Will your reader do this? Deciding on one soon

[frquixote]

Originally Posted by Lady Fitzgerald

Can you link to the legislation that makes it legal in the US?

The Digital Millenium Copyright Act (aka DMCA) clearly makes it illegal.

Wikipedia has a pretty good summary here, including the Library of Congress' recently announced exemptions to the anti-circumvention provisions of the original law:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital..._Copyright_Act

The actual text of the Bill is located here:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d105:H.R.2281:

Please note that the Librarian of the Library of Congress is responsible for the issuance of "exemptions from the prohibition against circumvention of access-control technology. Exemptions are granted when it is shown that access-control technology has had a substantial adverse effect on the ability of people to make non-infringing uses of copyrighted works." per the Wikipedia article.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Some people are of the opinion, Jeannie, that although the DMCA makes the development and distribution of tool for DRM removal a criminal offence, the actual use of such tools is not illegal. This has never been tested in court, though, and until it is, such opinions are just that--opinions.

Opinion is the key word here. Even though he claims to be a lawyer (yet not a legal expert, according to himself), Mr. Russell has had some interesting opinions on these forums, even to point of advocating lawbreaking. In this case, he is assuming DRM circumvention is legal here in the US. I am interested in seeing the legislation he is basing that assumption on before I form any opinions on it.

[Lady Fitzgerald]

Originally Posted by frquixote

The Digital Millenium Copyright Act (aka DMCA) clearly makes it illegal.

Wikipedia has a pretty good summary here, including the Library of Congress' recently announced exemptions to the anti-circumvention provisions of the original law:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital..._Copyright_Act

The actual text of the Bill is located here:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d105:H.R.2281:

Please note that the Librarian of the Library of Congress is responsible for the issuance of "exemptions from the prohibition against circumvention of access-control technology. Exemptions are granted when it is shown that access-control technology has had a substantial adverse effect on the ability of people to make non-infringing uses of copyrighted works." per the Wikipedia article.

While current DMCA doesn't exempt the prohibition of DRM circumvention from e-books for all fair use, including making copies for all personal use, such as media shift and archival (current exemption is currently limited to creating audio books when they are otherwise unavailable from any source), there is something in the works (I don't want to mention it yet in this discussion, mostly because I'm an ornery old bitch and don't want to make it too easy for Mr. Russell) that may allow DRM circumvention for fair use. Curiously, though, the same thing would still prohibit distribution of DRM circumvention tools but does not address its use for what would apparently be legal circumvention.