In 2012, the British tabloid The Sun (falsely) reported that actor Bruce Willis was planning to sue to establish his right to give his MP3 collection to his daughters in his will. If Bruce Willis buys a CD from Amazon, can he give it to his daughter Rumer? What if he rips the CD to MP3s on his computer first? If he buys the same album as a download from Amazon’s MP3 store, can he email a copy of the MP3s to Rumer? What if he deletes the MP3s from his computer after he sends her the email? Can he give Rumer his computer? Can he give her the password to his Amazon account so she can download a copy?
There should be no issue with Bruce Willis giving his daughter a CD that he purchased from Amazon because he is merely giving the actual CD to her and not changing anything about it.
Bruce may run into some trouble if he rips a CD to MP3 because he is transferring the files into a format he did not purchase. However, He would likely still be able to give that CD to his daughter.
Bruce will likely get in trouble for emailing a copy of the MP3 based off Amazon’s terms of use. In the terms it includes under rights granted, “We grant you a non-exclusive, non-transferable right to use Purchased Music, Music Service Content, Matched Music, and any additional Music Content we provide you access to through the Services only for your personal, non-commercial purposes, subject to the Agreement. Except as set forth in the preceding sentence, you may not redistribute, transmit, assign, sell, broadcast, rent, share, lend, repurpose, modify, adapt, edit, license or otherwise transfer, or use Purchased Music or Music Service Content.” In addition, it states “You may not transfer or assign your subscription or any benefits from the Unlimited Plan, Prime Music, or Amazon Music (free with ads). You may only use your Individual Unlimited Plan, or Unlimited Single Device Plan in connection with one Amazon account.” Therefore, these last acts would likely not be permitted.
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