If the user were in the USA then 17 USC 1201 (which I think is at question) says this at Section C(1):
>"Nothing in this section shall affect rights, remedies, limitations, or defenses to copyright infringement, including fair use, under this title." (17 USC 1201) //
So presumably personal format-shifting is still a fair-use defence that supersedes considerations under this section.
FWIW format-shifting was expressly removed from UK Fair Dealing after a challenge by BASCA, presumably no UK musicians rip songs to their MP3 player/phone or whatever.
Wish they'd sued Apple Computers for contributory infringement, what with the massive damage iPods have done to people wanting to buy music. /sarcasm
I'm thinking more that employing such circumvention for your own purposes would be hard to argue against, but publishing it publicly may not actually be defensible under U.S. law, even with the fair use exemption.
I think if I were thinking of publishing something like this I'd look at the outcome of lawsuits such as those surrounding the old DeCSS code (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_City_Studios,_Inc._v...). I'm in the U.S. so for me something like this would be relevant.
>"Nothing in this section shall affect rights, remedies, limitations, or defenses to copyright infringement, including fair use, under this title." (17 USC 1201) //
So presumably personal format-shifting is still a fair-use defence that supersedes considerations under this section.
FWIW format-shifting was expressly removed from UK Fair Dealing after a challenge by BASCA, presumably no UK musicians rip songs to their MP3 player/phone or whatever.
Wish they'd sued Apple Computers for contributory infringement, what with the massive damage iPods have done to people wanting to buy music. /sarcasm