Quote:
Originally Posted by rhadin
If I let my computer read Sunborn to me, that is OK because (a) it is a robotic voice with little-to-no inflection and (b) for personal use. If 10 of my friends and I are sitting around the campfire, can I use the text-to-speech to read it to us without violating the author's rights? If no, what is the line being drawn?
If the families of my friends join the circle, making us a group of 40, can I use the text-to-speech to read Sunborn to us without violating the author's rights? If no, what is the line being drawn?
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There are specific rules for "public performance" versus home use. Here's what a quick google search gave me for U.S. law:
To perform or display a work "publicly" means--
* to perform or display it at a place open to the public or at any place where a substantial number of persons outside of a normal circle of a family and its social acquaintances is gathered;
* to transmit or otherwise communicate a performance or display of the work to a place specified by clause (1) or to the public, by means of any device or process, whether the members of the public capable of receiving the performance or display receive it in the same place or in separate places and at the same time or at different times.
(Title 17, U.S.C., Copyrights, Section 101, Definitions)
But I don't really think the issue here is about public performance at all, it's about their contract and distribution rights. Amazon does not have the right to convert all their books to mp3s and sell them without paying for those audio rights, so is it okay for them so sell a device that does so without paying for those rights? I have no idea.