Quote:
Originally Posted by taustin
The issue isn't how he bought it. The issue is whether or not it was legal for him to import it to the US, or rather, to export it from whatever country he bought it in, which does not have a first sale doctrine.
The article may say that, but the first sale doctrine is part of the Berne Convention. This would not be an issue if he'd bought the books in a country that has signed it (because he wouldn't have bought them there, as they would have been far more competitively priced). The article has a political axe to grind of its own.
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He bought the books in Thailand, which
is a party to Berne (for Wiley to publish them in a non-Berne country would have been Publishing for Dummies).
The case had nothing to do with Berne; it concerned the interpretation of two (apparently) conflicting provisions of the US Copyright Act (one of them a codification of the First Sale Doctrine). If upheld by the Supreme Court, the decision would apply to copyright goods produced
anywhere outside the USA.
It might or might not be upheld by the Supreme Court; the last time the issue was before that Court (2009), it did not finally decide the issue, but it was split 4-4.