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Originally Posted by Dilscoop
Navo, are you willing lawyer up for this? How much do you want for a 4 page + bib. paper?
I really can't sit through and write this thing. This is one of the last and least important thing left in this sem. I finished all the important stuffs, including a 14 page term paper earlier last week. And this class is so stupid that even though I have like over 150 extra credit and pretty much nailed this class w/o doing much, if I don't turn this stupid thing in I won't pass. That makes zero sense!
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Haha, if you were serious Dilscoop, you could have messaged me. Going into personal 'moral and ethical relativism' regarding piracy, as Sohel bhai would term it, is not desirable but in the macro-scale, as countries have varying laws and codes regarding piracy, whether it is 'lawful' or 'not lawful' becomes different from whether it is 'right' or 'wrong'.
For instance, Bangladesh has certain stringent TRIPS [trade-related aspects of intellectual property rights] obligations to meet but as it is a developing country, the time period in which it has to satisfy such obligations is longer. As I mentioned in an earlier thread on a similar topic, Bangladesh only has to implement TRIPs related to pharmaceuticals after 2016 - so till then, effectively, pharmaceutical patents will not be upheld as strictly. By analogy, users in another country which is not a signatory to international conventions on IP/copyright piracy or doesn't have a stringent laws on movie piracy, would be able, to a large extent, get away with their activities. It may be ethically wrong but it won't be unlawful.
Besides this, you could/could have talk/ed about how difficult, expensive and laborious the process of enforcing such a ban is., as totally distinct from whether it is desirable or not. Imagine the kind of expense the US had to go through to take down the international operations of Mega Video?
This could lead to another issue - a hierarchy of IP laws, regulations etc. Those who can enforce the copyright, patents, etc. of their products (in this case movies) actually have IP rights in substantive terms. Other countries may, no matter how rigorous their respect for IP, find themselves without such protection due to a lack of resources, etc. Ultimately, it'll be American and British movies and TV shows that benefit from IP protection, get proper royalties etc while other country's films, tv shows, songs etc can get pirated unhindered as they can't enforce their rights internationally in the same way. Is such a gap desirable and does it support the ethical impulse that drives us to say that pirate movie sites should be banned?