CD Mailing

May 10, 2005 4:48 PM

How legal/illegal is mailing CDs (of MP3s) through the mail?

I mean, if I send a burned CD through the mail, will I get in trouble for it? Is there ever a possibility that the USPS would check the data? What about burned DVDs?

posted by graventy to technology (23 comments total)

You would never get in trouble for it. The USPS does not habitually open mail. They are not the police. Although I imagine they will call the authorities if they have a suspicious package, the things that would make them suspicious would be ticking sounds, a strong cannabis scent, etc. A flat package that for all they know may be a perfectly legitimate CD or DVD? Not gonna raise so much as an eyebrow.
posted by kindall at 5:07 PM on May 10, 2005

I think the likelihood of the USPS opening your letter/package is close to nil. That's not the business they're in, and I imagine it violates their code of ethics as long as your package obviously isn't a bomb, anthrax, etc.
posted by thebabelfish at 5:09 PM on May 10, 2005

No more il/legal than sending them through the internet, state lines and all. But unlike snooping P2P networks, it's a lot of legal paper work to open someone's unsuspicious mail, so the copyright police or the RIAA probably won't bust you.

Note: I'm no lawyer, but I've seen every episode of The Wire and an episode of Law and Order. Television wouldn't lie to me about these things.
posted by gaelenh at 5:15 PM on May 10, 2005

I mailed a two-disc set a few weeks ago and it was delivered without the packaging I sent it in. Obviously it had been opened, by act of God or snoopy postman, we don't know. May have raised a flag because it was close to a pound, but I didn't have the address when I got to the post office, so I bought a bubble envelope and the correct postage and dropped the package into one of those blue street boxes (there's a security warning on those boxes about packages over one pound).

Either way, that was weird. CD shows up in a mailbox with no envelope, no postage, no address. Usually I just wrap the disc itself in one sheet of 8.5x11 and put a 39-cent stamp on it. No problems there.
posted by airguitar at 5:24 PM on May 10, 2005

The post office does reserve the right to open media mail packages and verify that the contents meet the media mail guidelines at any time in the shipping process. I doubt they would check the contents of any discs though (unless maybe the label said SUPAH-LEET WAREZ GROOP PRESENTS REWENG OV TEH SIFF-ZERO DAY CAMM ADDITION).
posted by PinkStainlessTail at 5:25 PM on May 10, 2005

This is what one counter person at the Post Office told me, from the previous question about bringing burned discs into the US from abroad.
posted by CunningLinguist at 5:43 PM on May 10, 2005

I've sent close to a dozen packets containing a couple of self-made mix CDs to people all over the world, and have received as many packets in return. I've never been aware of any of those packets having been opened, so I guess the probability's pretty small.
posted by koenie at 5:44 PM on May 10, 2005

No more il/legal than sending them through the internet, state lines and all.

Not true. If you're sending them through the mail, then you are making a conscious decision to knowingly send them across state lines. With a P2P network, you have no idea if the individuals accessing the files are are next door, across the country, or across the world. You can't claim ignorance when you've made out the address...

The USPS does not habitually open mail. They are not the police

Very true. BUT, I believe they could do it under court order. The fact that it's unlikely that they would do it without probable cause is far different from saying that they wouldn't do it under court order.

All in all? You're not inviting suspicion from doing it. But that doesn't mean that you're in the clear, either...
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 5:45 PM on May 10, 2005

Sharing songs on a one-to-one basis, i.e. giving someone a disk, IS NOT ILLEGAL. It falls under the "fair use" area of copyright.

Apparently the RIAA did a Vulcan Mind Meld on everybody on the planet except me and made them forget that. It sucks how well they've managed to bury that point in all the hoopla over music copyright.

You can make a backup copy. You can transfer music from one format to another for personal use. And you can even share it with a few other folks- unless you reach the point of being a mass distributor, i.e., playing it on the radio or sending it out over a P2P network, you are PERFECTLY LEGAL, despite what the RIAA would like for you to believe.

Remember, "home taping is killing the record industry." The RIAA is an advocacy group, not a source of reliable information.

(For the record, I am not a P2P evangelist... I don't use it, and I hated the RIAA long before P2P existed.)
posted by BoringPostcards at 6:05 PM on May 10, 2005

I was in two MetaSwap groups earlier this year. Of the nine CDs I received, only one had been opened/inspected.

I live in Canada, and my Habaneras and Motif swappers were in the UK, Oz, Sweden, Canada and in the USA. No trouble from Canadian authorities for sending ten copies of my CDs out into the world, nor was there any trouble from receiving my swappers' beautiful compilations.
posted by seawallrunner at 6:09 PM on May 10, 2005

BoringPostcards, since I just posted this question, I'm wondering if by your lights the swapping/mailing of a hard disk full of, say, 250GB of mp3s along with 3-5 other people would fall under "fair/personal use" category you describe.
posted by stupidsexyFlanders at 6:16 PM on May 10, 2005

(I'll preface this by stating my utter hatred of RIAA and their kind...)

BoringPostcards, that's not fair use in any way, shape, or form. Yes, you can make a backup. Yes, you can transfer formats for personal use. You can even sample it and use portions of it publicly under certain situations. But to copy a song and give it to someone else isn't fair use, it's a copyright violation. (This is a great source for topics like this.)

(I'm not saying it's wrong, mind you, just illegal. I'll leave it up to you to decide the difference...)

The fact that they are going after people doesn't have to do with the fact that swapping a tape in the 80s is legal and swapping an MP3 in the 00's is illegal. They're both illegal. But the perceived threat is the scale of the situation, not the newfound illegality of it.
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 7:05 PM on May 10, 2005

Sharing songs on a one-to-one basis, i.e. giving someone a disk, IS NOT ILLEGAL. It falls under the "fair use" area of copyright.

It is not "fair use." Fair use is a specific legal doctrine intended to cover the use of excerpts of works for comment, criticism, reporting, education, and so forth. It doesn't cover giving copies of songs to your friends, sorry. Read what the U. S. copyright office has to say about it.

The Audio Home Recording Act of 1992 (Title 17, Chapter 10) does allow one to make copies of one's own music for noncommercial use in Section 1008 (more properly, it gives home tapers immunity from prosecution for such acts). However, this Act specifically defines a "digital musical recording" as a material object -- the record companies were primarily worried about digital audio tape at the time (this is the same act that instituted SCMS for DAT) -- so it doesn't apply to trading computer files over the Internet.

The only test related to the legality of MP3s (the Diamond Rio case) was settled after the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals refused to grant a preliminary injunction against Diamond on the grounds that what the Rio copied was files from a computer hard disk. A computer hard disk could be a material object that contained digital music, in which case it would have qualified as a "digital musical recording" under the AHRA, except for the minor fact that the AHRA specifically exempted media that stored computer software except as necessary to play the music! The issue of copying music around as files over the Internet did not really come into play and there is no law or court decision making it legal to do so in the same manner as the AHRA. But as long as you do it in the form of a material object, you're covered.
posted by kindall at 7:13 PM on May 10, 2005

When you make copies of material you legally own (but do not hold the copyright) for someone elses use and transmit them you're out of legal ground.

Your probability of being caught may be low but the law is being broken.

The law isn't exactly relative.
posted by rudyfink at 7:28 PM on May 10, 2005

BoringPostcards, that's absolute nonsense. Picking up the first CD to hand, I read the back: 'unauthorised copying, hiring, lending, reproduction, public performance and broadcasting of the work prohibited.' In this case, and many others like it, it's specifically prohibited to even lend the CD to someone, never mind copy it and distribute it to a few friends. You're unlikely to get busted for lending something to someone, but the point is that it's nominally prohibited.

The fact of everyone doing something and the authorities generally not being bothered about it doesn't automatically give you immunity from ever getting into trouble. If I'm caught speeding, a defence of 'but loads of other people were speeding too' won't mean that I wasn't speeding. But maybe a lawyer can tell me otherwise.
posted by nylon at 7:36 PM on May 10, 2005

unauthorised copying, hiring, lending, reproduction, public performance and broadcasting of the work prohibited.' In this case, and many others like it, it's specifically prohibited to even lend the CD to someone, never mind copy it and distribute it to a few friends.

In the US, again, I'm pretty sure you would be covered by the Audio Home Recording Act as long as your copying is for non-commercial purposes. Close inspection reveals that the notice cleverly doesn't mention who needs to authorize those things. In this case it is the United States Congress who has done so.
posted by kindall at 8:21 PM on May 10, 2005

You can legally lend a CD to someone just like you can a book. Reproducing the contents is what runs you against the copyright laws.

Be careful how much store you put into labels and signs posted by business entities. I laugh every time I see the "We cannot be responsible for cart damage" signs at the super market. They are not necessarily responsible but they definitely can be. These kinds of notices are posted in hopes that the consumer will mindlessly accept them and move on.
posted by Carbolic at 8:35 PM on May 10, 2005

"it's specifically prohibited to even lend the CD to someone."

This is gonna go over like a Lead Zeppelin
posted by airguitar at 11:48 PM on May 10, 2005

Any person who infringes a copyright willfully ... by the reproduction or distribution, including by electronic means, during any 180-day period, of 1 or more copies or phonorecords of 1 or more copyrighted works, which have a total retail value of more than $ 1,000 shall be punished as provided under section 2319 of title 18, United States Code.'.

posted by airguitar at 11:54 PM on May 10, 2005

It's been a long time since I read up on this subject, so I can't find the original article that I remember on the topic, but this guy sums it up pretty well.

He also links to the relevant portion of the law that keeps it legal to give a copy of recorded media to a friend:

"No action may be brought under this title alleging infringement of copyright based on the manufacture, importation, or distribution of a digital audio recording device, a digital audio recording medium, an analog recording device, or an analog recording medium, or based on the noncommercial use by a consumer of such a device or medium for making digital musical recordings or analog musical recordings." -- US Code, Title 17, Chapter 10, Subchapter D, Sec. 1008

Now, sending it through the mail may be a wrinkle I hadn't considered, but I still say graventy shouldn't be worried.
posted by BoringPostcards at 8:00 AM on May 11, 2005

The fact that they are going after people doesn't have to do with the fact that swapping a tape in the 80s is legal and swapping an MP3 in the 00's is illegal. They're both illegal. But the perceived threat is the scale of the situation, not the newfound illegality of it.

Where is your source for this? Tape swapping is explicitly legal. There is actually a law that says you can do it. Why? Because the RIAA gets a portion of all blank tape sales in the US, and in return people are allowed to copy songs.

I’m pretty sure that this also applies to music burned onto "music" CD-Rs (which are the same as regular data CD-Rs in every way, except that they are taxed)
posted by delmoi at 12:22 PM on May 11, 2005

unauthorised copying, hiring, lending, reproduction, public performance and broadcasting of the work prohibited.'

Prohibited by the recording industries wet dreams, maybe. What's printed on the back of a CD is not the law.
posted by delmoi at 12:35 PM on May 11, 2005

Btw, what's the deal with all these non-lawyers talking about what is, and is, not legal?

I mean, people in this thread talking about "THIS IS ILLGAL" when, in fact it's clearly not.

I mean, I guess the poster asked for legal advice, but, yeah. If you don't know, then don't try to speak so authoritatively.
posted by delmoi at 12:38 PM on May 11, 2005