11 Dec, 2008
2008-12-11 7:18:19 AM UTC
I recently bought a facimile dustjacket for the Hobbit offf Ebay the other day and I began wondering about the legallity of reproducing and seling these.
Does anyone know if this is breach of copyright or not?
Dior
11 Dec, 2008
2008-12-11 7:49:36 AM UTC
This is quite an interesting area.
In one sense yes they are a breach of copyright, as you are taking a very quality image of the original cover and reproducing it as a high quality image. The cover images of the books are copyrighted by the book publishers and The Tolkien Estate.
In another sense they may not be in breach of copyright, if you marry the facsimile dustjacket with an original book that has lost its original wrapper, that this is a facsimile of.
The book was originally sold with a dustjacket that has been lost and you have replaced it with a copy of its original wrapper. I think it is probably difficult to argue breach of copyright in this example.
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