UK offers long-awaited copyright reform that sanctions format shifting, remote education

Believe it or not, it's still illegal in the UK to rip a favorite CD, or even to show copyrighted work in distance education -- both fair use permissions that many North Americans take for granted. Some sense is at last coming around now that the Intellectual Property Office is putting forward copyright reforms that accept a digital reality. The measures explicitly approve private copying for personal use, making it legal to shift formats as long as it's to play purchased content. Many of the re...