What do you think about circumventing geographic restrictions?

[Ghitulescu]

Originally Posted by doctorow

Hard to believe, but there is something similar in the US as well - the Audio Home Recording Act.

Section 1008 of the Act, 17 U.S.C. § 1008:

By its terms Section 1008 provides noncommercial consumers with prescribed statutory immunity from suits for copyright infringement when performing "home taping" of musical recordings. Unlike public distribution (such as file sharing), which might go beyond "noncommercial", it would certainly seem that you can make (noncommercial) copies for your family and friends. Technically you'd still be infringing copyright, but the section above bars actions alleging infringement based on such uses.

I read it differently.
It concerns the manufacturers, the importers and the vendors (shops) which are exonerated from responsibility - like firearm shops are not guilty if they sell guns to a freak that shoot peoples in schools.

[Ghitulescu]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Then I am legally allowed to upload my ebook collection to torrent websites just so long as I do not do it for commercial purposes? Cool, thanks for the info.

Torrents are not illegal per se, as a gun is not guilty for the murder its owner committed (...people kill people, right? ).

You can do whatever you want, as long as the text is PD and you didn't copy the work of another editor. For instance you take the original manuscripts of Mark Twain and retype them into the ePub. You can distribute it freely, on whatever means do you like.

[Ghitulescu]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Recording from the radio, for personal use, is legal in the UK, but you're not allowed to give those recordings to anyone else, or sell them.

I remember the case when a BBC anchorwoman was fired in the late '80ies for saying something like it's a good movie folks a great opportunity to press rec - I don't remember either the name, nor the exact quote but the meaning was clear.

[Ghitulescu]

Originally Posted by tompe

It is legal to copy a CD so it does not mean that. Most web pages that discusses this mentions explicitly that copying a CD is allowed. I do not remember that in the Swedish text. The exception is computer programs and whole books.

Now, this is a perfect example of why the law is unethical.

There is no difference in the copyright of books (well, those were the original works), music, movies, or any other work (lyrics, scores etc.) and the games (computer programs).

It was the lobby of the computer games industry that first excepted them from copyright, then it followed the whole computer programs (to make the things look different than they actually are).

[Ghitulescu]

Originally Posted by RobertDDL

Some differences between German and Austrian laws exist, for instance, in Germany it is illegal to circumvent copy protection, while in Austria it is not, but to a large degree they are similar.

That is an entire other law. It's not the copyright law.

[jbjb]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Lending seems fine to me, but only when done through a system, such as Amazon's, which enforces both a time limit and the inability of the lender to read the book while the borrower has it.

I can see why enforcement is of interest to the copyright holder, and why it can be argued that it's required for a generally workable system, but when discussing an individual's ethical position when lending a book surely the thing that really matters is that the lender doesn't actually read the book during the loan, and that the borrower doesn't read it after its returned, not whether or not those restrictions were actually enforced by the system.

You are comfortable with stripping DRM from your books because you trust yourself not do do anything with the stripped books which damages the author. Is it not also ethically acceptable for me to trust myself not to read a book when lending it to a friend whom I trust to delete it when they've finished it?

/JB

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by Ghitulescu

It depends on the performing year. Any musical arrangement rights lapse after 50 years. So anything before 2014 - 50 (remember, the copyright years are full years, so 2015 does not count) may be safely copied and kept. Unless your local law says something different (eg 95 years, or forbidding copying altogether).

The copyright in sound recording expires after 50 years (now 70 years after publication in the EU), but the copyright in the music and/or lyrics may last longer. So you have to check all three before you're free to copy/distribute sound recordings.

[RobertDDL]

Originally Posted by darryl

It appears that these provisions, including giving copies to close friends, are not uncommon in the civil law countries of the EEC. Presumably these provisions also do not extend to whole books?

It seems that they do. The text of the law is a bit ambiguous:

https://www.ris.bka.gv.at/Dokument.w...er=NOR40074744

(8) excludes "whole books", but this probably refers only to (6), not to (1) to (4) -- sorry, I'm too lazy and/or incompetent to translate it all.

The comment on http://www.illsinger.at/wordpress/?p=442 explicitly talks about the right to make private copies "im Zusammenhang mit elektronischen Medien (Musik, Filme, e-Books)" -- "in the context of electronic media (music, movies, ebooks)". And what sense would it make to allow me to share with a family member or friend half a book?

Originally Posted by darryl

I wonder if recognising reality and allowing similar rights in, say, the US, would result in massive losses to the industries concerned.

I don't think so (I could write a long explanation why I don't think so, but these things have been argued before).

BTW, given how much the publishers and vendors save on costs for printing, storing, handling and shipping, an ebook should cost, at the most, half of what a printed book costs. Since most ebooks are sold for more or less the same price as paperbacks, I'm already paying for two when I buy one.

And, another BTW, I wonder, when Amazon started to allow sharing Kindle books with family and friends, did they double the authors' royalties per licence sold?

[tompe]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

The case is sharing your copy of a freebie book. It is a copyrighted, non-Creative Commons book that simply happens to cost $0.00 -- you do not have distribution rights just because your copy was gratis.
If it can still be purchased at that $0 price point, the friend can go get his/her own free copy. If not, they must pay money to attain their own copy. Either way, they too must go to the only authorized redistributor.

So Manybooks are distributing these kind of books. I did not know that.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by jbjb

I can see why enforcement is of interest to the copyright holder, and why it can be argued that it's required for a generally workable system, but when discussing an individual's ethical position when lending a book surely the thing that really matters is that the lender doesn't actually read the book during the loan, and that the borrower doesn't read it after its returned, not whether or not those restrictions were actually enforced by the system.

You are comfortable with stripping DRM from your books because you trust yourself not do do anything with the stripped books which damages the author. Is it not also ethically acceptable for me to trust myself not to read a book when lending it to a friend whom I trust to delete it when they've finished it? That's why I wouldn't personally be comfortable with giving a copy of a book to someone else.


/JB

The difference, as I see it (and please feel free to disagree!) is that I see a significant difference between judging the ethics of my own actions and those of someone else. I know that I'm not going to upload a DRM-stripped book to a torrent site. I have no way of knowing what someone else is or isn't going to do, regardless of how well I think I know them. If I gave a copy of a book to someone, and they then in turn gave it to other people, uploaded it to the internet, etc, I'd feel morally responsible for that piracy, because it would be my actions which led to it. Because of this, I prefer not to take the chance. I should add that I also don't lend paper books to people because they don't look after them the way that I do. If I can't trust my friends to look after my paper books, I'm not going to trust them to look after my ebooks.

[Ghitulescu]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

The copyright in sound recording expires after 50 years (now 70 years after publication in the EU), but the copyright in the music and/or lyrics may last longer. So you have to check all three before you're free to copy/distribute sound recordings.

That's true.

[doctorow]

Originally Posted by HarryT

If I gave a copy of a book to someone, and they then in turn gave it to other people, uploaded it to the internet, etc, I'd feel morally responsible for that piracy, because it would be my actions which led to it. Because of this, I prefer not to take the chance. I should add that I also don't lend paper books to people because they don't look after them the way that I do. If I can't trust my friends to look after my paper books, I'm not going to trust them to look after my ebooks.

Your mistrust of people's motives (motives of your friends no less) depicts a lonely and disconnected picture of this world. How can you still interact with them if you mistrust them with something trivial as respecting your wishes not to pirate the e-book you lent to them?

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by doctorow

Your mistrust of people's motives (motives of your friends no less) depicts a lonely and disconnected picture of this world. How can you still interact with them if you mistrust them with something trivial as respecting your wishes not to pirate the e-book you lent to them?

Precisely because, as I said in my previous post, on the few occasions that I've lent people paper books (which I keep in a pristine condition) I've got them back in a shocking state, with creased spines, bent covers, etc. It's not a matter of being "lonely and disconnected" - it's a matter of experience teaching me that, much as I enjoy the company of my friends, they don't have the same respect for books that I do. And if I'm pirating the book by giving it to them in the first place, it's a bit hypocritical to ask them not to do the same, isn't it? One rule for me and a different one for them?

[murg]

Originally Posted by Ghitulescu

It's debatable.
First of all, define friend. Then define friends. Because while it's commonly accepted to watch a movie or listen a tune in the family, it's not the same if you invite the whole school or all the friends you may have (eg in facebook) - remember the giant parties of thousands of invitees? And if charges are applied (apart for the medium) you entering the business world...

Well, I have 300,000 facebook friends. So I guess it's alright if I loan my ebooks to all of them...

[tompe]

Originally Posted by jbjb

You are comfortable with stripping DRM from your books because you trust yourself not do do anything with the stripped books which damages the author.

But it is hurting the author because he is not buying a new copy for a device using a different format.