Thinking about selling my CD collection = MP3

Yes, interesting, but it is almost a year old and just that; a blog. Who knows if this person, whoever they may be since there is no way to authenticate who it is, has any better handle on this than anyone else.

Fair enough, we can differ on whether the RIAA is on a general hunt to track down and sue consumers; if you do some research, I think the facts there *are* objectively pretty dismal.

Dismissing Patry's blog as "just another blog" or saying you don't lend any credence to it because its on the internet does not do you credit, however. Patry isn't just some dude with wordpress. His resume is on the website and easily authenticated. FBOW, he is a leading policy scholar in the copyright field--"Senior Copyright Counsel, Google Inc. Former copyright counsel to the U.S. House of Representatives, Committee on the Judiciary; Policy Planning Advisor to the Register of Copyrights; Law Professor Georgetown Law Center (adjunct), Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law (full-time faculty member, founding director L.L.M in Intellectual Property program), author of numerous treatises and articles (including one on fair use with Judge Richard Posner), including a forthcoming multi-volume treatise on copyright." It's not exactly a punter's resume, even though Posner isn't my favorite academic.

Besides, I think we may be in violent agreement, except for our respective views on the RIAA. I was just trying to answer your question on the "proof" issue by noting that, as a practical matter, the legal process is a very expensive way to discern truth. So expensive, in fact, that the actual truth of the matter may be irrelevant when matching an experienced and well funded litigant against a consumer who is a neophyte to the court system.

Actually, the quoted section was misquoting Herman's post before yours... ;)

B'sides, "[n]one agreed on the interpretation of the copywright law as it applies to the area we are discussing" is basically where blog comes out. I think my point in citing the blog was the fact that it spelled out the actual controversy under the law--and the relevant statutory provisions--fairly well. This is not some well considered digital policy issue before the courts, its the intersection of the relatively ancient First Sale Doctrine and the relatively ancient law of Fair Use. The copyright laws were not written with digital media in mind, and haven't changed for a while. The courts are banging square pegs into round holes.

I totally agree with your last two points. Given the vagueness of the law, keeping CDs--in my mind, even if the law itself is screwy--makes practical sense as an last resort backup, makes practical sense in terms of a legal defense should you ever need it, and moral sense in that it seems to me to be the right thing to do as a means of avoiding the bypassing of artist compensation.