Why isn't reselling illegal?

[eris404]

Forgive my ignorance, but I want to know why selling used books isn't illegal. I wondered this when reading threads that discussed "bootlegged" PDFs offered for free through file sharing. I'm wondering why someone can't put a (copyrighted) PDF on Kazaa, but can sell their old 3.0 books on eBay. I'm not saying I agree or disagree with either practice, I just want to know the answer.

 

[S'mon]

There's a doctrine of 'first sale exhaustion of right' - this means that once the publisher sells a copyright work, they can't prevent its resale, or demand additional money from the second buyer. In theory this applies to electronic works embodied in physical form also, ie if I buy a CD with a computer game on it, I can resell it - but if I do that I no longer have a right to keep a copy of the game on my PC. Legally, downloads of software, .pdfs etc counts as provision of services not of goods, so the exhaustion-of-rights doctrine doesn't apply to downloads.

 

[Qualidar]

Once you buy a book, it's your property, to do whatever you want with it. You can cut it up into confetti or give it away, or even sell it on e-bay. I would presume that if you bought a pdf, you would have the legal right to sell that copy to someone (providing you deleted your copy after the sale). Not that anyone would, but you probably could.

~Qualidar~

edit: Er....listen to S'mon, he sounds like he's more knowledgeable than me.

 

[Krieg]

Apples & Oranges.

Think of it more as buying a book, making multiple photocopies and then selling (or even giving away) hundreds of copies.

 

[EricNoah]

As the others have said... you can do with the physical book basically what you could do with any property -- keep it, destroy it, cut it up and rearrange it, give it away, sell it. But what you can't do with copyright-protected property is copy it, distribute copies of it, perform it in public, display it in public, or create derivative works based on it -- unless you get permission to do so, or unless doing so falls under certain guidelines like fair use.

When you sell your only copy of a book, sure the other person gets to read it, but then you are deprived of it. If you both want a copy of the book, in theory you should each buy a copy.

 

[reanjr]

Forgive my ignorance, but I want to know why selling used books isn't illegal. I wondered this when reading threads that discussed "bootlegged" PDFs offered for free through file sharing. I'm wondering why someone can't put a (copyrighted) PDF on Kazaa, but can sell their old 3.0 books on eBay. I'm not saying I agree or disagree with either practice, I just want to know the answer.

To put it very simply, copyright covers who has the "right to copy" (weird...)

Since posting a PDF on Kazaa creates new copies of said material, it is illegal. Selling a book, on the other hand doesn't produce any more copies.

 

[rbingham2000]

Reselling of old stuff has always been a time-honored practice. Since we forked over some good money for that stuff to start with, reselling that stuff once we get sick of it is a good way of getting that money back and taking the stuff off our hands in the bargain.

When we're dealing with a print medium, this exchange serves us quite admirably. When we get online and we start dealing with downloading files, however, it becomes a whole new ballgame.

 

[reanjr]

Once you buy a book, it's your property, to do whatever you want with it. You can cut it up into confetti or give it away, or even sell it on e-bay. I would presume that if you bought a pdf, you would have the legal right to sell that copy to someone (providing you deleted your copy after the sale). Not that anyone would, but you probably could.

~Qualidar~

edit: Er....listen to S'mon, he sounds like he's more knowledgeable than me.

I'm not a lawyer, but I design software solutions and part of doing that is learning copyright and licensing issues.

Inasmuch as I know, you are correct. You have the legal right to sell the PDF to someone else as long as you delete the original. On the other hand, I would make sure you are purchasing a product instead of a license (unlikely).

The license agreement can stipulate pretty much anything (within certain legal limits). What they are saying is that you have not purchased this book, but rather licensed the right to copy it and use it for personal use. Oftentimes, this can include a non-transferrence clause that prohibits you from transfering the license to another individual.

 

[bolie]

I expect that publishers would love to find a way to make selling used books illegal. The law on reselling books is old and well-established, so it would be hard (and unpopular) to change. Electtronic books, though, take their cues from software. Unfortunately, when you buy software and install it on your computer, that installation is interpreted as making a "copy" that is covered by copyright. So you have to have a license to make that copy. When you make that copy, you are bound by the license agreement, which often has a number of restrictions, often even on whether you can review the software or what you can use it for. eBooks will likely have similar restrictions because they can.

There are authors who don't like used bookstores, but that's silly. If there's a high demand for used copies of your books, the prices will go up until people will want to buy new copies. Also, no one can buy a used copy unless someone bought it new, first.

Bolie IV

 

[kigmatzomat]

Tech-a-nica-lica-ly, the difference between "buying" an e-book and "licensing" an e-book are the terms of acquisition. Truth be told, about 25% of license agreements are rehashes of federal laws (don't make copies and give them away, don't make copies and sell them, etc) that most people aren't bright enough to realize are laws despite the inherent comprehension of exhanging wealth for labor when physical objects are concerned.

Because many consumers are stupid and a few software writers were incredibly smart/greedy, they started selling things on a license. The licenses made sense to a point; you pay for 1 thing, you can use the thing in one place. Since software could be installed multiple places, making it a license vs. a purchase meant you had legal recourse when someone installed it willy-nilly.
I'm cool with that, really. It means you've got two hammers to hit people with; civil contract violation and criminal offenses.

The trouble came when the licenses became unreasonable. Non-transferrable licenses, for instance. I'm sure the justification was that you can't be *sure* the seller didn't keep a copy for themselves, but that's really just laziness. They make it illegal to transfer the licenses so they can just track down *all* resellers instead of just the unethical resellers. IIRC, in some states the non-transfer limit of a software license is illegal, hence the thriving used PC game market. Even DRM'd games can be resold since the DRM protects against copying the base media.

Unfortunately you can't have a thriving used e-book market because it is media-less. The DRM usually requires an authenticating server so local authorities can't invalidate the license. I'm waiting to see if these illegal DRM licenses force the dealers to not sell to citizens in those states that don't accept non-transferrance clauses.

I personally will *never* pay for an e-book license. My job may pay for such, but I won't. I *will* buy e-books. Do all the time, but from publishers who don't make it onerous. I have 5 functional computers in my house and you want me to register me e-book to a single machine? Worse, you want me to register it to a single OS installation?!?

That amounts to buying an album, but only being allowed to play it on the current stereo in your current car. New car? Sorry, no album. New car stereo? Sorry, no album. Home stereo? Sorry, no album. Bite me, I'll buy paper and be fairly confident that you're making *less* money on it than if you'd sold it in a reasonable electronic format.

I think in an average year I buy about 10-12 e-books, plus I'm a paid writer for an online magazine so I'm on both sides of the consumer fence here and not some neo-luddite.

Now, do I think the used e-book market will thrive? probably not. Ebay won't bother; there'd be too many legal hassles. Stores? Nahh, they won't trust it. And buyers won't have any confidence that what they're getting is a complete copy with all add ins. (meaning a text PDF as compared to scans in a PDF. I love e-books for search functions and being able to copy/paste text into my game note and hand-outs.) So I figure the used e-book market will be a non-existent entity. After all, as long as the publisher is still in business, there's no reason the book should ever go "out of print."