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Originally Posted by asjogren
Is this getting a little off track? For items delivered electronically, possibly via VPN, how is Customs going to get involved?
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Here, you're confusing "is it legal" with "can I get away with it". But you're right that this is getting off topic as the original question was why there were GR within the EU. My point was that it's perfectly valid for companies to decide that international sales are too complicated-but AFAIK that should *not* be the case in the EU-so it's probably inertia.
Quote:
Originally Posted by asjogren
Again, how does "traveling" eBook purchases via the Internet differ substantially from traveling paper book purchases? I don't have to demonstrate residency, let alone identity, to buy a paper book. Why should this be a requirement for eBooks?
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Because, according to law (international law, I believe, but definitely the law in all countries I'm familiar with) the 'place of sale' for a pbook is the location from where it's shipped while the 'place of sale' for an ebook is the location where it's bought. (And that has a couple of definitions too, so it can get really complicated.) As to why it's different-no valid explanation I know of. (There are a couple of legal decisions that might be the basis for it, but I'm not sure I agree with them in the first place.)
Why's the location important to whether or not you can buy the book? Other than the previously mentioned possibility that purchase/ownership of it might be illegal in some locations, there are also contract restrictions. These, technically, don't prevent you from buying the book, but they do prevent people from selling it to you. (Or course if you misrepresent your location in order to buy the book, then that *might* be an illegal act on your part. Otherwise, if the seller simply doesn't check, then the illegal act is on their part.) BTW, an interesting point about pbooks is that GR only applies to the original sale. AFAIK, if you legally buy it in, say, Germany, you can then take it to, say, Italy & legally resell it even if it's illegal to buy it from that publisher in Italy. (Convoluted, but I think you know what I mean.)