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Comment by tzs | Hacker News Reader

I don't think they are gutting anything. They are simply trying to work around the Supreme Court's botched decision in Quality King.

Until I read Quality King, I had no idea that the section 6xx limitations on importing had any connection to the section 1xx exceptions to 17 USC 106. And I doubt that Congress had any idea there was a connection, either.

The 9th Circuit is trying to find a way to read section 109 so as to undo Quality King and get back to what Congress intended--unauthorized importation of copyrighted works, other than for personal use, is prohibited.

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So the intended meaning is that a used-book store in Amsterdam can't sell a batch of books to a used-book store in NYC without individually contacting each of the books' copyright holders and asking for their permission to import the book?

The idea is that the multi-nationals can sell stuff to third worlders at near cost to build market share or comply with price controls and mark up 500% in another country to take advantage of subsidies, medicare reimbursements, perceived brand "value", or on-the-sly price collusion with other vendors and no screwy small fry grey market traders can get in the way of their "marketing policies".

Yep, in other words it's bullshit.

the Supreme Court's botched decision in Quality King

The footer of the Supreme Court ruling says it was a unanimous decision. More than likely, the problem lies in how the law was written, not in how it was interpreted.

You've gotten distracted by the handwaving and forgotten that the "copyrighted work" here is essentially a wristwatch. Specifically, they're talking about the logo they put on the wristwatch, but to argue that a logo on an item brings the whole item under copyright law is madness.

It's especially mad since there's no copying taking place at all.

Because a wristwatch is a copyrighted work.

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