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>But it's copyright laws that allowed this to happen legally. How should Amazon decide which legal rights publishers get to keep and which rights they don't? L

by arohner 17y ago

>But it's copyright laws that allowed this to happen legally. How should Amazon decide which legal rights publishers get to keep and which rights they don't? Legally, you can write a contract that says Amazon has the right to break into your house and repossess books they've sold you that they no longer have the rights to. Just because it's legal doesn't mean it's good business.

andreyf 17y ago
Legally, you can write a contract that says Amazon has the right to break into your house and repossess books they've sold you that they no longer have the rights to. Could you cite the law which would make such a contract enforceable?
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
- arohner 17y ago
  Fine, IANAL. Maybe we can't have a contract that says Amazon can literally break down doors but you can sign contracts that have physical analogs that require you returning the book to Amazon. The core of my point still stands though. Amazon is using DRM and EULAs to accomplish things that people would not normally expect when thinking about a book. Amazon wants people to think of the things they "buy" on their kindle as books, but this incident demonstrates that they are not. Amazon is (probably) legally within their rights to do what they did according to the kindle contract, but that doesn't mean it's good for business.
  - andreyf 17y ago
    Amazon is using DRM and EULAs to accomplish things that people would not normally expect when thinking about a book Just because people expect to have certain rights, doesn't mean they do. If people expect to have rights (to keep copyrighted material indefinitely) that the law of the land takes away from them, the problem isn't with the mechanism through which that law is implemented, it's with the law itself!
scott_s 17y ago
You probably can't. I don't know if it's at the federal or the state level, but people are usually protected from signing away their rights in a contract. For example, a contract that stated I was not able to vote in an upcoming election would be unenforceable.

by arohner 17y ago

andreyf 17y ago

Legally, you can write a contract that says Amazon has the right to break into your house and repossess books they've sold you that they no longer have the rights to. Could you cite the law which would make such a contract enforceable?

deleted 17y ago
[deleted]
arohner 17y ago
Fine, IANAL. Maybe we can't have a contract that says Amazon can literally break down doors but you can sign contracts that have physical analogs that require you returning the book to Amazon. The core of my point still stands though. Amazon is using DRM and EULAs to accomplish things that people would not normally expect when thinking about a book. Amazon wants people to think of the things they "buy" on their kindle as books, but this incident demonstrates that they are not. Amazon is (probably) legally within their rights to do what they did according to the kindle contract, but that doesn't mean it's good for business.
- andreyf 17y ago
  Amazon is using DRM and EULAs to accomplish things that people would not normally expect when thinking about a book Just because people expect to have certain rights, doesn't mean they do. If people expect to have rights (to keep copyrighted material indefinitely) that the law of the land takes away from them, the problem isn't with the mechanism through which that law is implemented, it's with the law itself!

scott_s 17y ago

You probably can't. I don't know if it's at the federal or the state level, but people are usually protected from signing away their rights in a contract. For example, a contract that stated I was not able to vote in an upcoming election would be unenforceable.