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As with many things, what is legal depends on who you ask and when. Disney's VP has said that he considers it illegal to record a program and not watch the commercials. Few would agree with that assessment. The legality of changing the formats of an e-book hasn't been determined by the courts yet, although the most recent cases have said that as long as you do it for your personal use, it's considered fair use under copyright laws (that's where I think a previous poster is getting confused. People who get nail for derivative works get nailed for using them for commercial ventures such as remixing songs) . What is illegal is to defeat the DRM of that e-book when you change the format.
From a practical point of view, as long as you do not try to sale a copy or brag about it, I doubt if anyone will come after you.
From an ethical point of view, you could make the argument that as long as you own a hard copy of a book, then it's not unethical to get a computer copy of that same book, be it by scanning it yourself or downloading from the various irc or newgroups that specialize in such things, especially if the computer copy is not otherwise available. (just watch out for virus and the like). Some lawyers and authors might disagree with that, though I can quote others who think it's perfectly alright. Of course, some authors think it unethical to borrow a book from a library (and no, I'm not making that up) though I know of none who argue that it's illegal.
However, I would said that as a practical point, the more copies that a writer sales, the more likely he or she is to continue writing. I have been known to buy hard back and ebook copies of books that I like, just for that reason. Over the years, I've purchased roughly 600 ebooks for that reason. I've had too many authors that I like who give up writing not to try to support them to the best of my ability. I'm a very selfish guy in that respect, you know. <grin>
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