Court Rules Users Can't Resell Songs Bought on iTunes

[Avatar74]

Another awesome win for corporate America!

Yeah, how dare they not make for free everything that I would never have heard of if it weren't for their distribution networks!

In all seriousness, nobody is going to come after you if you're just handing off your AAC/MP3 collection to your younger brother or something.... The resources to even determine that you did that simply don't exist now that DRM tagging is dead. The real usage here will be as a deterrent to those who are thinking about abusing first sale doctrine in a realm where the nature of the product is in the artistic content and not fixed in a tangible product whose transfer means the original owner having to physically relinquish their access to the content in a meaningful way.

If the law is flawed, then organize and bring good legal cases against it that have merit or organize a boycott instead of sitting here and complaining because you didn't read the agreement you signed with iTunes/Apple.

 

[tekboi]

This is the reason I still buy physical CDs, it's usually cheaper too plus ill decide what bitrate to encode in

This. If I purchase music, then I should truly OWN the music and do with it as I please.

 

[DesertEagle]

You guys are so gullible... it's even written on your ceiling!

Oh, so it is an April Fool's joke?

 

[longofest]

It forever eludes me why courts have such a hard time grasping technological things. For every technological thing there is a physical equal, and the court should simply interpret based on the precedent that has been set forth. Digital music should be treated no different than CDs, tapes, cassetes, betamax, vinyl, whatever. Its really like using a GPS tracker for law enforcement to track a car should be no different than having an officer tail the car from a warrant point of view.

We need some judges and lawyers that have a strong technology background to get promoted to the bench and start making sense of the situation.

 

[samcraig]

This. If I purchase music, then I should truly OWN the music and do with it as I please.

The same goes for movies (for me) for those I really want to own. I'm not sold on cloud storage as the only means of ownership at the moment.

 

[longofest]

My understanding was that this was clear via the license agreement we have to OK before making iTunes purchases.

Yes, perfectly clear from the 100 page license agreement.

You may be 1 out of 10,000 people that actually read that thing.

 

[MacDarcy]

I understand cause its digital and all...but it seems so strange. I remember growing up in the 80s...and being able to resell old albums. As an environmentalist, I totally welcome the convenience of the paperless world we now live...but I do get nostalgic for the analog world sometimes. Must be a childhood thang.

I do love reading books on my ipad mini tho.

 

[PBG4 Dude]

Well, iTunes has no DRM, but it has your apple ID encoded in it. So, there's your first sale. You can copy it, but it will always have the e-mail address of the first buyer.

Unless, of course, you use a Hex editor and change the file.

 

[840quadra]

Yes, perfectly clear from the 100 page license agreement.

You may be 1 out of 10,000 people that actually read that thing.

I wouldn't say it's perfectly clear, though, I would have believed this would have settled without a case being needed.

Though I am not 100% clear it was even in the agreement during the period this dispute is covering.

 

[TheRainKing]

If it were legal to sell songs downloaded from iTunes, people could resell the same file over and over again, making a huge profit.

Or am I just confused?

 

[Peace]

How is this going to be enforced ?

 

[drewc1138]

Did anyone actually have plans to sell content that they'd purchased digitally?

All this complaining sounds like nothing more than people seizing an opportunity to complain about "greedy" corporations.

 

[alent1234]

How would you resell music anyways? What's stopping you from selling file copies? I think I don't understand..

the itunes bought files have metadata about who bought them. they aren't protected but you can bet idevices send "telemetry" about people playing back MP3's bought by someone else

 

[Avatar74]

The same goes for movies (for me) for those I really want to own. I'm not sold on cloud storage as the only means of ownership at the moment.

The concept of copyright has always been rooted in the idea that you do not own the content/music/movie. You own one licensed copy fixed in a tangible format.

I understand why it's complicated with digital files because the aspect of a "tangible copy" has changed and made it very easy to deprive content creators/copyright owners of the sole discretion and manner in which they (rightfully) wish to control distribution of their content.

Of course, what one has to realize is that anti-piracy efforts aren't really aimed at preventing you from sharing a library with your friend down the street. They never were.

A shrewd person would pass their files on to the personal acquaintance of their choosing and be done with it. A dumb person would scream about it all over the internet (giving people everything they need to know where to find you), not realizing that the times you hear about someone getting sued it is almost invariably because they were found using conventional means: That is, they were sharing thousands of songs on a P2P network openly like a moron...

There's simply no effective way to track and harvest evidence against downloaders, only sharers/uploaders... unless the servers sharing the content are themselves logging downloaders... and I sincerely doubt they are, unless the entire objective of the P2P sharing operation was to entrap their users in the first place.

 

[Krazy Bill]

Nope. First sales applies to physical goods, where ownership is without a doubt.

With digital, there's no way to determine whether you are only selling a copy.

Yep. Sounds pretty "cut and dried" to me. Not understanding why people here don't see it that way. (Note: not saying I like it, I just understand the rationale behind the ruling).

 

[alent1234]

I understand cause its digital and all...but it seems so strange. I remember growing up in the 80s...and being able to resell old albums. As an environmentalist, I totally welcome the convenience of the paperless world we now live...but I do get nostalgic for the analog world sometimes. Must be a childhood thang.

I do love reading books on my ipad mini tho.

the resale value of books and CD's plus the paypal/ebay fees aren't worth the effort and time to sell your old stuff

 

[zonesey]

The forum is too much about court rulings and stuff like that nowadays.

 

[bushido]

with the prices of cds and albums these days it never even occurred to me to sell my files. like i spent 9,99€ on an album, how much could i get for it?

probably less than a mc donalds menu

 

[applesith]

It has everything to do with it. Care to tell me the difference?

Re-selling physical CDs and digital content are two very different matters.

 

[MikhailT]

This. If I purchase music, then I should truly OWN the music and do with it as I please.

Agreed but increasingly in the digital world, everything is turning into "you own the license to view the content, not own it". Technology is allowing the owners to control the content completely and we're letting them get away with it.

How is this going to be enforced ?

Not possible through private sharing but music services like mentioned in this ruling will not be allowed to provide such a service legally anywhere to resell music as they don't have the rights and thus, they can be taken down instantly for violating the copyright laws.

 

[rjohnstone]

It forever eludes me why courts have such a hard time grasping technological things. For every technological thing there is a physical equal, and the court should simply interpret based on the precedent that has been set forth. Digital music should be treated no different than CDs, tapes, cassetes, betamax, vinyl, whatever. Its really like using a GPS tracker for law enforcement to track a car should be no different than having an officer tail the car from a warrant point of view.

We need some judges and lawyers that have a strong technology background to get promoted to the bench and start making sense of the situation.

I think the courts have a great handle on this particular scenario.

First Sale doctrine applies to ORIGINAL physical objects/media.
When an ORIGINAL physical CD is resold, it deprives the seller of the object. It's ownership can be physically transferred.
The seller can obviously make a copy for themselves prior to selling the original CD, but that is illegal under current copyright law.

With digital media, there is no physical media, so there is no original work to be resold. There is no way to prove the seller is selling you a copy or an original file. Further, there is no way to prove the seller has deleted the file after it was resold.

 

[APlotdevice]

How would you resell music anyways? What's stopping you from selling file copies? I think I don't understand..

The same thing that "stops" you from selling copies of CDs. It's copyright infringement either way.

 

[Porco]

I think we all know why this makes sense, we just don't like it

 

[Mike Valmike]

Anyone else smell the hypocrisy in this phrase?

"...particularly when Congress itself has declined to take that step."

The courts won't listen to the people, but it will listen to the most corrupt group of politicians. Sadly, this no longer ironic.

It's not hypocrisy we smell, but your legal illiteracy. In the U.S., courts are not constitutionally authorized to promulgate law. Congress is. When a court makes a statement like this in a ruling, what they are communicating is that anyone who wants a change in that particular law should be telling their representative(s) to enact legislation to that effect. The court's job is to apply the law to the case currently before it, not to write the law itself.

This is what they were explaining in Social Studies during those slow afternoons when you were doodling band logos in your notebook and staring at Jessica Nickerson's tight skirt two desks over.

...as to the topic at hand, the licensing model is pretty clear, but I'd love to see some clarification on inheritance. I have a loooooot of iTMS purchases that I want to make sure can pass through to my wife and then children. Yes obviously I'll give them the login info, but that's a stopgap measure. Transferability is going to become necessary down the road.

 

[Radiating]

Digital is different from physical.

Someone paints a painting and sells it to you. Can you then take a photo of it, enlarge it, and sell that? Of course not. You bought that particular copy of the painting, and cannot reproduce it. The Artist owns it.

Not true, taking a picture of a painting is considered original art. People actually HAVE taken artsy pictures of a painting then had those pictures make 10 times more than the paintings themselves... Just like making a remix of a song is original art.

Someone writes a book. Can you Xerox all the pages, bind them together and then sell that? Of course not. You bought that particular copy of the book, and cannot reproduce it. The author/publisher owns it.

Right unless you're adding your own spin onto the original art the copywrite holder owns it. With a book the specific words are copywrited.

Now, can you sell that ONE painting to someone else, and not own it yourself anymore? Can you sell that ONE book to someone else, and not own it yourself anymore? Can you lend it out? I think you should be able to.

This is where the law needs to be straightened out.

Digital content is different. For digital content you enter into a contract to be allowed to license use copywrited data. Because it's a contract they can specify that you can or can't transfer the license to another party. You never own a copy the physically copywrited item, which the law says you're allowed to resell.