The case was a copyright case.... and it was called Harper and Row v. Nation Enterprises 471 U.S. 539 (1985), if any one is interested.
What Harper hit the Nation for was extensive quotation of the book and thus they claimed that the Nation violated their copyright. The Nation claimed that this was a newsworthy item and they were engaged in fair use. The court concluded that "fair use" narrows for an unpublished work. Since Ford's book was not yet "officially" published Ford's right to control the publication of substantial portions of his work was violated.
If you will notice the New York Times piece avoids this problem by not quoting in any substantial way from Woodward's book.
Thus as far as I can tell there were no laws broken here. But the contract between the bookstore and Woodward's publishers was probably broken if an agent of a bookstore actually sold the book.
Jerry
I'm surprised this doesn't happen more. I've had a copy of this book since
> Wed. the 20th but I haven't made a
> point to get to it yet. Woodward isn't a high priority for me.
>
> I received the book free since it was damaged and headed for the trashcan.
> A B&N employee I know thought it
> looked "like something I would read" and gave it to me rather than add it
> to the local landfill. I receive a large
> number of books with minimal damage this way. Officially the company
> forbids this practice but in reality it
> happens quite a bit.
John as a former employee of B & N I think that you should have been less specific here. The contract between B & N and Woodward publishers was broken by simply opening the box, damaged or not. If B & N gets sued you could be called upon to testify and I doubt you would be able to claim press privleges because actually you are receiver of stolen goods. Listen I am on your side here I am just hoping that we can be discrete to protect our friends, just in case.
I'm sure an employee of B&N or Borders would be happy to sneak a copy out
> for $200. The books aren't locked
> up or anything. They just sit on a few shelves or stacked in boxes in a
> receiving area.
>
> On rare occasion an employee will shelve the book early because they had a
> space to fill and didn't pay
> attention to the signs listing a shelving date for a title.
>
> The people actually responsible for keeping the strict on-sale date are
> the lowest paid employees along the
> books path to the consumers hand. That's why I'm surprised it doesn't
> happen more.
>
> John Thornton
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>
-- Jerry Monaco's Philosophy, Politics, Culture Weblog is Shandean Postscripts to Politics, Philosophy, and Culture http://monacojerry.livejournal.com/
His fiction, poetry, weblog is Hopeful Monsters: Fiction, Poetry, Memories http://www.livejournal.com/users/jerrymonaco/
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