqr ( 808554 )

      IP like armored drones and other weapons technologies are all fine, I guess

      Pirating movies and music is easy because they are publicly distributed. Last time I checked, this wasn't the case for Predator drone design documentation, which in any case is likely to be classified and thus non-copyrightable. As far as any unclassified information is concerned, US Export controls on weapons technologies are extremely restrictive and penalties for violations are draconian. The average citizen of Belarus is unlikely to get their hands on such material, and agents of the Belarus government

  • This is a non-issue. (Score:3)

    by SysEngineer ( 4726931 ) on Monday January 09, 2023 @02:13PM (#63192642)
    Belarus population is small and they did not enforce copyright before, so this is just a PR stunt.

  • 20 Years Should Be Acceptable (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 09, 2023 @03:01PM (#63192920)

    I have an admittedly emotional reason why I believe that a 20 year duration for copyright, as laid out in the Constitution, is reasonable. I might be in favor of 30, and I might be in favor of allowing extension purchases at exponentially increasing prices. But here's my reason for at least 20: Douglas Adams. This admittedly may be an "appeal to emotion" or some other logical fallacy. I don't care.

    When Douglas passed away, he left behind his wife and a 6 year old daughter. His wife then developed cancer and suffered from it for several years before dying when their daughter was 17.

    I literally owe Douglas Adams my life. The proceeds from his writings made sure that that little girl was well provided for, even with him gone, even through her mother's medical hardship and passing. I can't argue against that, not even a little.

    • I'd go with 30. It covers most of the working life of an author. It'll endure the author is likely to benefit if sales of older works spike due to a later interest in them. Given that we lose our right to copy a work, 30 years would make it far more likely we'd see that right returned within our lifetimes. This is important as copyright is neither natural nor a human right, and it takes from the majority for the few.

      Copyright is not a retirement plan. Authors need adequate time to profit in order to invest

      • I'd go with 30. It covers most of the working life of an author.

        The Founding Fathers of the United States agreed with you. The first US copyright law was for a duration of 14 years with an optional, free (but paperwork mandated) extension of 14 years, for a total term of 28 years as long as the copyright owner was paying attention the year of the first expiration. Twenty eight years was reasonable. Time enough to profit, even in the era of the fastest interstate communication being Pony Express, and the fastest cargo transport being stage coach, yet short enough that

    • I have an admittedly emotional reason why I believe that a 20 year duration for copyright, as laid out in the Constitution, is reasonable.

      FWIW there is nothing in the constitution about copyright terms only enabling grant of authority. First copyright act in late 1700s carried a 14 year term that was later doubled to 28 years in the 1830s.

    • and I might be in favor of allowing extension purchases at exponentially increasing prices

      That is one way of ensuring copyright is only available to the rich. It's an incredibly bad idea.

      The proceeds from his writings made sure that that little girl was well provided for, even with him gone, even through her mother's medical hardship and passing. I can't argue against that, not even a little.

      I can argue against it. You found an edge case that saved one person while not addressing the underlying situation that needed to be overcome. Why should the daughter of an author be cared for while the daughter of a firefight or a truck driver not? If you want to campaign for social security to protect and provide for people who lose their parents, let's do that. I'm right there with you. But using one edge cas

  • Belarus is issuing digital letters of marque.

  • If the US blocks access to needed patents, it sure makes sense to ignore the patents of US companies, I'm pretty sure the US would do exactly the same.

  • napster.by is not working, there must be a URL...

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