It is legal to make backups of media that you have purchased. You just can't share it with people. for safety's sake, if you ever loan out that movie, loan out the marked original.

DVR's according to the companies that manufacture them are not intended to copy DVD's unless they are your own DVD's that you recorded with your videocamera. OF course they know only a fraction of people aren't going to use it for that very much, if ever at all. It's illegal in the US to copy most DVD's and tv shows...but because the rest of the world has either no laws or very loose one's they can and do record lots of TV shows and more because it is legal. But that's not fully true because DVR penetration into the American home is higher than most other countries. Why? Because Americans have more disposable income and want for it. They can't ban americans from owning DVR's but to be able to use one it's basically illegal to use for anything that would justify the price. So in otherwords, the rest of the world has more freedom than the supposed land of the free when it comes to fair use and copyright infringement.

Actually, this is a fairly vague area. When you buy a DVD, you don't actually OWN the DVD. What you have essentially bought is the right to use it. Copyright laws pretty much say that AFTER purchase you can use the movie under what is defined as "Fair Use". What this means is that you can watch the movie any time you want. You can even have family and friends watch it, show it at a family reunion, gather your son's cub Scout Pack together ans watch it with them, and so forth. But you CANNOT CHARGE ANYONE to watch the movie for any reason (this would be a commercial use). So don't ask your son's Cub Scout buddies to pay to see it! Now, duplication for your own use IS NOT all that clear in the law. Will you get into trouble if you make a duplicate for your own personal use just in case the original is damaged? Honestly, not likely. Even if you were caught doing so and charged, in fact. Technically, I suppose you COULD, but the KEY WORDS here are 'YOUR OWN PERSONAL USE". This could be easily defended under the "Fair Use" criteria, as you are NOT doing anything which could be construed as a "commercial use". So if you DO make a copy, you most certainly may NOT either give or sell it to another person, nor may you loan it out for someone else to use. You may only do this with the original. The absolute bottom line here is that copyright laws are made to protect the OWNER of the copyrighted material from fraudulent and illegal use of the material. As the owner, that person, or corporation, is legally entitled to ANY procedes which come from any sale of the copyrighted material. If you make another copy and sell or give it to another person, you have circumvented his legal entitlement and you can be held liable. Now, broadcast shows may be different in some aspects, because SOME of the broadcast material may be in the public domain. This means that it is essentially NOT private property and is, in fact, free to one and all to do with as they will. But many TV shows fall under the "Motion pictures and other audiovisual works". Which means that you can't legally use them for commercial ventures either. Remember: Fair Use isn't a strictly defined term. It's a balance of several factors, such as: -Purpose and character of use. -the nature of the copyrighted work. Tha amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole -The effect of the use on the potential market for, or value of, the copyrighted work. So those TV shows? Id kinda depends. News broadcasts can be copyrighted material, for example. But under consideration for Fair Use, distribution of a portion of a news broadcast MAY be viewed in a court of law as falling under "Fair Use" and thus be legal. However, distribution of a similar portion of a TV production show may NOT fall under "Fair Use", and thus may be illegal. http://ezinearticles.com/?What-Are-The-Laws-Regarding-DVD-Use-And-Duplication&id=283426 http://library.findlaw.com/1999/Jan/1/241476.html

I'm no lawyer but If you read the fine print it usually says "distribution"

It is illegal to make copies. However, there seems to be some confusion on this subject, so I will give an expanded answer. In 1984, the Supreme Court ruled that it was fair use to “time shift” television shows to watch at a later time. The case that decided this was brought by Universal (and many other film studies) against Sony for their release of the BetaMax VCR recorder. It is this precedent that allows Tivo, and other such services, to exist. Copying a DVD, however, is not time shifting. The original DVD can already be played at anytime. More recently it has been held that “format shifting” is also fair use. This is where you buy a CD and then rip-it into MP3 format to be played on a portable device. Although I do not know of any case that applied this rule outside the CD/MP3 format, it would be a safe bet to assume this rule applies to movies WITHOUT COPY PROTECTION (read on to learn why copy protection matters). However, copying a DVD onto another DVD is not shifting formats, and therefore not protected. So why does copy protection matter? There was an amendment to the Copyright Act called the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which made it illegal to circumvent copyright protection schemes built into a copy of digital media. Thus, although it may be legal to convert a DVD to a portable format to be played on an iPod, it would be illegal if doing so required you to break any copy protection scheme (which nearly all DVD’s now have).