The US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has found the reselling of ‘used’ digital music illegal. In a ruling handed down on 12th December 2018 it rejected an appeal by Redigi who had created a platform for the resale of legally purchased music files and reaffirmed the original judgement in favour of Capitol Records LLC who had won a $3.5 million settlement in a New York City federal court in 2013.
The ruling confirms that purchasers of digital music files from music download services cannot resell them through a virtual marketplace as if they were second hand LPs or CDs. Redigi had argued that because their system removed the original file from the seller as part of the transfer process to its new owner it did not ‘copy’ the file but ‘transfer’ it but this was rejected by the court.
The full judgement can be found as a PDF file here.
Redigi originally created its reseller site in 2011 but filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2016. The appeal was part of restructuring plan begun in 2017. With the decline of downloads and the growth of streaming the original business case for reselling second hand digital music would seem to have disappeared.
