Capitol Records, LLC v. ReDigi Inc.

Capitol Records, LLC v. ReDigi Inc.
Court	United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
Full case name	Capitol Records, LLC v. ReDigi Inc.
Decided	March 30, 2013
Docket nos.	1:12-cv-00095
Citation(s)	934 F. Supp. 2d 640; 106 U.S.P.Q.2d 1449
Case history
Subsequent action(s)	Affirmed, 910 F.3d 649 (2d Cir. 2018).
Holding
Partial summary judgment for plaintiff Capitol Records was granted, with the court finding that the first-sale doctrine does not apply to digital resale.
Court membership
Judge(s) sitting	Richard J. Sullivan
Keywords
Copyright, Copyright infringement, Fair use, First-sale doctrine

Capitol Records, LLC v. ReDigi Inc., 934 F. Supp. 2d 640 (S.D.N.Y. 2013), is a case from the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York concerning copyright infringement of digital music. In ReDigi, record label Capitol Records claimed copyright infringement against ReDigi, a service that allows resale of digital music tracks originally purchased from the iTunes Store.^[1] Capitol Records' motion for a preliminary injunction against ReDigi was denied,^[2] and oral arguments were given on October 5, 2012.^[3][4]

The ReDigi case raised the novel issue of whether digital music purchases are eligible for resale under the first-sale doctrine.^[5] On March 30, 2013, Judge Richard J. Sullivan ruled in favor of Capitol Records, explaining that the transfer of digital data from one storage medium to another constituted a violation of copyright, because the copy was ultimately an unauthorized reproduction, and therefore outside of the protection of the first-sale doctrine.^[6]

ReDigi appealed to the Second Circuit. Oral argument was on August 22, 2017, and the court issued a decision on December 12, 2018.^[7] Again the copyright holders won, on the theory that it is impossible to transfer any digital file from a user's storage medium without making a copy that is controlled by copyright's ongoing "reproduction right", as opposed to the "distribution right" that is extinguished by the First Sale doctrine.