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Originally Posted by msundman
Yes, it has. As I said, it has decided that people are better off without their natural right to copy.
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The government has only set general rules so that not every right holder has to define its own rights. But the laws are only defaults or fall-backs. They can be altered in both directions and only apply if the right holder does not define other rules.
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Originally Posted by msundman
This is clearly not suitable for normal (e)books.
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Of course not, it was only an example.
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but I do think that such a contract should be void if it's very easy to "sign" (e.g. by pressing an "I agree"-button or somesuch).
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Even oral contracts are legit. And to say "Yes" is very easy.
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AFAIK that's the case in most countries. E.g., I think "by opening this CD-case you agree to the license X"-type EULAs are void almost everywhere.
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I can only speak about Germany. Here such general rules are void if they contain "surprising" terms that cannot not be easily recognized or are inherent of the contract itself. An example: If you shop online and buy some shirts, you will sign a contract with the seller. He will give you some shirts and you give him some money. It would certainly be a big surprise if you would have automatically signed a non-terminable subscription that would bind you to buy 20 shirts per year for the next five years. However, such a subscription would be valid, if it was clearly offered as such.
So it always depends on how the terms are being published to the customer.
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If sellers are forced to make buyers know what they are buying (if the sellers want to impose their additional, non-standard restrictions) then it will probably have the effect that buyers won't be so eager to buy from places where they have many restrictions.
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And what restrictions would I not know, when I buy an ebook? At least on sites like fictionwise and mobipocket the restrictions are clearly named. So are they on iTunes - an people love to buy music there.
Alan