iPod Legality Question

Fitzcarraldo wrote: Vompatti, I don't know about your libraries, but in the libraries where I have used a photocopier, I had to complete and sign a form saying that I was photocopying a page or article for the purposes of academic research, for example. If you look in the front of every book you will find a clause stating something similar to the following: "All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted, or reproduced or utilized in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the Publisher." The above is from a book I just picked at random from my bookshelf. It's very clear: you cannot copy it. Full stop. Same applies to CDs and LPs.

Also illegal, Ghandi 2, because then two separate consumers are benefitting from paying once for the work. To take it to an extreme, what if the person you sold the CD to then copied it and sold it to someone else who then copied it and sold it to someone else who...

In the UK, if I remember correctly it's currently illegal to copy a CD to MP3 even for yourself, but the UK Government intends to (may have done so recently?) change the law because that particular law 'is an ass', to use the popular saying, and everyone is ripping their CDs to MP3 for their iPods.


EDIT: Yep, my memory was correct:

Daily Telegraph 30 Oct 2006 - Why you are breaking the law every time you copy a CD to your iPod

But, as I said, the current law is an ass and will no doubt be changed.

Edited by Fitzcarraldo - January 01 2007 at 22:17

Asses do bite arses, though.

În Germany we have a somewhat unique "exception" in our laws: Some of the restrictions usually defined by the rights holders don't apply for private use. That means that no matter whether a rights holder allows you to make private copies, you can do it. Also, differently to most other countries, you are allowed to make private copies of CDs and then sell the original, or borrow CDs from friends and copy them.

Personally I don't think this is ok ... in essence it means that for any burned/copied CD you have you can always say that you copied it from a friend, and nobody could prove you downloaded it from p2p (unless the files are watermarked of course).