MP3 copyright question.

[Triskadecamus]

Legal minds, please attend!

I have a new CD player that plays MP3’s.

I like it a lot. It buffers two minutes of sound, so it never skips, and it will hold 170 or more of my favorite songs on one CD. A pair of rechargeable batteries will run it all day, and it plays the tracks at random. I am a very happy listener.

So, here is my question. Am I violating the copyrights of the artists by making the favorites selection CD?

The actual published CD’s are sitting in a big carrier right here in my house. Every one purchased, mostly at retail prices, long ago. (OK, maybe ten songs I got from the Internet, because you can’t buy Lightnin’ Hopkins, or Sonny Terry at the store, and Ledbelly’s best stuff was never published by the folks who make CD’s.) (sigh. OK, maybe twenty five songs.)

So, is this the crime of the century, or of the last three or four seconds?

Tris.

[PeppermintPatty85]

Don’t stress it kiddo. Do you have any idea how many people do 10x more illegal things regarding the copying of music? And no one bugs them about it, as long as you aren’t selling them, there’s nothing wrong with it. I don’t consider it any different than making a mixed tape. (If I do completely understand what you are asking.) Now I really don’t know anything specific about the dos and don’ts regarding mp3s.But either way, you’re not gonna get caught unless the music police get on this cite and hunt you down.

[Triskadecamus]

Thanks Patty.

In truth, I was not all that much worried about the Music Industry Gestapo breaking in my door. It was pretty much a theoretical legal question.

Even in my later years, after giving up a life of crime, I have certainly done more serious things than making an odd MP3 copy of a song. (I once took six cents from the “need a penny” dish at the convenience store!) I just wondered in the cases where I have the original right here if it makes any difference in the nit pick world of the law.

Tris

[Larry_Mudd]

It’s clearly Fair Use.

What’s been recognized as fair use?

[ … ]

Space-shifting or format-shifting - that is, taking content you own in one format and putting it into another format, for personal, non-commercial use. For instance, “ripping” an audio CD (that is, making an MP3-format version of an audio CD that you already own) is considered fair use by many lawyers, based on the 1984 Betamax decision and the 1999 Rio MP3 player decision (RIAA v. Diamond Multimedia, 180 F. 3d 1072, 1079, 9th Circ. 1999.)
Making a personal back-up copy of content you own - for instance, burning a copy of an audio CD you own.

No worries.

[Triskadecamus]

With precedents no less!

Just the assurance I was seeking.

So, it’s just the owners of Ledbelly’s copyrights I have to worry about. Great.

Let the Midnight Special shine its light on me!

Thansk for the trouble.

Tris

[Larry_Mudd]

The portions of Judge O’Scannlain’s opinion from RIAA V. Diamond that apply:

In fact, the Rio’s operation is entirely consistent with the [Copyright] Act’s main purpose – the facilitation of personal use. As the Senate Report explains, “The purpose of [the Act] is to ensure the right of consumers to make analog or digital audio recordings of copyrighted music for their private, noncommercial use.” S. Rep. 102-294, at *86. … The Act does so through its home taping exemption, see 17 U.S.C. S 1008, which "protects all noncommercial copying by consumers of digital and analog musical recordings, " H.R. Rep. 102-873(I), at *59. The Rio merely makes copies in order to render portable, or “space-shift,” those files that already reside on a user’s hard drive. Cf. Sony Corp. of America v. Universal City Studios, 464 U.S. 417, 455 (1984) (holding that “time-shifting” of copyrighted television shows with VCR’s constitutes fair use under the Copyright Act, and thus is not an infringement). Such copying is paradigmatic non-commercial personal use entirely consistent with the purposes of the Act.

:previews:

Hey, no worries. I’m in much the same position, so I wanted to be sure anyway.

I was curious as to the actual wording, 'cuz that page just says “many lawyers” consider it fair use. I think the decision is more-or-less unequivocal, though.

And just so you know, I’m envious of your portable player. I have my PC hooked up to my stereo system for continual listening enjoyment – sure would like to be able to take it on the road…

Cheers.