Re: [dvd-discuss] Interesting 1st sale-shrinkwrap-EULA-(c)infringementcase

[Kurt Hockenbury <khockenb(at)stevens-tech.edu>]

On Fri, 2 Nov 2001, Jeme A Brelin wrote:

> On Fri, 2 Nov 2001, Noah silva wrote:
> > So let me be stupid here and ask...  What happens when someone who
> > wants to do something against (GPL, BSD Lisence, MPL, SISSL, LGPL,
> > etc.) claims he isn't bound by the lisence because he has "first sale"
> > (or first gift?).
>
> First sale doesn't give you the right to redistribute copies... certainly
> not commercially.
>
> I don't see how you could violate any of those licenses by practicing the
> rights transfered at first sale.

The problem is first sale assumes copyright is bound into a physical object.

<DA>

Under first sale, can I take a book, ink out words, write notes in the margin,
draw pictures on the fly leaf, etc, and then re-sell the book?  I think the
answer is yes, if I don't claim any copyright on it (otherwise it may be
considered a derivative work, instead of a "damaged" book).

Run that book through a shredder, and re-sell the shreddings?  Again, I think
yes.

Can I buy a video game cartridge, solder a wire across a pair of pins that
changes the game to give the player unlimitted ammo, and re-sell the
cartridge?

If the answer is yes, then under first sale, could I "buy" (for free) a disk
with a GPL'd program source code, can I edit the source code, run it through a
compiler, overwriting the orignal source on the disk, and re-sell the compiled
version without my edited source?

</DA>

-Kurt