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"The sole act of ripping a DVD is only illegal because the studios want it to be. The sole act of breaking the copy protection is illegal only because the studios want it to be. There is no basis in historical copyright law to support the philosophy that those two things should be against the law.

The presumption behind those laws is that ripping and breaking copy protection are in preparation for illegal copying, duplication and piracy. But what if they aren't? What if I'm making a backup copy or ripping it to my laptop so I don't have to carry the discs with me, or trying to edit out all the unskippable commercials at the beginning of the disc? Every one of those activities are perfectly legal with any other medium."

Chris, I know where you're going with this, but the bottom line is regardless of all of it, the law says you can't do it legally.

Much of what you said could easily be applied to other issues, with equal furvor.

"IMO, any activity that does not deprive the copyright holder of sales they would have and should have realized should be entirely legal and beyond the control of the copyright holder. If I copy the work and sell, rent or give it away, sue me. If I show, read or perform the work publicly without permission, sue me. But if I want to edit, alter, rewrite, rearrange, shred, fold, spindle or mutilate my personal copy of a work, or pay someone else to do any of those things for me, I should be completely free to do so."

Actually, that statement alone says you agree with the decision, because, as I've said repeatedly, that is exactly what the crux of the case being discussed, and this thread are about.

Take a look at Cleanflicks.com. They are doing EXACTLY what you just described.

I dare say they shouldn't just be sued, but at the level they are operating, I think Jail time for them, above and beyond the 250,000.00 per violation (and it appears they'd be paying into the next millenium)

Chris, I know where you're going with this, but the bottom line is regardless of all of it, the law says you can't do it legally.

First, it's amusing that you presume that my FR user name has anything at all to do with my real name. Shall I refer to you as "Lord" or "Baltar"? :-)

Second, I am quite aware that the law currently says that breaking the copy protection on a DVD is illegal. My previous posts made that clear, or so I thought.

The point I was trying to make is that it shouldn't be illegal.

The same philosophy, applied to other issues, would result in all sorts of bizarre laws.

Since you have to load bullets in your gun if you're going to murder someone with it, loading bullets in a gun should be illegal.
Because most bank robbers wear a jacket during the holdup, the wearing of jackets in banks should be banned.
In order to shoplift an item in a store, you first have to remove it from the shelf. Clearly, picking up merchandise with the hands should be against the law.

Take a look at Cleanflicks.com. They are doing EXACTLY what you just described.

You should review my postings to others on this thread. That subject has been well addressed. The conclusion seemed to be that the only problem arises when the business edits the movies before selling them.

If they offered the editing service to those who already own a legal copy of the movie, then destroyed the original copy so that only one exists, which the customer paid for, I don't see any theoretical copyright violation. One copy was paid for; one (edited) copy exists. It's only for the personal use of that customer, and not being made available for sale or use to anyone else.

I believe that would be a defensible business.