copyright law

Factual Questions
1

if i legitimately own an album on cassette, is it legal for me to burn a copy of it on cd? of course getting the mp3’s from the net…

2

For your own personal use, yes. IANAL. TINLA.

3

Actually, in an article in USA Today, they hinted that the way the law is written now, it is technically legal for you to burn a copy of that tape for a friend and give it to them as well! As long as you don’t charge for it, it’s fine. That’s why Napster thinks they can still win…it’s the same, just on a huge scale. (The law was written when giving a few copies to friends wouldn’t damage the artist…but giving it to 30 million friends is different.)

Jman

4

mp3.com lost in a recent trial. To a tune of $25,000 per cd. whoa.

5

I don’t think the copyright law has been interpreted that way. AFAIK, even if you own a copy of a work, you can’t get a copy (and someone else can’t give you a copy) from somewhere else- you have to copy it yourself from your own copy. This is true even if the copy would be indistinguishable from the original (i.e. there would be no way to tell where the copy came from). For example, if you own a video game catridge, and you want to copy the rom to play on your PC emulator, you’d have to copy the rom yourself from your cartridge, rather than downloading a copy from a website, even though there’s no difference in terms of bits.

Of course it would be hard to prove where you got the copy, short of just asking you under oath.

I don’t have any links to back this up, but with some effort I could find something. I think it’s still somewhat of a gray area- it depends on how the courts intepret the law.

Arjuna34

6

Legally, you cannot currently burn the song onto a CD. That’s making a copy, and unless you own the copyright (which you don’t by merely buying the song) you have no legal right to make copies of anything.

Current law does provide a loophole – if you use an approved medium, you can make copies for your own personal use. Cassettes and videocassettes are approved, but CDs haven’t been (yet). Eventually, they probably will be.

You shouldn’t go to USA Today for copyright information (or news, either, if it comes to that – though, to be fair, it may have been them just quoting one of the many “experts” who haven’t even bothered to read the law). It is legal to make a tape for your own personal use. Giving it to a friend doesn’t fall under this. And it is not currently legal to make a copy of any CD, even for your own personal use.

And it’s irrelevant whether you charge for something or not (and ultimately silly – would you argue it’s legal to steal a car if you don’t plan to sell it?). Under copyright law, whether you’re selling it or not is irrelevant. The only mention is in a guideline for determining “fair use” – a concept that doesn’t apply here (read the law before arguing this).

I’d love to hear the laughter from the judge if Napster tries to make that argument. The loophole is only for copies made on approved media, and your hard drive is not. Napster is in deep trouble in court (especially after the MP3 ruling) and would be fools to think they can win this. You can’t win when you infringe on copyrights, no matter how smart your lawyers are. No one expects Napster to win this one; at best, they’ll come to a settlement.

7

Copies using blank CDs are approved- that’s why there’s a royalty on blank “audio” CD-Rs. Consumer digital audio copying devices are also required to include a mechanism for only allowing a 1st generation copy.
Check out http://www.riaa.com/Copyright-Laws-4.cfm for more info on digital copyright law. RIAA’s page has lots of other copyright info also. Of course, they take the most restrictive view possible given the existing law and court interpretations.

Arjuna34