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9th Circuit Guts "First Sale" Rights
- tzs 16y agoI don't think they are gutting anything. They are simply trying to work around the Supreme Court's botched decision in Quality King. Until I read Quality King, I had no idea that the section 6xx limitations on importing had any connection to the section 1xx exceptions to 17 USC 106. And I doubt that Congress had any idea there was a connection, either. The 9th Circuit is trying to find a way to read section 109 so as to undo Quality King and get back to what Congress intended--unauthorized importation of copyrighted works, other than for personal use, is prohibited.
- _delirium 16y agoSo the intended meaning is that a used-book store in Amsterdam can't sell a batch of books to a used-book store in NYC without individually contacting each of the books' copyright holders and asking for their permission to import the book?
- narrator 16y agoThe idea is that the multi-nationals can sell stuff to third worlders at near cost to build market share or comply with price controls and mark up 500% in another country to take advantage of subsidies, medicare reimbursements, perceived brand "value", or on-the-sly price collusion with other vendors and no screwy small fry grey market traders can get in the way of their "marketing policies".
- dantheman 16y agoYep, in other words it's bullshit.
- nhebb 16y agothe Supreme Court's botched decision in Quality King The footer of the Supreme Court ruling says it was a unanimous decision. More than likely, the problem lies in how the law was written, not in how it was interpreted.
- CamperBob 16y agoThe 9th Circuit is trying to find a way to read section 109 so as to undo Quality King and get back to what Congress intended--unauthorized importation of copyrighted works, other than for personal use, is prohibited. Because a wristwatch is a copyrighted work.
- chc 16y agoYou've gotten distracted by the handwaving and forgotten that the "copyrighted work" here is essentially a wristwatch. Specifically, they're talking about the logo they put on the wristwatch, but to argue that a logo on an item brings the whole item under copyright law is madness.
- wjy 16y agoIt's especially mad since there's no copying taking place at all.
- sfall 16y agoWhy are they not suing for breach of contract, which (should / would) contain specifications on selling products regarding the market they would be in
- pillsy 16y agoBecause you can't sue a reseller for breaching a contract if you never had a contract with them in the first place.
- cma 16y agoTrue in this specific case; not true in general: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privity_of_contract#Exceptions http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Privity_of_contract#Exceptions Also notice that this doesn't include prominent examples from labor law (company A that hires someone who will knowingly break a non-compete agreement they held with company B can be held liable even though company A wasn't a party to the contract (c.f. the MSFT/GOOG executive hiring war)).
- sfall 16y agomany companies that sell imported goods hold contacts to protect interst on both sides mfg and seller. Why would you not try and protect your supply of goods
- ck2 16y agoI bet corporation are going to do what Google has done for them on Youtube - get a cut of every activity. So you'll be allowed to sell your Rolex on ebay, as long as the Rolex company get a percentage of the sale. There are some really crazy rulings coming out of the courts lately.
- sabat 16y ago"Pro-business" has apparently come to mean that any desire of a company, especially a large company, should be granted. That watch has a company logo? Pay up.
- jshen 16y agohow does costco fit into your model?
- rictic 16y agoCould you expand on this point? I don't see the relationship between the parent's assertion and Costco (even after reading the wikipedia article on Costco).
- ars 16y agoHe means that costco is a business too. But their desires are not being granted. Meaning that his "pro-business" argument is wrong, since it's pro one business and against a different one. So his entire premise is false.
- electromagnetic 16y agoWell another issue is that costco is a wholesale company. Anything that is anti-costco is also opposing the untold thousands of small businesses that use costco to get cheap supplies and increase profits.
- CWuestefeld 16y ago
- jacquesm 16y agoAt some point in the future the legal system will need to be rebooted because of decisions like this.
- olefoo 16y agoEvery instance of that happening historically has been while in the throes of devastating war, or revolution. It does seem necessary, and it really seems like the US is ratcheting up the pressure higher and that all three branches of government are now captive arms of the plutocracy to the point where they don't even bother with the illusion of evenhandedness anymore.
- MartinCron 16y agoA "reboot" generally takes the form of violent revolution or war. Softer reboots happen (at least nominally) every 4-8 years as we get new administrations in place. Legislation and policy can get better over time, incrementally. It feels short-sighted to throw everything out because of (admittedly ugly) decisions like this one.
- bkrausz 16y agoCode rewrites are always a bad idea...they just need to refactor instead. http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000069.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog0000000069.html
- MartinCron 16y agoThat's exactly what I was getting at. I was even thinking of that article, but I was too lazy to go find it.
- code_duck 16y agoHey, I have an idea! Let's completely destroy well established foundations of commerce in favor of convoluted, complex and rather insane 'IP' laws. The BEST would be if you had to pay large corporations a tax on every single commerce related action you could conceivably undertake.
- Aaronontheweb 16y agoThe 9th circuit does have a pretty terrible batting average, so I'm confident that this will be overturned.