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

The truth of the matter...

[Fyre2012]

...is that we really don't own anything.

Slashdot != legal advice

[stinerman]

IANAL (but cpt kangarooski is), but it would seem to me that once you purchase a work it is yours. You have made backups for just the reason that happened ... the originals were lost.

If you're talking about the RIAA busting down your door and asking you to prove that you have a legally purchased copy of any of those CD-Rs with "their IP" on them, then I think you can be safe knowing they have to prove that it is more likely than not that those are the result of infringement.

Thievery, title, and use right...

[isaac]

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?

(I am not a lawyer, etc.) There's no express right to make a backup of an audio recording, but leaving that aside, what's the point of a backup except to prolong access to the recording beyond the life of the original media? From the legal perspective, it's silly to even make a backup if one loses the right to use it in the event the original media is destroyed.

Now, the question of theft of the original media is slightly more interesting. A thief obtains no legal title to stolen goods, so if ones original media were stolen, one might retain constructive possession of the originals. That constructive possession would, if we assume the backups were themselves legal, permit the continued use of the backup media.

I wonder whether there's any precedent as to what would happen if the originals were later destroyed by the thief - would the use right terminate? If we assume that destruction of the originals in a house fire would terminate the right to use the backups, then I imagine no use right would be retained if the would-be thief hadn't stolen them but destroyed them and left the pieces in the possession of the owner. Wacky.

-Isaac

What happened with implied innocence?

[Vo0k]

What happened to "Innocent until proven guilty"?
Why do -I- have to prove the mp3 in my mp3 player is legal? Why can't my word suffice? Shouldn't RIAA have to prove I obtained it illegally?
They say I got it from p2p. I say I ripped it off a legal CD I misplaced later. Until they -prove- I actually downloaded it from p2p I should be innocent, shouldn't I?