

Do you own your digital content? - andyjohnson0
http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2012/sep/03/do-you-own-your-digital-content

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lutusp
When I had LP records, I could legally give them to someone else. Now that I
have MP3s, I can't do that any more (at least, not legally).

When I had films on VHS cassettes, I could give them to someone else. Now that
I have Netflix/cable/satellite TV and an HDMI connection between the cable box
and TV, I can't do that any more.

When I had printed books, I could give them to someone else. Now that I have
e-books, I can't do that any more -- indeed, there's a system in place in
which the e-book vendor can delete any e-books from your reader for any
reason, and without warning (as amazon.com did with two George Orwell books in
2009:
[http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18ama...](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18amazon.html)).

So the question is not whether I own digital content, but what exactly does
"own" mean? Owning a printed book isn't remotely like owning an e-book, but
the same word is loosely used to describe both.

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andyjohnson0
I am a subscriber to emusic.com, who were offering drm-free mp3 downloads long
before Apply or Amazon, and I have bought a lot of music from them. Unlike
Amazon [1], their terms of use [2] seem to be silent about ownership and
transfer.

Whatever the legal reality actually is, I consider that I 'own' the bits that
I've downloaded, and could give them to my children if I wanted. I do think
that it pretty unlikely that my kids will be interested in their old dad's
music collection though.

[1]
[http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId...](http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=200285010#content)
[2] <http://www.emusic.com/info/help/terms-of-use-uk/>

