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<blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 6339444" data-attributes="member: 2067"><p>This thread gives me a Nefarious Idea. IANAL, of course, just a little thought experiement. </p><p></p><p>Copyright law doesn't restrict reselling things that were legitimately acquired with permission of the rightsholder.</p><p></p><p>WotC is putting out a PDF of the Basic rules. Those PDFs are legitimately acquired with the permission of the rightsholder.</p><p></p><p>So per the doctrine of first sale, it seems that while selling a printed copy is problematic (since you're making a printed copy), you could sell that PDF. You could then presumably go to WotC's site and get another one, and even sell that one, if you wanted. So, like, it could be legal to put this PDF up on e-bay. Or, you could download like 10 copies, sell them all. </p><p></p><p>Now it would be a violation of copyright, as I understand it, to click on that PDF file, and choose "copy" from the menu that pops up, since you're not the rightsholder. It would also be a violation of copyright to print it from your home printer, or to take it to Kinko's and copy it. All of these are unauthorized duplications. </p><p></p><p>But basically: copyright is weird. I'm sure WotC doesn't want to enforce every aspect of it here. But I wonder what aspects they do want to enforce. Is putting it up on lulu a step too far? More than likely. Is making a home copy something they're going to overlook? Probably. But there's a swath of grey area where it's not clear what they'll overlook and what they'll enforce. Which is probably reasonable from WotC's perspective -- gives them flexibility.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="I'm A Banana, post: 6339444, member: 2067"] This thread gives me a Nefarious Idea. IANAL, of course, just a little thought experiement. Copyright law doesn't restrict reselling things that were legitimately acquired with permission of the rightsholder. WotC is putting out a PDF of the Basic rules. Those PDFs are legitimately acquired with the permission of the rightsholder. So per the doctrine of first sale, it seems that while selling a printed copy is problematic (since you're making a printed copy), you could sell that PDF. You could then presumably go to WotC's site and get another one, and even sell that one, if you wanted. So, like, it could be legal to put this PDF up on e-bay. Or, you could download like 10 copies, sell them all. Now it would be a violation of copyright, as I understand it, to click on that PDF file, and choose "copy" from the menu that pops up, since you're not the rightsholder. It would also be a violation of copyright to print it from your home printer, or to take it to Kinko's and copy it. All of these are unauthorized duplications. But basically: copyright is weird. I'm sure WotC doesn't want to enforce every aspect of it here. But I wonder what aspects they do want to enforce. Is putting it up on lulu a step too far? More than likely. Is making a home copy something they're going to overlook? Probably. But there's a swath of grey area where it's not clear what they'll overlook and what they'll enforce. Which is probably reasonable from WotC's perspective -- gives them flexibility. [/QUOTE]
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