Foggy Stealing

I'm not really sure how much I should say leading up to this, because it might just come off like a justification and it might muddy thinking on the issue. So I'm just going to go ahead and ask the question.

I have a red trunk full of CDs. I would like to burn them to iTunes, and sell the ones I would not like to keep to my used bookstore. Is this stealing? Why, or why not?

I'll post my original and (perhaps) changed viewpoint on it sometime later. For now, work.

On Selling My Cake and Eating It, Too

I've been giving this question a lot of thought since this morning, and considering the opinion of everyone who's offered one. By the way, thanks.

The way I saw it, I bought the CD new, so the artist, record company and whoever else is supposed to get their money from that sale has received it. Ideally, paying for an album should only happen once; once you've paid for it, you have the right to listen to it for as long as you want. There shouldn't be a statute of limitations on it. Should I only be allowed to listen to the music on the CD until it gets scratched? Until I lose it in a move? Until the CD gets warped or damaged? Is it reasonable to expect I should be able to listen to the music I've paid for indefinitely? I don't think it's so far-fetched to think that once I've plunked down the money for a CD, I should be able to listen to the music for as long as I can.

My dilemma, however, is this: all of my CDs are sitting in a red steamer trunk that hasn't seen the light of day since August. The media is just taking up space there, and I don't want it any more. I pretty much plan to buy my music digitally (either from iTunes or some other outlet) from now on, with the occasional CD purchase when I simply can't find a way to buy it online.

I would like to get rid of my CDs *and* still have the music on them. If I, say, delete the music from my computer when I sell the media I got them from, I'll have to rebuy it online. Should I be expected to pay anywhere from $9 - 15 per CD *just* to be able to have my inventory exist on computer only? For even a modest library of 100 discs, that's around $1000 just to get rid of a bunch of CDs. This strikes me as an unreasonable price to pay for going digital.

I could buy a ginormous CD notebook, per cooner's suggestion, which is probably the best of the lot. It would cut down on the space my catalog takes up considerably, but the problem would still remain that I would never listen to the CDs themselves (unless, say, my HD failed horribly and I had to start over from scratch), and they'd sit there unused. I don't see anything wrong with selling them to a used store so that someone else could use them; the artist and recording company have already made all the money they're going to on that disc, and I'm providing someone else the opportunity to listen to music they wouldn't otherwise be able to afford in a more-or-less acceptable way. Finally, the 'profit' I make on keeping the music and selling the CD will more than likely go towards simply buying more music (though, I'll be honest and say I'll probably nick books and the occasional DVD as well with the store credit I'd be getting for them).

To me, selling the CD (which is really...bartering the CD for other CDs, books and media if that makes a difference) is the best option. The CDs are being listened to instead of taking up space, I get to keep the music (or the listening license), someone else gets cheaper music, and the artist and record label will remain rich. This is preferable to me over either throwing the CDs away to make sure no one else can ever listen to it or boggarting something I have no use for any more.

Does this...make sense to anyone? I feel like I shouldn't have to pay huge amounts of money to have a digital music library with a clean legal standing. It's silly to me that the only other options are 'keep the CDs' or 'throw them away and delete the music files'. I will admit that it's morally gray, and that it's not something I plan to make a habit of. I like supporting artists, especially the ones who could really use it. It's why I *bought* the CDs in the first place. But to be expected to pay for the same CD twice just to change mediums with a clean break is unfair.

So what do you think? Should I just bite the bullet and pay over an extended period of time to rebuild my music library on a computer? Should I keep the CDs so I can have the music files without any moral ambiguity? Should I sell the CDs and keep the media file, but do something charitable with the store credit (buying gifts for friends or whatnot) so that I take none of the profit? Should I keep the credit and do what I want?