Some Kinkos have, in the past, policed self-service machines.

What GD said. Go for it. :)

Well, now, if you're using an iPod, then theoretically iTunes fetches the license for that disc. I don't know if each disc has its own unique license or whatnot, but if they do, then it could get interesting when the third or fourth person comes along and wants to do the same think with that disc set.

Like GD, minus the wife, I've done that with library CDs.

Excellent. Thanks for the input. Maddy will be so happy plus it's kept her quiet for two whole days now - woo hoo.

iTunes does not seek a license for a pre-burned CD as I do not believe that CDs HAVE an individual serial number. They do have a code which says what the CD is which is how your computer gets the info (iTunes defaults to retrieving such data from CDDB).

Isn't it considered legal to photocopy X number of pages for research purposes? Or are laws being broken at colleges all across the country?

Or should I say "were being broken" as I wonder how much of this practice still exists in the age of the interwebs.

"Fair use" exists as a defense to claims of copyright infringement, but there's no absolute definition of "fair use". It's not just about how many pages you copy. There are a whole bunch of factors that go into assessing fair use, and it's basically done on a case-by-case basis.

And it's not that "fair use" is a legal right - it's a defense.

Yes, laws are being broken all across the country.

There's a reason college professors still have to charge way above photocopying costs for those reading packets they put together. So that the campus bookstore, or whomever is doing it, can play clearances on them.

But no, nobody is going to raise a stink about photocopying a journal article for individual research purposes or a semi-lengthy excerpt from a monograph. But I knew student workers at every college library I've worked at who would use the back-room copiers to simply photocopy their entire textbook for free (to them) and save all that money on their books for the quarter.