"Judge made the right call regarding rentals.... but to say that all companies that "clean" movies are illegal is idiotic."
If the companies are doing it "Free of Charge" as one time, personal-use-back-ups, there might be some logic to to that.
However, we both know that if these companies are altering the movies, for a fee, without advice or consent of the filmmakers, then what they are doing is illegal
No, again you are missing the point.
There is NOTHING illegal with paying someone to edit content you own for your own personal use... or making an edited copy for your own personal use.
If you own the original, you can pay someone to make an edited copy all day long.. for your use.
IE I buy the white albumn.. ANd then pay to have it cut down to just the songs I like and burned to a CD or even pressed into an Albumn for my collection. I have violated ZERO copyright laws doing so. Paying someone to do the actual editing is NOT illegal so long as I own the original.
What would be illegal is for me to take a copy, edit it, and then sell or rent that edited copy out for a fee.
You don't need the filmmaker or songwriters consent to edit copies you own, or to pay someone to do it.
You are confusing "software licensing" with "copyright". Licensing is an entirely different issue.. in licensing, you don't really own the software, you have paid for a license to use it, and agree to use it as the owner of the software allows you to do.. so modification of it is indeed a violation of the licensing agreement you agreed to.
Copyright is not this.. you can pay someone to copy, make an edited copy or whatever you want of content you have purchased for your own personal use to your hearts content. It is not illegal at all. Paying a video editing company to take a disk you own, and edit it how you see fit and give it back to you is NOT a violation of any copyright law.