your comment sent me into a researching frenzy last night. i started reading about this issue and couldnt stop till 2 in the morning. its very interesting.
i dont wanna blab on about my opinion but i feel like making a couple observations from my reading last night: 1) this issue seems to be in a grey area. its untested. 2) the outcome is very fact specific. case-by-case basis is needed, and even then, there are many contradictions in this area of law.
For example,
1) assume i have 1,000 CDs that I purchased full retail price at some point, and then i rip them to mp3 because i want to use the ipod i got for valentine's day. after a while, i stop using my cds because i prefer the mp3 versions because im a playlist junkie! my apartment is 100 square feet because i live in NYC, so i decide to sell them to a pawn shop for $500. I take the money and buy a few records and some cigarettes ($10/pack) and some pizza slices. I continue to use my mp3s for the rest of my life, and become the cool guy of the neighborhood because my music collection is the best
2) Now assume the above, BUT, that i start distributing the digital files on my blog because it drives up traffic to my site which increases my advertising revenue.
potentially two very different outcomes.
what i find most interesting, is that the resale for profit of used recordings is perfectly fine. entire businesses are based on the used market, yet the copyright holder never sees anything of real tangible value from it. the copyright holder only got one shot at the apple. its possible to imagine that some of the CDs out there have passed through 5 or 10 transactions in the past 20 years....sometimes even to the same store over and over
hmmmm...
