[NatassaKattou]

Hello KODI users,

I need your help, as a Final year student studying Television and Broadcasting I am to complete a dissertation, completely of my own topic choice.

Being interested in the implication that illegally downloading/streaming has within the industry and how easily accessible it is I wanted to know the ins and outs of illegally sharing with users online. I understand fully that KODI itself is not illegal but some of the add-ons are, I would really appreciate speaking to some members of this forum (You will be annonymous), An interview or just a simple email would really help.

what I am looking for is why peer to peer sharing is so easy and if anything has ever been done to stop it, if you have ever been caught, and how you make a profit from P2P sharing.

Thank you, for taking the time to read this.

Natassa Kattou

[JxPx]

Kodi is a media player. The official Kodi Add-ons are all legal. Sounds like you may want to ask your questions on third party add-on forum sites that have no affiliation with Kodi. Good luck.

[Prof Yaffle]

The addons distributed as part of Kodi, or available via the installation/download links on this site, handle legitimate content as far as anyone has been able to establish. Any addon that crosses the line into the kind of sharing you mention - the kind for which you *could* be "caught" - is removed from the conversation.

You can have a look at the list of banned_addons (wiki) as a (non-exhaustive) example, and also read this post.

[da-anda]

IMO streaming of pirated content only became so popular because of the barriers the movie industrie is creating for customers. Biggest ones DRM and geoblocking. Instead of spending millions on encrypting content and putting barriers in the customers way, they should have spent that money in better broadcasting platforms or distribution systems. The easier the content is to consume, the more people will use it. If you have to pay for 5 streaming services only to see the TV shows you love, and constantly have to jump between websites/apps/devices, then this is surely nothing users are happy to do. Give them one platform with all the content they desire and they'll use it. Some of the streaming services are even not available for all platforms, TVs, settop boxes the users have, which is even more annoying. Amazon Prime not being available for AndroidTV is such an example.

DRM f.e. on Blurays is also totally ridiculous. Who isn't pissed having to do a firmware upgrade on the bluray player only to watch the new movie he just payed for. Pirates otoh only have to press one button these days and are also not forced to watch these lame trailers upfront.

Next reason are likely the suckers trying to make a quick buck by promoting and selling fully loaded devices to users that don't know better or are just really dumb. Yes, one has to be overcredulous to not even have the slightest doubt that something might be wrong when somebody offers them all movies and tvshows on earth for free.

I'm personally just pissed about these illegal streaming add-ons, as they do nothing but harm our project and will only lead to even more restrictions for paying customers.

[NatassaKattou]

Thank you, would you know what these third party add-on forums are called?

also if you could maybe fill out my survey https://goo.gl/forms/4zNWJQzg6xu9cmHt1 that would be great!

[trogggy]

Although it's often stated here as fact I'm not sure you could call any addon illegal per se.
An addon might allow the user to do something illegal, which is not the same thing.
The actions possible might be legal in one jurisdiction but not in another.
Selling a box with particular addons installed (ie making a profit from them) might be legal in some jurisdictions but not in others - I think this is currently being tested in the eu and Canada, for example.
Whether an addon itself is illegal (so the author / distributor has a liability?) isn't something that's been tested by courts anywhere AFAIK. Happy to be corrected if it has.

[Ned Scott]

Thank you, would you know what these third party add-on forums are called?

also if you could maybe fill out my survey https://goo.gl/forms/4zNWJQzg6xu9cmHt1 that would be great!

Your survey is flawed, though: http://imgur.com/a/Cdzmg

"KodiTV" is not a source. Kodi is just a video player, just like VLC.

Most of the pirate streaming video add-ons are just python scripts that download lists from the internet. The actual videos are usually hosted on file locker sites like putlocker.

[Prof Yaffle]

I'd also suggest that you're leaning towards pay TV in that image ("i.e. Sky, Virgin") vs free OTA (Freeview, Freesat) or even on-demand (iPlayer, YouTube, etc.). And, reflecting Ned's comment, I'm not sure many folks would know if they're using "Putlocker" if they're using an addon or other intermediary, and similarly for many other file locker sites, or BitTorrent sharing, or Usenet downloads. Yes, some folks know what they're doing, but we have a lot of people here who genuinely seem oblivious.

[natethomas]

Although it's often stated here as fact I'm not sure you could call any addon illegal per se.
An addon might allow the user to do something illegal, which is not the same thing.

My knowledge of what is and is not legal is limited to US law, but as a general rule if you actively facilitate the breaking of a law, that makes you liable as well. There's some debate about whether users are liable for streaming, but there's little question whether the people uploading and the addon writers facilitating are breaking the law.

[da-anda]

Selling a box with particular addons installed (ie making a profit from them) might be legal in some jurisdictions but not in others - I think this is currently being tested in the eu and Canada, for example.

It's never the less a violation of our trademark in case they don't ship Kodi rebranded

[trogggy]

Selling a box with particular addons installed (ie making a profit from them) might be legal in some jurisdictions but not in others - I think this is currently being tested in the eu and Canada, for example.

It's never the less a violation of our trademark in case they don't ship Kodi rebranded

Yep - if Team Kodi wrote the law the box sellers would definitely be breaking it.
In reality it's not nearly that simple.
Edit: just to put that into perspective - me downloading krypton to my pc, installing to a folder, making a portable shortcut, installing confluence and sending it to my mum's laptop** breaks your trademark policy. Should I expect a knock on the door?

** This never happened. You can't prove nuffink.

[natethomas]

Selling a box with particular addons installed (ie making a profit from them) might be legal in some jurisdictions but not in others - I think this is currently being tested in the eu and Canada, for example.

It's never the less a violation of our trademark in case they don't ship Kodi rebranded

Yep - if Team Kodi wrote the law the box sellers would definitely be breaking it.
In reality it's not nearly that simple.
Edit: just to put that into perspective - me downloading krypton to my pc, installing to a folder, making a portable shortcut, installing confluence and sending it to my mum's laptop** breaks your trademark policy. Should I expect a knock on the door?

** This never happened. You can't prove nuffink.

That's not actually correct. The Kodi trademark policy doesn't create restrictions. It grants rights. The law is the law governing trademark infringement, which is fairly strict. The times when the policy applies is when you would otherwise be violating trademark law, but our policy grants you certain additional, carefully limited rights. Since giving a screwed up version of Kodi to just your mom isn't trademark infringement in the first place, our policy wouldn't be involved.

[trogggy]

That's not actually correct. The Kodi trademark policy doesn't create restrictions. It grants rights. The law is the law governing trademark infringement, which is fairly strict. The times when the policy applies is when you would otherwise be violating trademark law, but our policy grants you certain additional, carefully limited rights. Since giving a screwed up version of Kodi to just your mom isn't trademark infringement in the first place, our policy wouldn't be involved.

I have a site with kodi in it, and offer tips to people using it, would this be classed as a a infringement

Yes, if you use kodi in its name without the foundation's permission, as per the trademark policy:
http://kodi.wiki/view/Official:Trademark_Policy

So this was wrong?
It should have been 'As long as you're not breaking trademark law it's fine.'?

Because I could point to plenty of posts saying that the trademark policy applies irrespective of whether someone's doing something illegal.

[mymo.sunshine]

I still wonder how some official add-ons can be perfectly legal.
For instance, both Rai on demand and Dplay add-ons allow streaming of contents without ads, whereas the respective official apps and websites force the streaming of ads along with their contents. Rai website won't even start playing when detecting adblocks, and Raiplay Android app won't work on devices with adfree or adaway installed.
For those who don't like ads, all these limitations can simply be avoided by just installing Kodi and using its official and allegedly legal add-ons.

[trogggy]

Breaking the terms and conditions of a website does not (necessarily) equate to breaking the law.