Is it legal to have a video library (movies will be circulated) among the employees of an organization?

Question

Hi, This is Anil, In our office we are planning pool some money and have a movie club (we will buy new Original DVD's and circulate them among us). It is legal to have such type of movie club?

Answer 1

Yes, based on first sale doctrine, which allows your public library to do what it does. I'm not a lawyer, just a librarian with an interest in intellectual property law, and this is my understanding of our legal justification.

Here are some things that might come up, though, that are illegal (though in most cases probably unenforceable):

It would be illegal for an employee to copy one of the club's DVDs for his/her own personal library.

It would be illegal to add homemade recordings of movies or television shows to your library.

It may be illegal -- the law is kind of fuzzy here, and I confess I don't understand it -- to have an organization "movie night" where you screen one of the DVDs for the organization's employees.   It would certainly be illegal if you opened such a showing to employees' friends and family.