Downloading Roms from others is basically taking their copy. Its not a copy of your individual cart. And that’s the thing. You have the right to make a copy of your cart and use it. But you are not allowed to distribute the copy. One could probably get away by using Roms from others, but that is open to interpretation of law for individual countries. However the distribution itself is not allowed, in any (normal) country. And I also don’t believe (believe is not knowledge, I have no knowledge of Canadas laws) distributing personal backup copies is allowed in Canada as well.
Using copies from libraries is something different BTW, as these are not personal backups and are meant to be used by many other people. But that can be complicated too, in example in case of Archive.org. It’s a library in the US, but not other countries in the world.
Downloading content is almost definitely legal in Canada, and non-commercial digital distribution has never gone to court, so its legality hasn’t been established.
I can’t find the source, but I recall reading speculation that sharing backup copies between owners of the media is likely legal in Canada but, again, it hasn’t been tried by courts, so its legality hasn’t been firmly established.
Anyway, with non-commercial digital distribution not having any legal teeth in Canada, it’s effectively legal and its literal legality is unknown.
Assuming this is the correct source for Canada’s law about copyright. In the section about backup copies 29.24 (1):
( c ) the person, in order to make the reproduction, did not circumvent, as defined in section 41, a technological protection measure, as defined in that section, or cause one to be circumvented; and
( d ) the person does not give any of the reproductions away.
So (d) means it is not allowed to distribute the backup copy. As far as I understand. This is standard in most countries in the world. Also I cited ( c ), because this is usually also standard law. Normally, you are only allowed to make backups, if you do not circumvent any protection. Well its up to the interpretation if the Switch has such protection measure that falls into this category. But still, for our topic, (d) is relevant and seems to not allow for distribution of backup copies.
Mind you, I am also not a lawyer. And not everything needs to go to court in order to have an understanding of the law. Off course, unless it is a bit of grey area like in the case of ROMs. But I think this is addressed in the above quote. I hope this is the correct source! So for the time being, I have to assume law regarding this is just the same as in most other countries, because there is nothing else for me to evaluate here.
The key here is that distributing a copy is illegal, but receiving the copy isn’t. If you download someone else’s copy that’s identical to your own copy you purchased, you’ve done nothing wrong (the other person might have)
If you download someone else’s copy that’s identical to your own copy you purchased, you’ve done nothing wrong (the other person might have)
Note, this law above does not mean its legally right to download and use someone else copy. And if its wrong or not. That was just your personal interpretation. The law just tells us what is illegal, not what is legally right. If you say someone you are not allowed to steal an apple, that does not mean he is allowed to steal an orange.
And downloading someone else’s copy is not identical to your own copy, its never. Edit: However I am not sure about downloadable games, as they have to be identical I guess. But then, its not your personal backup copy of a cart then.
If the person who gives a reproduction (a backup copy) away makes something illegal, then the entire operation of downloading is illegal. Because without your downloading, he could not give it to you. Someone has to download in order to make it illegal, so you, who download the ROM is part of the entire operation to make it possible. That’s the problem. And it does not matter if you knew or not; the operation was illegal and you was part of it.
Downloading Roms from others is basically taking their copy. Its not a copy of your individual cart. And that’s the thing. You have the right to make a copy of your cart and use it. But you are not allowed to distribute the copy. One could probably get away by using Roms from others, but that is open to interpretation of law for individual countries. However the distribution itself is not allowed, in any (normal) country. And I also don’t believe (believe is not knowledge, I have no knowledge of Canadas laws) distributing personal backup copies is allowed in Canada as well.
Using copies from libraries is something different BTW, as these are not personal backups and are meant to be used by many other people. But that can be complicated too, in example in case of Archive.org. It’s a library in the US, but not other countries in the world.
Downloading content is almost definitely legal in Canada, and non-commercial digital distribution has never gone to court, so its legality hasn’t been established.
I can’t find the source, but I recall reading speculation that sharing backup copies between owners of the media is likely legal in Canada but, again, it hasn’t been tried by courts, so its legality hasn’t been firmly established.
Anyway, with non-commercial digital distribution not having any legal teeth in Canada, it’s effectively legal and its literal legality is unknown.
https://www.laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-42/page-6.html#h-103344
Assuming this is the correct source for Canada’s law about copyright. In the section about backup copies 29.24 (1):
So (d) means it is not allowed to distribute the backup copy. As far as I understand. This is standard in most countries in the world. Also I cited ( c ), because this is usually also standard law. Normally, you are only allowed to make backups, if you do not circumvent any protection. Well its up to the interpretation if the Switch has such protection measure that falls into this category. But still, for our topic, (d) is relevant and seems to not allow for distribution of backup copies.
Mind you, I am also not a lawyer. And not everything needs to go to court in order to have an understanding of the law. Off course, unless it is a bit of grey area like in the case of ROMs. But I think this is addressed in the above quote. I hope this is the correct source! So for the time being, I have to assume law regarding this is just the same as in most other countries, because there is nothing else for me to evaluate here.
The key here is that distributing a copy is illegal, but receiving the copy isn’t. If you download someone else’s copy that’s identical to your own copy you purchased, you’ve done nothing wrong (the other person might have)
Note, this law above does not mean its legally right to download and use someone else copy. And if its wrong or not. That was just your personal interpretation. The law just tells us what is illegal, not what is legally right. If you say someone you are not allowed to steal an apple, that does not mean he is allowed to steal an orange.
And downloading someone else’s copy is not identical to your own copy, its never. Edit: However I am not sure about downloadable games, as they have to be identical I guess. But then, its not your personal backup copy of a cart then.
If the person who gives a reproduction (a backup copy) away makes something illegal, then the entire operation of downloading is illegal. Because without your downloading, he could not give it to you. Someone has to download in order to make it illegal, so you, who download the ROM is part of the entire operation to make it possible. That’s the problem. And it does not matter if you knew or not; the operation was illegal and you was part of it.
See? Things are not that easy!
Maybe, but who cares?