What is Proof of Music Ownership?

scottsk asks: "What is proof of music ownership? I can't find a good answer anywhere. Let's assume some random person is hauled into court allegedly for having music that he has not legitimately bought. What must that person produce to prove the music was purchased legitimately? Is producing an original commercially sold CD with the music acceptable, or is some further proof of purchase needed (cash register receipt, cancelled check, etc.)? What if a person has digitized a commercial cassette, like digitizing a photo? Must the person carry the cassette around forever, or is just the cassette insert sufficient? (What about an LP record that has been digitized?)" Now, what happens if you've lost all of your property in a fire, but still had an off-site digital backup of your legally purchased music somewhere? Does the loss of the original property invalidate the legality of the backups?

Comments

What is Proof of Music Ownership?

[John Hasler]

> What is proof of music ownership?

Copyright registration in your name.

catch-22

[TheSHAD0W]

This is why the RIAA isn't invading people's homes and going through their CDs and hard drives. Yet. They'd *like* to say that you are only entitled to one copy of each work you purchase, and if it's destroyed you'd need to buy another copy. But they're already raising tons of consumer discontent and if they push it much farther they risk a huge backlash.

Not Something to Worry About

[Anonymous Coward]

The question is flawed. The music companies aren't suing anyone for possession. They are suing them for providing copies to others.

The question should never come up.

[argent]

It's legal in the US to record music from the radio, to rip it from your CDs, to record it on a cassette tape from another cassette tape or CD or LP, to download it from the Internet (but not to upload it, and of course P2P filesharing technology makes everyone a redistributor), to stick a microphone out your window and record it from your neighbours stereo...

So, given that, the burden of proof is on the RIAA. And they know it, why do you think they go to such efforts to catch people actually using P2P software to get their music fix?

Two Thoughts

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

What is proof of music ownership? I can't find a good answer anywhere. Let's assume some random person is hauled into court allegedly for having music that he has not legitimately bought.

First Response:

Criminal court? He doesn't have to prove shit, innocent until proven guilty, right?

Civil court? The accuser still needs a preponderance of evidence. Just about anything from physical media, to a receipt, to testimony by a friend that he saw the guy make the purchase ought to be enough reduce the accuser to less than a preponderance.

Second Response:

If this is about one of the MAFIAA's "sue 'em all and let God sort it out" lawsuits then chances are it doesn't matter if he has legal ownership or not. Those suits are about distribution and not simply possesion of a copy.

No way I'm going to double-check and go dig through USC Title 17 on a Friday night while under the influence of tequila, but I don't think it's illegal to receive an unauthorized copy, just to make the copy or to distribute the copy. Feel free to dig through the spaghetti code on the other end of that link to find something that says otherwise.

PS, all typos and poor logic are the sole property of Padron's Resposada.

Re:Well ...

[cpt kangarooski]

Citations, please.

We agree that plaintiffs have shown that Napster users infringe at least two of the copyright holders' exclusive rights: the rights of reproduction, 106(1); and distribution, 106(3). Napster users who upload file names to the search index for others to copy violate plaintiffs' distribution rights. Napster users who download files containing copyrighted music violate plaintiffs' reproduction rights.

A&M Records v. Napster, 239 F.3d 1004, 1014 (9th Cir. 2001).

[W]e do not hold that a computer owner who downloads copyrighted software onto a computer cannot infringe the software's copyright. When the computer owner downloads copyrighted software, [he] possesses the software, which then functions in the service of the computer or its owner.

CoStar Group v. LoopNet, 373 F.3d 544, 551 (4th Cir. 2004).

Last June the Supreme Court held in [Grokster] that a distributed file-sharing system is engaged in contributory copyright infringement when its principal object is the dissemination of copyrighted material. The foundation of this holding is a belief that people who post or download music files are primary infringers. [Aimster], which anticipated Grokster, made the same assumption.

BMG Music v. Gonzalez, 430 F.3d 888, 889 (7th Cir. 2005)

I guess it depends on how you define `seriously', because I see people arguing otherwise all the time.

Actually, I think it depends on how I define 'people,' because I have yet to see anyone who knows anything about US copyright law argue otherwise. Plenty of knowledgable people, including myself, will argue that it shouldn't be illegal, but everyone will accept that it is at least prima facie illegal.