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'Buy/Burn/Return' May Violate Copyright Law

Buy It, Burn It, Return It" is the policy recently adopted by a record chain in New Jersey. A radio ad for another retail store states: "You find it, you buy it, you burn it. What, I mean, not really burn it. You know. Put it in your iPod or MP3. And then sell it back. That's right: we'll buy your CDs back." The retailer can then sell the recording as used, over and over again, buying it back for less than the selling price and profiting perhaps even more than by selling it only one time. <br/>The problem with these "new" record-retail tactics is that they clearly violate the rights of sound-recording and musical-composition copyright owners to control the rental distribution of their works.

7 minute read November 29, 2005 at 02:17 PM
By
Geoffrey Hull
'Buy/Burn/Return' May Violate Copyright Law

“Buy It, Burn It, Return It” is the policy recently adopted by a record chain in New Jersey. A radio ad for another retail store states: “You find it, you buy it, you burn it.

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