When I
teach property, I generally don’t teach much IP because I’ve found I get
frustrated with the necessary quickness of any coverage. But they’ve come for my casebook, and so I
must respond. Aspen is making the next
edition of Dukeminier, Krier et al. into a tied deal, purporting to provide a
physical copy that must be returned at the end of the semester (thus trying to
defeat first sale, even though this type of servitude isn’t historically
allowed for chattels and I disagree with the apparent idea that this is an enforceable
condition) while providing “lifetime” access to an electronic version.
Paul Levy suggests a boycott
is in order. I agree that I’m not about to require my
students to pay this money for a book they won’t be able to resell plus non-credible
“lifetime” access. The internet is littered with the corpses of websites that
were supposed to give you access to your paid-for, DRMed content forever,
including websites backed by some very big names. I’m pretty lazy and don’t like to switch
casebooks, but I guess I have to if this policy persists. Law school is expensive; so is giving up the
first sale doctrine.
1 comment:
Conceivably, these putative "licenses" might be challenged as an unlawful vertical restraint under the antitrust laws.
Of course, that just gets us into a messy rule of reason analysis...
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