[wwhitman]

Transcribing audio does not transfer ownership. People get amazingly confused about copyright. You can argue that all info wants to be free, which is very bad for privacy, but you cannot argue if you transcribe Star Wars now you own the dialogue.

[sk00byd00]

Sure but then Netflix and Universal stealing translated subtitles from these "pirates" and including it on their commercial content is also piracy.

Thing is though, as a civil claim, the monetary incentive is clear on the movie companies side but not the "pirates". I suppose with all things being equal, in the spirit of fair play, we can expect to see headlines stating these people have been awarded a massive sum of money in the future right?

People get confused about copyright because it is confusing. It isn't what it was when it was created and your interpretation of copyright makes no allowance for fair use, and as far as I am aware those precedents set in the 80s still stand to this day. So until they don't, you're only half right.

[wwhitman]

>Sure but then Netflix and Universal stealing translated subtitles from these "pirates" and including it on their commercial content is also piracy.

Umm, no. It may be unethical but the "pirates" have no copyright protections for a movie dialogue unless they wrote the movie.

[brazzy]

They would have copyright for the translation if it weren't itself illegal - §103 of the US Copyright Act. But this may be different in other jurisdictions.

[jeltz]

Two wrongs does not make a right. Translations are derivate works which means the new author has copyright, but they cannot be distributed without both the author of the original and the author of the derivate allowing it.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Derivative_work