In a college class I took a few years ago an instructor's husband was a copywright lawyer. She said that college instructors could copy small sections of a lesson, but not the whole lesson for assistance in class. But to copy whole chapters to give to students was BREAKING the law, unless they had premission from the author and should also be from the publisher. Copyright laws forbid the copying of that extensive of a book, a whole chapter, let alone the WHOLE book. So, to copy a whole book for personal use is breaking the law. Period, there is no argument, acccording to this lawyer. She is wanting to quote her lawyer, so I guess I get to quote my lawyer,
Now, I have gone the university library and copied sections of books, jounals, mags, and other to use in a reseach paper, and knew that technically it was illegal, but have done so for my own personal usage, to be destroyed at a later date. I have also contacted authors to use a section or photo in a term paper that I felt was important enough to share (and was given persmission to do so).
To me, to make a copy of the library ebook is the same, by stripping the DRM, so I can make a copy of a ebook that does not belong to me is breaking the copywright law. To tell others how to strip the DRM so they can keep a library book (whether is is on paper or electronic, is breaking the copywright law.
That is my personal opinion. I can make a backup copy of my own ebook, it is for my own personal use. To make a copy to give to others, to share with a friend who will read it and then give it back can be a grey area, but to give to them to keep is not, it is black and white.
Carl Rogers states that is isn't so much as how I see an issue as how another persons see the issue. That to understand why they see something they way they do I must accept how they see it. That goes both ways. It matter how KK see the issue of the legality of stipping DRM and saying a Kindle can read books from a library.
What also matters is how others see it. And that is where KK is missing the whole discussion. She can shout all she wants (I am making an assumption that KK is a female), but what she is missing is that what the others believe is just as important as what she believes, not trying to force them to beleive, see it, the way she does.
In that aspect, it doesn't matter who is right.
Having said that, I do believe it is wrong for someone to tell a Kindle owner they can obtain ebooks from a library, by stripping them, and not informing them of the confusion of the legailty of it. No matter what I believe, the rightness or wrongness of the legality of it, THEY may not see it as legal and will be offended by not being informed. And that is an important aspect that is being ignored here.
So, KK can shout all she wants, but she is ignoring that the person she is telling they can read the library ebook may not agree with her method of obtaining the book, they may see it as illegal, as stealing from the library.