DescentBB

Dear Internet,
Some of my big textbooks weigh a lot. And because of this I have to leave them in my car between classes. I copied my biggest book (photographing each page) and put it in my hard drive.
My netbook weighs much less than the book. Which I think is funny.

Obviously there are legal issues with this. But I'm not distributing the images or getting a refund. The way I see it, I can do anything I want to this book. As long as I'm not illegally distributing part or all of it.(That includes incorrectly citing it.)
Your thoughts?

The RIAA / MPAA would say doing that is illegal, but nobody on the entire planet who has the authority to do so would do anything to you because of it.

LOL Issac.

So then taking notes would be illegal…

As I understand the law, you have a right to make copies of any material you have purchased the rights to, for personal use only, such as protection from destruction, and the use in your car for example.

Again…For Personal Use Only.

If you don’t have the rights for the material…then each case would be different.

I wouldn’t worry about it, unless you plan to sell the copies.

Krom wrote:The RIAA / MPAA would say doing that is illegal, but nobody on the entire planet who has the authority to do so would do anything to you because of it.

Maybe they would say that if they believe copying music to your ipod is illegal. It's the same concept.
Also, remember that many of these text books have glossaries and other sections of information made to help the student copy for study notes.

Falls under \"fair use\" AFAIK.

Grendel wrote:Falls under "fair use" AFAIK.

Ah! Thank you! Now I'm ready to talk to my teacher about it.

why would you teacher care?

fliptw wrote:why would you teacher care?

She looks like the type...

Spidey wrote:So then taking notes would be illegal…

As I understand the law, you have a right to make copies of any material you have purchased the rights to, for personal use only, such as protection from destruction, and the use in your car for example.

Again…For Personal Use Only.

If you don’t have the rights for the material…then each case would be different.

I wouldn’t worry about it, unless you plan to sell the copies.

Yes, in most cases "For Personal Use Only" is the general rule and practice. (The "fair use" that Grendal mentioned)

However, watch out for the times where the Copyright specifically denies you the right to make even personal copies. Usually don't see that with text books, but it's like that more and more with music, audio, and electronic data. ... Which means that it's slowly becoming more and more important to read (or at least peruse briefly) the copyright included with stuff.

I use to scan in and create in Adobe their entire stock room of course material for the previous company I worked for. Now that I am taking college classes again, I would really LOVE to have a ctrl F function ability when I am reading a textbook. So I told my wife I was going to scan it in to PDF (unfortunately page by page) & she is totally against it lol.

Since when does anyone have the right to tell you that you can't copy something you have a legit license to?

If you copy a book you already own to a digital format, and won't redistribute it, how could that possibly violate a law?

Bleh...

Its because the MPAA and the RIAA are quite determined to eliminate \"fair use\", the DMCA includes several clauses to that effect. Granted for now nobody cares about copying books for personal use.

I'm still stuck on you photographed every page, how big are they? Couldn't you find it on the internets?

Gooberman wrote:I'm still stuck on you photographed every page, how big are they? Couldn't you find it on the internets?

I just put the camera on a tripod and the book on a "book" stand. My friend turned the pages while I pressed a button.
800 pages taken.
854.7 KB per page.
All letters are visible except for fine print on maps. (...not worried since I have the book, at home if I need it.)

TechPro wrote: However, watch out for the times where the Copyright specifically denies you the right to make even personal copies. Usually don't see that with text books, but it's like that more and more with music, audio, and electronic data. ... Which means that it's slowly becoming more and more important to read (or at least peruse briefly) the copyright included with stuff.

Don't think so...

You can deny fair use by including a disclaimer. Fair use is a right granted to the public on all copyrighted work. Fair use rights take precedence over the author's interest. Thus the copyright holder cannot use a non-binding disclaimer, or notification, to revoke the right of fair use on works. However, binding agreements such as contracts or license agreements may take precedence over fair use rights.[32]

Hey Isaac, you gots a good OCR program?

X, you just confirmed what was stated which was that you need to watch out for the times it \"specifically denies you the right\" (like the disclaimer you mentioned?) and when they have you specifically accept or agree to the copyright ... that makes it a binding agreement which may take precedence over fair use.

That leads us to the last bit I said about ... drumroll ... how it's \"important to read\" the dang copyright information. Thus ensuring that you are aware of what they are permitting you to do with their copyrighted material.

Sorry, I didn't quote it properly. That was listed under the section of common misconceptions. What you said in your first post is invalid. The italics part in my quote is the part that is NOT true and it goes on to explain why. Only way you can give up fair use is if you specifically agree to in a contract. A custom copyright disclaimer doesn't work. If I ever had to sign a contract to buy a Music CD or DVD then I would never buy it.

Read through that wikipedia article Grendel posted and you should be able to understand more how it works from that. Again, they can not deny you fair use unless you sign a contract or agreement.

Reminds me of a funny (well, sad) story of when I worked at The UPS Store: One of our mail box renters came in one day while an elderly customer was photocopying a professional photo of him and his dead wife. You know, when you go to get a photo taken of you and your family by a photographer (not sure how many people do that any more). Anyway, I forget why he was copying it but he was only making one. This box holder guy is a photographer himself and apparently runs a photography club in the area as well. He confronts this elderly customer and tells him it is illegal to copy that photo and attempts to actually stop him. He wanted me to stop him as well. I couldn't care less and ended up getting in a big argument with that box holder. He even tried to get me fired. My boss and I had a laugh about it and ended up putting up copyright notices in the store as a disclaimer. I assume that photographer was disgruntled about all the changes recently in the photography field - probably doesn't make much money any more.

Spidey wrote:Hey Isaac, you gots a good OCR program?

I was thinking about checking out what the Ubuntu software center had available. But the only reason I would use one is to runs searches within the text. Which would be nice, but it's not something I really need at the moment.

TechPro wrote:X, you just confirmed what was stated which was that you need to watch out for the times it "specifically denies you the right" (like the disclaimer you mentioned?) and when they have you specifically accept or agree to the copyright ... that makes it a binding agreement which may take precedence over fair use.

Wouldn't that be like signing a waver, 'not to sue'. I mean, you can sue even if you agreed not to; the law is the law. So wouldn't 'fair use' still be legal even if tried to sign your rights away? It's like a company policy trying to override the law. Or at least that's what it sounds like to me.

From my 10 years in the Printing/Copying business, you are allowed to make copies of anything you own but can't sell it. I was not allowed to copy text books for you because I would be selling it to you which is not allowed. You could stand and do it yourself.

As for photos, it's the users descretion to copy the professional ones. We didn't make colour copies of those. The client could make black and white ones no problem.

Most places don't allow clients to use the colour copiers because they are to complex and to fragile.

CDN_Merlin wrote:From my 10 years in the Printing/Copying business, you are allowed to make copies of anything you own but can't sell it. I was not allowed to copy text books for you because I would be selling it to you which is not allowed. You could stand and do it yourself.

As for photos, it's the users descretion to copy the professional ones. We didn't make colour copies of those. The client could make black and white ones no problem.

Most places don't allow clients to use the colour copiers because they are to complex and to fragile.

Good point! So if I were to take my book to a photocopy business it would be illegal, because someone would be making money off the dubbing of the book.

Isaac, no it wouldn't be illegal if you copied it there. Only if they did it. But I bet you they won't.

It was my impresion that schollars can copy whatever they want as long as they're not selling it.