A fundamental tenet of copyright law, and another limitation on the exclusive rights, is the first sale doctrine, which prevents an owner of copyright in a work from controlling subsequent transfers of copies of that work. Once the copyright owner transfers ownership of a particular copy (a material object) embodying a copyrighted work, the copyright owner's exclusive right to distribute copies of the work is "extinguished" with respect only to that particular copy. The common law roots of the first sale doctrine allowed the owner of a particular copy of a work to dispose of that copy. This judicial doctrine was grounded in the common law principle that restraints on the alienation of tangible property are to be avoided in the absence of clear congressional intent to abrogate this principl
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