It is easy to avoid illegal movie download problems: simply watch legal movie downloads. If you download copyright-protected movies using P2P file sharing services, you could face prosecution and a $150,000 fine. Many people consider the chances of being caught so remote that they take the chance - that is their choice. However, why take the chance when there are legal movie download services also available online.



Many people wrongly believe that membership sites offer only peer to peer file sharing software, and that any other form of download is going to be expensive, involving paying for each individual movie. In fact that is wrong: while you are unlikely to get free movies in the public domain (that usually involves pre-1923!), there are membership sites that offer unlimited free legal downloads to members. Free in respect of their being no download after paying the initial membership fee.

There are completely legal movie downloads, every movie being licensed to download, and enabling you to avoid illegal download issues. The way they generally work is through large libraries of movie DVDs that can either be downloaded for viewing, or streamed direct from the server. Movies are updated as soon as the DVD comes on the market, in much the same way as P2P movies became available from members' hard drives.

There is an alternative to this type of movie download: online hiring. You can hire DVDs online from companies such as Love Films without any time limit. Unlike normal offline DVD rentals, you will have no later return fees to pay, and can usually hire up to three or more videos at a time, these being exchanged on return using the free postal service.

This is far better than trying for a free illegal download, since such software often costs over £30 for a lifetime membership. OK, online DVD hire costs are round about £14 a month for 3 DVDs at a time, and lower for only 2, but that's cheap compared to purchase costs, and you get unlimited downloads for that, limited only by the speed of the postal service. You could theoretically get 30 videos for that price.

There are not a great many online video rental companies in the USA, but there are some. However, back to legal and illegal downloads. Clickbank has removed a lot of P2P file sharing services from its Marketplace, but are still allowing others to trade. There must be a reason for this, and perhaps those still trading through Clickbank are not promoting the illegal side of P2P, since it is not the software that is illegal, but how some people use it to download copyright material.

You can use it for legal movie downloads of material that is free of copyright, or that is being licensed for downloading by people that want their work or their names to become more familiar to potential customers. The same is true of many legal music downloads using the same type of software: in many cases exactly the same software can be used to download music and movies.

Going back to the title, it is possible to avoid illegal downloads through a P2P link. You can either restrict your download to legal movies that are not protected by copyright, or you can download from a site offering movies licensed for downloading. You will be unlikely to get free downloads, unless you use the raw Gnutella open source software, and enhanced version of which is used by the commercial versions.

However, it is very inexpensive to pay a one-time membership fee and then download free from then on. They are free legal downloads in all but name, unless, as I have stressed, you download protected material. Video libraries, that offer licensed videos for download or streaming, is 100% legal, and the safest way to download movies.

It is easy, then, to avoid illegal download issues. All you do is to watch legal movie downloads, offered by several sites online for a relatively inexpensive membership fee. Your alternative is to use a monthly membership online rental firm, or simply to purchase your videos legally. The cost of illegal downloads can be high - if you are the one to be caught.