It came to my attention recently that some of the people who have volunteered to serve as mirrors for the ADS may not be aware of the possible legal ramifications of the service.
This document is intended to explain both the legal issues of running the ADS and the ethical justifications for the service. While it is not meant to be a legally binding document, per se, its usage and nature of transmission is, for all instances of submission, the de facto stance ADS takes on all matters arising from questions of copyright law and intellectual property issues as it pertains to ADS as a whole.
1] Goals of the ADS
The ADS and its mirror sites are attempting to use the growing global communication network known as the Internet to distribute anime fansubs to those who would otherwise be unable to watch and understand this unique art form. As it forges new ground in this area it will attempt to promote the highest ethical standards to those that follow in its footsteps in order to ensure the least possible damage to the anime producers in so doing.
2] What it Means to be an ADS Mirror
In an ideal world, a service like ADS could run without any "policing"; everyone would know their responsibilities and a document such as this would not necessary. However, due to ignorance of laws of copyright and intellectual property, whether wholly innocent or willfully blatant, have forced me to implement these measures. Being an old school fan, raised on the belief of "never charge a fan for a sub", these policies are, in my opinion, the only "right" way to acquit myself in this little hobby of bootleg video.
In short, being a mirror of ADS means that you agree with these policies and will follow them to the letter with _no_ exceptions No gilding the lily here; this is serious stuff, and I simply can't afford to open myself or my other mirror to the antics the MP3 Generation. Neither should you.
Being an ADS mirror is more than simply having fat bandwidth and a big hard drive; any bozo can do that. It is a philosophy, one that tries to follow its own Law of the Jungle and (at least) attempt to foster a sense of ethics and morality lacking in your average warez kid or script kitty. We're anime fans. We're supposed to be above that nonsense.
3] On The Legality of Fansubs, and the Distribution Thereof
To put it simply, the distribution of fansubbed anime is a violation of the Berne Convention, which is an international treaty dealing with matters of intellectual property and copyright law. In other words, since we were not given permission to distribute this by the copyright owners, everything that we do is illegal and potentially prosecutable in an international court. What we do is illegal in the extreme.
How illegal? According to US Title 17, it's a Class E Felony, punishable with 3 years in prison and a $15,000 fine. That's for a _single_ offense. Assuming an average file size of roughly 90MB for every file downloaded from the ADS, yours truly could face over 14,000 counts of copyright infringement, a jail sentence of approximately 43,500 years and a fine of over $275,000,000! I won't live that long and I don't have 275 Million dollars either.
I firmly believe, however, that the distribution of titles which are not, and are not likely to be, licensed for commercial release in the U.S. or North America, is unlikely to cause serious harm to the producers of Japanese animation, so long as that distribution is limited to those areas where anime does not already have a significant commercial market (i.e. outside of the Far East). Indeed, it is likely that the distribution of anime fansubs has extended the markets of anime considerably, particularly in the United States where fansubs are common. Nevertheless, my belief that the producers of Japanese animation have benefited from the distribution of fansubs does not make that activity any less illegal. The law is the law, and we (that is _you and I_) are breaking it.
4] Rules that I live by and which you must live by too
In order to minimize possible damages to the Japanese producers, and to minimize the risk of legal prosecution both to myself and to those people whom I have designated as official mirrors, I maintain some strict rules about what will and will not be distributed and to whom it shall be distributed.
- Mirror sites of the ADS will not carry files that have not been
sanctioned by the ADS administrator. The ADS will never sanction
distribution of titles which have been licensed for a commercial
English release.
- In order to minimize damage to potential licensees, and to
minimize efforts of compressing and posting files which must later
be removed, the ADS will endeavor to distribute only those titles
that are unlikely to receive a commercial English release.
Furthermore if, at any time a title or titles which have been
previously sanctioned by the ADS becomes licensed for a commercial
English release, or if at any time a title or titles which have been
previously sanctioned for distribution by the ADS, is specifically
prohibited from such distribution by a letter or e-mail from the
legal copyright holders of said title, then that title will be
immediately removed from the ADS main site and all of its mirror
sites.
- The ADS and its mirror sites will only distribute files that have
been subtitled into English by fans. No untranslated material will
be distributed. In particular the ADS and its mirror sites will not
distribute full length MP3 files and/or untranslated music videos.
- The ADS and its mirror sites will not distribute files to the Far
East. This is to ensure that the ADS and its mirror sites is not
in any way competing with existing anime markets by offering free
copies of the files.
To ensure the widest possible access while accommodating this regulation, all sites will have made available to them a list of all IP addresses which have been assigned to Far East countries. These countries include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Japan
- China
- North Korea
- South Korea
- Singapore
- Thailand
- Pakistan
- India
- Under no circumstances will the administrator of the ADS or the
administrators of its mirror sites use the distribution of its files
for financial or personal gain. This includes, but is not
restricted to: charging for priority access, assigning
upload/download ratios, using banners on a linked web page, and
selling copies of the files on CD. Distribution of the files on CD
using SASE methods is acceptable.
- Administrators of mirror sites who wish to distribute other files
than those designated by the ADS administrator may do so on a
separate password as long as the standard ADS password does not have
access to these files. The ADS greeting message should not contain
reference to other passwords with unsanctioned files. Only the
standard ADS password, or approved variants thereof, will be listed
on the ADS mirrors reference page.
If at any time after reading the above you do not feel that you can adhere to these strict ethical guidelines or you have any concern about the possible legal ramifications of distributing ADS files, then you should inform the ADS administrator of your concerns immediately. No prejudice will be shown to anyone who, for ethical or legal reasons, should choose not to participate in the illegal distribution of copyrighted anime titles. In particular, you will not be banned from access from any ADS site as a result of this decision.
Should you have any questions relating to these policies or other issues of fansub ethics, please send e-mail to the address below.
Thanks for listening,
derik DeVecchio
Administrator, Anime Download Site (ADS)
All original graphics and page designing by Bernardo
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