quoted 6 lines It's a violation of US copyright law (Title 17 section 602) to import works
>> It's a violation of US copyright law (Title 17 section 602) to import works
>> that have a US copyright without the permission of the US copyright holder.
>
> But isn't the US copyright holder the same as the foreign copyright
> holder (i.e., the artist?) And therefore, wouldn't said artist generally
> give themselves permission to sell their own records?
Very few artists on major labels own the copyrights to their own work.
quoted 3 lines In the case where a record label may own a copyright (and not the
> In the case where a record label may own a copyright (and not the
> artist), wouldn't it be in the US label's best interest to keep the
> imports highly priced to drive US consumers to the domestic disks?
It's even more in their best interests to keep imports out of the country
completely, which the parallel-import laws allow them to do.
quoted 3 lines The point of the law is probably to prevent undercutting the price of the
> The point of the law is probably to prevent undercutting the price of the
> domestic product, which is certainly not a possibility in a situation where
> US records and CD's are usually around half the price of the imports
I think that's probably a little too narrow a view of the law -- the labels
seem to view these laws primarily as an additional tool for enforcing their
distribution agreements. And in a sense I can't really blame them; if I were
investing X dollars in exclusive US distribution rights to a release, I'd be
annoyed by the general availablility of non-US copies in my territory. But
ultimately I think it's the labels' own fault when they lose sales to imports
-- most of the reasons people buy imports (better track selection, better
sound quality, earlier availability) could be matched by the US labels if they
cared enough to do so.
--
::: Lazlo (lazlo@swcp.com;
http://www.swcp.com/lazlo)