Private Translation of Japanese Language Book - Copyright

[justalayman]

*makes popcorn*

Make plenty.

I'm simply amazed that ldij feels she can go to toe to toe with Quincy regarding copyright law but outright flabbergasted at calling him a jerk. Quincy a jerk? I don't think on his worst day he could be a jerk.

 

[quincy]

Make plenty.

I'm simply amazed that ldij feels she can go to toe to toe with Quincy regarding copyright law but outright flabbergasted at calling him a jerk. Quincy a jerk? I don't think on his worst day he could be a jerk.

Oh. I CAN be a jerk.

I just don't think asking LdiJ to support what she says is being a jerk.

Popcorn sounds good.

 

[LdiJ]

Asking you to support what you say is not being a jerk. Calling someone a jerk IS being a jerk.



Do you understand what you quoted? Where in what you quoted does it say you can copy a copyrighted work or create derivatives of the copyrighted work?

When you legally purchase a legal copy of a copyrighted work, you can sell that work, or give it away, or (in the case of artwork) hang it on your wall, or you can toss the copyrighted work in the trash. All of this is permissible under the first sale doctrine.

However, you CANNOT exercise the rights EXCLUSIVE to the copyright holder because ... these rights are EXCLUSIVE to the copyright holder.



You are not being purposefully obtuse, are you?

From the Copyright Act, scroll to section 106, exclusive rights (or perhaps read everything ): https://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html

Definition of "exclusive:" Given or belonging to no other; not shared or divided; excluding all but what is specified.

Creating derivatives is an EXCLUSIVE right of a copyright holder.

Now, I mentioned in an earlier post a possible "defense" to copyright infringement.

One defense is FAIR USE. Fair use is NOT permission to exercise a copyright holder's exclusive right. It is a defense to infringing on a copyright holder's exclusive rights. If a copyright holder objects to the unauthorized use of their copyrighted work and sues the infringer over this unauthorized use, the infringer can argue, "yes, I infringed but it is an excusable infringement." There are factors a court will look at to determine if the defense defeats the claim.

I did not call you a jerk for challenging what I had to say about copyright law. You know what I called you jerk about and it was not that.

You specifically said that someone could not have a work translated for their own personal use.

Prove it. Either show me where in the law it says that...or give me case law that says that.

I know that you are wrong. I know that you will not be able to prove that. I know it because doing something for one's own personal use (after one has paid for a copy of the copyrighted product) can never harm someone with a copyright. Therefore it cannot be illegal.

This whole argument is idiotic...and you are extremely smart so you know it as well. I am not the one who is being obtuse.

 

[quincy]

I did not call you a jerk for challenging what I had to say about copyright law. You know what I called you jerk about and it was not that.

I have NO idea what you are talking about. I asked you to provide legal support for your statements and you called me a jerk.

You specifically said that someone could not have a work translated for their own personal use.

Prove it. Either show me where in the law it says that...or give me case law that says that.

I GAVE you the law. You cannot translate a copyrighted work without authorization from the copyright holder BECAUSE it infringes on the copyright holder's exclusive right to create derivatives.

The first sale doctrine does NOT allow you to infringe on a copyright holder's rights. Again, take a look at the "warning" you see at the beginning of a movie on a DVD.

And please read the link YOU provided. You failed to post the full paragraph from which you pulled your quote. The paragraph went on to say that, "Since the first sale doctrine never protects a defendant who makes an unauthorized reproduction of a copyrighted work, the first sale doctrine cannot be a successful defense in cases that allege infringing reproduction."

I know that you are wrong. I know that you will not be able to prove that. I know it because doing something for one's own personal use (after one has paid for a copy of the copyrighted product) can never harm someone with a copyright. Therefore it cannot be illegal.

You cannot "know" I am wrong because nothing I have said is wrong. What you said above, however, is not in accord with the law.

This whole argument is idiotic...and you are extremely smart so you know it as well. I am not the one who is being obtuse.

The argument - one you started by the way with your inaccurate statements - is only idiotic because one of the participants (looking at you here, LdiJ ) does not know copyright law.

 

[LdiJ]

I have NO idea what you are talking about. I asked you to provide legal support for your statements and you called me a jerk.



I GAVE you the law. You cannot translate a copyrighted work without authorization from the copyright holder BECAUSE it infringes on the copyright holder's exclusive right to create derivatives.

The first sale doctrine does NOT allow you to infringe on a copyright holder's rights. Again, take a look at the "warning" you see at the beginning of a movie on a DVD.

And please read the link YOU provided. You failed to post the full paragraph from which you pulled your quote. The paragraph went on to say that, "Since the first sale doctrine never protects a defendant who makes an unauthorized reproduction of a copyrighted work, the first sale doctrine cannot be a successful defense in cases that allege infringing reproduction."



You cannot "know" I am wrong because nothing I have said is wrong. What you said above, however, is not in accord with the law.



The argument - one you started by the way with your inaccurate statements - is only idiotic because one of the participants (looking at you here, LdiJ ) does not know copyright law.

Do not ever ask me to prove something to you again...since you refuse to do it yourself. I have asked you to prove that someone cannot make a derivative, of a work that they paid for, for their own personal use. So far, you have merely proven that someone cannot make a derivative for commercial use, and that was never in question.

 

[justalayman]

So maybe ldij can explain how the translator can create a derivative work and distribute it to the op and it not be infringement. Yes, the translator would hold the copyright to their individual work so distributing it to the op takes it out of personal use. In case you bring about a work for hire; doesn't apply. The original work already has copyright protection so the op cannot cause a work for hire to be created without the original copyright holders permission.

 

[quincy]

Do not ever ask me to prove something to you again...since you refuse to do it yourself. I have asked you to prove that someone cannot make a derivative, of a work that they paid for, for their own personal use. So far, you have merely proven that someone cannot make a derivative for commercial use, and that was never in question.

I will continue to ask you to prove what you say, LdiJ. You cannot on a legal forum expect to spout falsehoods and think you won't get called on it. You will.

Translations are derivatives. Making derivatives is an exclusive right of the copyright holder. Creating a translation of a copyrighted work from one language to another requires permission from the copyright holder. That is the law - and I provided you with a link to the law.

There are DEFENSES available to those who take a copyrighted work and create derivatives for their personal use, this if the copyright holder discovers the infringement in the first place (which is probably unlikely) and decides to sue over the unauthorized use of the work.

I provided you with one defense - fair use. And again, this is a DEFENSE to infringement. Making a derivative of a copyrighted work is infringement.

For a fair use defense, a court weighs four major factors - the purpose and character of the use (is it for a commercial or educational purpose), the nature of the copyrighted work (fiction, nonfiction), the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the whole of the work (small quote, reproduction) and the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work (for registered works, there are statutory damages).

Translations of literary works are (generally) licensed by the author and the text approved by the author of the original text for a few reasons. One reason of course is financial - the copyright holder is entitled to be paid for the use of his work. Another is control over the quality of the translation (so words are not put into the work that change the character of the work or the author's intended meanings).

We ALL unintentionally infringe on copyrighted material. Most of the infringement is de minimis, or trivial and of no legal consequence. The drawing by a child of a Mickey Mouse look-alike, or a parent's changing up of the words of a storybook when reading it aloud, or the making of a backup of a backup of a backup CD for security reasons, or making a mobile for a baby using Disney princess figures - these are all acts that infringe on the rights of the copyright holders. There is a whole host of stuff we do personally and we are not going to have Disney or other copyright holders knocking at our doors.

Most of this personal infringement goes undetected by the copyright holder; a lot of this infringement can be excused as inconsequential; some of this infringement could be judged by a court as a fair use of the material; and some of this infringement will result in the infringer being sent a settlement demand letter or a summons and complaint.

I will post back with links to cases for you to read. But if I go to the trouble of providing you with cases, I will expect you to read them. If you don't understand the court decisions, I will be happy to explain the how's and whys of them all.

And, LdiJ, I want to say that I have found your tone in this thread offensive from the start. I don't mind disagreements but I DO expect those who disagree to support their arguments. You have failed to do this. What you THINK the law should be is NOT the same as what the law IS. I provided the law.

 

[quincy]

First, and to repeat what has been said previously, any unauthorized use of a copyrighted work which falls within the terms of Section 106 (which gives copyright owners control over reproductions and adaptations and distributions and performances and displays of their works) violates the copyright law unless it comes within the terms of an express statutory exemption.

This was not always the case for translations. In 1835, LdiJ would have made a good argument that the translation of a Japanese book to English does not violate the original author's copyright. A court held, in Stowe v. Thomas, 23 F.Cas 201 (C.C.E.D. Pa 1835), that Harried Beecher Stowe's copyright in "Uncle Tom's Cabin" did not extend to the publication of an unauthorized German translation. https://law.resource.org/pub/us/case/reporter/F.Cas/0023.f.cas/0023.f.cas.0201.2.pdf

The law, however, has changed. The Copyright Act in 1831 gave an author the "sole right and liberty of printing, reprinting, publishing and vending" their work, but did not include adaptations or derivatives. The Copyright Act today has substantially expanded the rights of copyright owners.

The US copyright law, and international copyright laws, have increasingly recognized that authors rights to control and be compensated for uses of their works extend to personal uses. There was indication of these changes in A & M Records v. Napster (https://www.law.cornell.edu/copyright/cases/239_F3d_1004.htm) and in MGM v. Grokster, https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/04-480.ZS.html).

Although Justice John Paul Stevens said in 1983, "It would be plainly unconstitutional to prohibit a person from singing a copyrighted song in the shower or jotting down a copyrighted poem he hears on the radio," and this still holds true, there are not now and there has never been express privileges or exemptions given a private user of copyrighted material for personal use. There are only defenses.

As the Napster court noted in its discussion, a copyright holder needs only to prove copyright ownership and that one of his exclusive rights was violated, and that is a prima facie case of infringement. Any unauthorized reproduction or adaptation or distribution or performance or display of a copyrighted work is copyright infringement unless it is covered by a specific exemption, limitation or privilege.

 

[CTU]

Do not ever ask me to prove something to you again...since you refuse to do it yourself. I have asked you to prove that someone cannot make a derivative, of a work that they paid for, for their own personal use. So far, you have merely proven that someone cannot make a derivative for commercial use, and that was never in question.

Oh my gawd ... it's right there in plain view!

WHY are you doing this? Why? I don't understand why you're behaving this way throughout the thread

 

[quincy]

Oh my gawd ... it's right there in plain view!

WHY are you doing this? Why? I don't understand why you're behaving this way throughout the thread

I thought I had made the law pretty clear.

I know that there are people like LdiJ who believe that all personal uses of copyrighted material is legal. However the law as written simply doesn't support that belief.

 

[justalayman]

I do have an question concerning something you have stated in this thread though Quincy. You have referred to the FBI warning on dvds.

I thought it is lawful to copy a DVD if it is used for personal use, held by whomever also holds the original, and is not used while the original is also being used (same rules that apply to cd's basically). I understood the issue was that it is unlawful to circumvent the anti-piracy protections used on some dvd's (ripping) but otherwise it was lawful to create an archival copy. Am I misunderstanding the law as it's currently applied to dvds?

 

[quincy]

I do have an question concerning something you have stated in this thread though Quincy. You have referred to the FBI warning on dvds.

I thought it is lawful to copy a DVD if it is used for personal use, held by whomever also holds the original, and is not used while the original is also being used (same rules that apply to cd's basically). I understood the issue was that it is unlawful to circumvent the anti-piracy protections used on some dvd's (ripping) but otherwise it was lawful to create an archival copy. Am I misunderstanding the law as it's currently applied to dvds?

No. It is still illegal to make backup copies of DVDs and Blu-Ray discs for personal use.

You can make a backup copy of a CD if the CD has no technical measures taken to protect it.

This issue was revisited and addressed by the Library of Congress in October 2015. There were a few tweaks in the law/DMCA at that time and a few additional exemptions added (e.g., for libraries, documentary filmmakers) but no exemption for personal uses or backup copies.

Here is a link to the Library of Congress 2015 adopted recommendations (you can scroll to page 75 to see the additions):

https://copyright.gov/1201/2015/fedreg-publicinspectionFR.pdf