I met up with a friend at a library today. After an hour of productive meeting, we packed up to leave. As we strolled towards the library entrance, we walked passed the music collection section. We were curious what kinds of music the library carried, so we stopped and investigated.

“The Immaculate Collection” by Madonna…”The Blue Men Group”…”Best of the Corrs”…there was certainly a wide selection of CDs for all kinds of music fans. All of a sudden, my friend said: by lending CDs, isn’t the library indirectly participating in music piracy? Why buy CDs when you can just borrow them from the library and make digital copies for your own music collection? No doubt this is an unintentional side-effect of a library’s function, but I wonder if the RIAA can go after libraries for facilitating music piracy?

What do you think? Are libraries liable for their patrons’ illegal music copies?