Quote:
Originally Posted by teija
I still can't understand how thrift stores are "allowed" to sell used physical books, when their corresponding eBooks have such strict copyright rules on it. Don't get me wrong - I think they should ALWAYS be allowed to, if nothing else other than it stops said books from ending up in the landfill/recycling pile!
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They are allowed to by specific USA law.
They don't bother making such a law in most countries as the copyright applies to the content, not the physical instance. So a book, DVD, CD, record, cassette, painting, print, magazine, Disney toys, etc, being a physical item can be resold or given away, but you can't give away or sell copies, no matter how made. That's the essence of copyright; defines who has right to make and distribute copies, not the physical item once it's sold.
An exception in many countries is distributing copies of an advert as long as it's not edited to advertise a different product, nor used to to recover a magazine or book with no cover at all (as that might be unsold stock and the wholesale refunds the retailer if there is evidence of destruction, which can be the masthead for a newspaper)