[Nathanael]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

Copying entire contents of a bit of IP for format shifting has been found legal. Perhaps not for print specifically--but the principles of law are supposed to be applicable to different situations.

Courts don't deal in principles, they deal in application of principles to specific situations. If you want to walk into court and tell the judge, "But the Sony case said it was legal to copy entire TV programs for purposes of time shifting, therefore it's also OK to photocopy in its entirety a book I own because the print's too small," without the bother of demonstrating to the court's satisfaction why the two situations are equivalent -- well, again, all I can say is good luck with that.

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

Copyright law doesn't acknowledge a difference between text, image, audio, or video formats.

It most certainly does. Read § 101. Why would Title 17 define "audiovisual works" and "literary works" separately, and why would it say things like, “'Literary works' are works, other than audiovisual works" if it had no intention of distinguishing them? The distinction is repeated in § 102, which specifies that "literary works", "sound recordings" and "motion pictures and other audiovisual works" are separate categories of copyrightable material. You cannot simply cite the Sony case vis-a-vis literary works because Sony dealt with an entirely separate category of copyrighted material.

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

Saying "but that hasn't been found legal in court" is ridiculous--we don't have an "it's illegal until a court says otherwise" system.

Let's restrict ourselves to US copyright law, not nebulous blanket statements. And that is exactly what US copyright law says: it is illegal to copy without permission IP you don't own unless.... That's what the "exclusive" in "exclusive rights" (see § 106) means:

the owner of copyright under this title has the exclusive rights to do and to authorize any of the following:
(1) to reproduce the copyrighted work in copies or phonorecords;

(My emphasis).

§§ 107 and 108 of US copyright law are carving out the exceptions to § 106. This is demonstrable both from § 106's prefatory "Subject to sections 107 through 122", and in the titles of most of those paragraphs, viz., §§ 107-112, 117, 119, 121 & 122 all begin with the phrase "Limitations on exclusive rights". In short, § 106 says, "it is illegal"; §§ 107-122 stipulate the "unless".

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

TITLE 17 > CHAPTER 1 > § 107
... reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright.

Sorry -- I don't see "note-taking" or "enlarging" in that list.

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

Directly states that fair use includes copying for research, comment, and scholarship, and strongly implies that fair use is not limited to the listed purposes.

Once again, all you're arguing is that there are exceptions to the "exclusive rights" enjoyed by copyright holders, and I am not disagreeing. My arguments are directed specifically against calvin-c's blanket statement that he is permitted to photocopy books he owns. As he did not specify any conditions, the clear implication of his assertion is "under any circumstances". Quite clearly, that is not what Title 17 says.

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

Not all contracts are legally valid. That contract says they can change the terms at any time... do you think that, if they changed the terms to say "all Kindle owners will be charged a $200 update fee every time Amazon edits its website," it would hold up in court?

I have no idea. You'll have to take that up with a court of law.

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

If it were changed to say, "Use of Amazon's Kindle books requires that the user never sue or charge with crimes any employee of Amazon.com," would that hold up?

Doubtful, most likely because that particular term would violate some other US law. Look, Elfwreck, you're attempting to argue that, because it's remotely conceivable that Amazon could at some future point unilaterally insert some unenforceable clause into its contracts, therefore the whole notion of contracts is ludicrous and unenforceable. Contract law doesn't work that way. Even if Amazon did at some future point do so, a court would simply invalidate that particular clause; it would never throw out the entire contract simply on the basis of a single unenforceable term.

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

The purpose of copyright, in the US, is to "promote progress."

No. The purpose of copyright is to secure the rights of authors and creators. "United States copyright law governs the legally enforceable rights of creative and artistic works under the laws of the United States."

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

Court Re-Affirms That First Sale Doctrine Can Apply to “Licensed” Software

First sale doctrine applies to software specifically because a physical medium (in this case the CD or DVD) is involved. Your article says as much: "Under the Copyright Act, owners of copyrighted material are given substantial rights in the particular copies they purchase." (My emphasis). Note that any rights I have with respect to copyrighted material I have purchased are restricted to the particular copy I own. Further (your article doesn't note this): my rights wrt to said copyrighted material extend only to authorized copies and do not include the right to make unauthorized copies, except for the purposes specified in §§ 107-108. And note that, if challenged by the copyright owner, the burden is on me to prove that I'm protected by fair use, not on the plaintiff to prove I'm not. Id est, illegal unless proven otherwise.

Note also that in the Autodesk case, the court only invalidated the portion of the contract forbidding resale of the physical medium. It did not invalidate the entire EULA just because it found one unenforceable clause.

In the Autodesk case, the defendant was reselling original copies of the Autodesk software. If, rather, he'd been burning personal copies of the disks, then attempting to sell those copies instead, I guarantee the court would have ruled much differently. This case simply reaffirms my original statement that first-sale doctrine is intrinsically tied to the phyiscal medium.

Those of us who've been around computers awhile remember a time when you used to get an actual physical Windows CD when you purchased a computer with Windows preinstalled (not a "recovery CD", but an pristine Windows install CD). Those CDs also used to turn up quite frequently in used computer stores (the fact that they were often stamped "not for resale" notwithstanding). Microsoft no longer allows computer manufacturers to include physical disks. Why do you suppose that is? Without a physical CD, you cannot resell your copy of Windows.