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Used Books: An Actual Internet Success Story
theodp writes: "An Actual Internet Success Story explains how, in just a few years, the Internet has transformed the world into a huge marketplace for used books, utterly transforming a business that had gone pretty much unobserved for centuries. The Net has changed how we buy and think about books - someone in Illinois can easily buy a cheap used hardback over the Net from a New York dealer, read it and then resell it to someone in California, having spent, in effect, only a few dollars. According to the story, the increase in the number of used books sold is staggering, maybe 100 times what it was in 1995, and now accounts for more than 15 percent of Amazon's sales. Tales are told of used book dealers lining up nine hours before a library sale to get 'free money,' cutting deals with thrift-store managers and library-sale organizers to avoid 'feeding frenzy' fights, volunteering at the Salvation Army to get first dibs on donations, and offering review copies for half price on the Net weeks before a book is even published."
I've been haunting used book stores for years. It's usually a hit-or-miss proposition. The mass market books are usually pretty easy to find in the local shops, but the more obscure or esoteric books are nearly impossible to find.
Amazon.com and B&N (and their associated sellers) have greatly changed that. I can find almost anything now and usually at a reasonable price. I looked for years to find copies of out-of-print and obscure books before and now it's pretty easy.
I expect it'll be a few years before we're able to get the majority of used-book stores on-line though. Most stores have far too much stock and too few resources to make that happen.
Don't anthropomorphize computers, they don't like it.
You own the disc. The publisher can not take that away from you. Just as with a book where you own the paper. You don't own the music on the disc or the words on the paper. The author/publisher owns them. By selling you a CD or a book, the author has given you the right to use the music or words that are contained on the medium.
In your example, you are taking a copy of the music off of the medium and distributing it sans the disc. Unless the owner give you permission to do so, you are not allowed to do that.
Data is not a tangable object; you can't pick up an idea. You can do anything with the medium that you would please you. However, unless the owner gives you permission to do so, you can not take the data and distribute it independantly of the medium.
I may be wrong, but I believe that you do indeed own the music on the cd, or the words on the paper.
I might not have been clear when I said "own". What I meant by "own" is that that words in the book or the music on the CD are that of the author. You can't claim that they are yours, even if you bought the book or the CD. It is hard to use ideas of ownership for ideas. As I said, you can't pick up and hold words or music. They aren't tangible things.
The author of a work does own the rights to the work, for a limited time as defined by copyright laws. Once the copyright expires, the work becomes part of the public domain. Yet, you still don't "own" the work. I am again using "own" as definded above. The words are still those of the author, you can't claim that they are yours. Your use of the work is no longer restricted but you still don't own the work. The public as a whole does.
So, when you buy a book or CD or other work, you own the physical stuff that the work is distributed on. But you don't own what is contained on the physical stuff.