I know, I know, it's "beating a dead horse" to point out that "copyright infringement" and "theft" have been legally separate since the invention of copyright. After all, any message board will have someone who says "it's the same thing" and we're supposed to just let it pass because everyone's tired of hearing the argument. But every time you do let it pass, it just helps strengthen the position of a greedy cartel against the average guy.
So far as infringing on the anime companies' copyrights, nonsense. Five minutes of video out of a 6 hour series falls clearly under the fair use doctrine. It's part of the deal that society made when we granted the copyright holders a limited "right" which they lacked for the first several thousand years of human history. No one worries about the anime companies because they're afraid the law is one their side. The worry is because when an individual or informal group is up against a corporation with deep pockets full of money, the individual is likely to be crushed regardless of the law being on their side.
So far as the music goes, legally, it's debatable. a-m-v.org is not in the same position as a person torrenting albums. A court could rule that it or it isn't fair use. It will never get to court, though, because again, Phade is going to be too smart to fight in a rigged game which will cost the RIAA nothing, win or lose, and could bankrupt him, even if was to somehow win. But legally debatable or not, I think it's morally quite defensible, since I really cannot believe that people are losing album sales because of the availability of AMVs.


