I've purchased a book that was only ever published in e-format. I would like to have it printed to keep a physical copy.
Bearing in mind that I didn't write it and I don't own the copyright to it, could I run into any sort of barriers or legal niggles if I pay a professional printer to make me a bound version? Are there printers that handle stuff like this just for single books?
It's a breach of copyright, as the name suggests - copyright is the right to make copies. With that said, nobody is likely to notice.
There are loads of companies that will print single books. The search term you're looking for is "book print on demand". lulu.com is probably the most popular option. Expect to pay between £10 and £20 per copy, depending on the page count and the binding.
Just go to a copy shop and ask them to print it out for you and bind it. Just like you would with a thesis. Most copy shops really don't care at all what you have them print out, as a one-off no less, as long as it's not child porn or a terrorist manifesto.
Cpoyright law is actually pretty complex, because as you might imagine, there are a lot of everyday things that would suddenly become illegal if we were to take the right to make copies as a gospel, concrete legally binding principle.
Doing something like this would fall under a similar sort of grey area/loophole as taping programmes off the telly, or making personal backups of your own CDs/DVDs always has done. You're not making a copy for distribution, you are merely transferring your copy into a different medium, which is generally agreed to be your right as an owner of that item.
Where that gets complicated in the modern age is that the digital platforms and stores that sell you stuff have it in their terms and conditions that you forfeit such common sense legal rights. IN turn, it has been successfully argued in some cases that those contracts that exempt you from your rights are in turn illegal and you do still have them.
Remember back when MP3 players were new? Nobody used iTunes or whatever at first, you ripped your CDs. According to the strictest interpretation, illegal. What about those USB turntables for digitising your old records? Illegal.
Fuck the entire concept of copyright to be honest. We'd be fine without it.
Under EU law, it was legal to make one personal copy for yourself of a copyright protected work. Provided that you had lawfully obtained an original of it. Ripping your own CDs at home to make MP3s of them for portable use was also legal. Downloading your MP3s off Napster or sharing them online was always a problem. Especially after lawmakers worldwide had caught up with the new technology.
It then later became illegal to rip DVDs because it's illegal to circumvent copy protection or DRM implementations which are built both into DVD and Blu-ray. Stadard audio CDs never had copy protection, which meant that that didn't affect your right to rip your own legally bought audio CDs.
