CHICAGO (MarketWatch) Tucked into the U.S. Supreme Courts agenda this fall is a little-known case that could upend your ability to resell everything from your grandmothers antique furniture to your iPhone 4.
At issue in Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons is the first-sale doctrine in copyright law, which allows you to buy and then sell things like electronics, books, artwork and furniture, as well as CDs and DVDs, without getting permission from the copyright holder of those products.
Under the doctrine, which the Supreme Court has recognized since 1908, you can resell your stuff without worry because the copyright holder only had control over the first sale.
Put simply, though Apple Inc. AAPL -2.13% has the copyright on the iPhone and Mark Owen has it on the book No Easy Day, you can still sell your copies to whomever you please whenever you want without retribution.
Thats being challenged now for products that are made abroad, and if the Supreme Court upholds an appellate court ruling, it would mean that the copyright holders of anything you own that has been made in China, Japan or Europe, for example, would have to give you permission to sell it.
It means that its harder for consumers to buy used products and harder for them to sell them, said Jonathan Band, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law Center, who filed a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of the American Library Association, the Association of College and Research Libraries and the Association for Research Libraries. This has huge consumer impact on all consumer groups.
Another likely result is that it would hit you financially because the copyright holder would now want a piece of that sale.
It could be your personal electronic devices or the family jewels that have been passed down from your great-grandparents who immigrated from Spain. It could be a book that was written by an American writer but printed and bound overseas, or an Italian painters artwork.
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/yo...own-stuff-is-in-peril-2012-10-04?pagenumber=1
Wow, really hope the supreme court reverses this bad decision. Can you imagine not being able to resell your old ipad or iphone. Not having the right to resell family heirlooms. You wouldn't be able to resell used textbooks, and other things too.