In a word: no. This is what copyright law is all about.

No its not, on both accounts, he would be breaking copyright law. The only time you are allowed to legally make a copy of something that is protected by copyright, is when its for your own use. For example: I frequently copy my CD's, then store the originals and use the copies to keep the originals in good condition.

No. It is not legal.

Well, the short answer to the first part is technically no. And for the second part I think is perfectly fine. Now that aside, is it unethical? No. Whoever made the album would be greatful that somebody new is listening to their music. As a musician myself I pray day and night that people will do what your son wants to do lol. And nobody EVER enforces any of this anyway. Actually, I remember a law that basically says the law doesn't concern itself with petty matters. And this is such a small issue I don't see why you should stop him. It's along the lines of going one mile an hour over the speed limit.

This is from 2006 -- I don't know if anything has changed in this realm: You are thumbing through your friend's CD collection when you come across the album that you've been meaning to buy for months. You friend offers to burn you a copy, and you start to look forward to listening to cool new music on your ride home. Everyone has been in that situation, but not many stop to ask a relevant question: Is it illegal to burn CDs for friends? Technically, the answer is yes. Under general copyright law, distributing a copy of copyrighted materials (like a music CD) can only be done with the permission of the copyright holder (usually the artist or record label). Moreover, the No Electronic Theft Act, a federal law, states that it is a federal crime to reproduce, distribute, or share copies of electronic copyrighted works such as a music CD. This can be true even if you copy and then give the CD away without a commercial purpose or receiving financial gain. The law creates an exception for "personal use," which means that burning copies is legal if the person plans to use the copies for their own personal use. Practically speaking, this means that once you have bought an album, you can burn it in order to play on your portable music player, computer hard drive, etc. The law, however, does not allow someone to burn a CD and then pass the copy on to others. Passing out burned copies of the CD to family and friends or otherwise giving away a copied CD is not considered "personal use" and would be in violation of federal law. The same general rules apply to other copyrighted materials like movies, video games, or software programs.

does it matter if it is everyone does it now even my nan

You can as long as you don't SELL or make money from the transaction. If it was a problem Mp3 programs such as ITunes wouldn't have a burning option built into there own program.

totally illegle but whos gonna stp u? i wont tell if u wont. just dont sell them to uptite cops! and dnt sell them in car boots there be sum twit there tht will report u, but u aint gonna get caught doin it and my step dads been in the police fource for 22 yrs and him and his mate maje and excahnge for cash copy DVDs , whos gonna tell?

This is what we were told, we could make cd's for ourselves to listen to if we download them legally or we at one point owned the original copies, but we cannot give them to someone that does not have ALL these cd's too or downloads. That is when we were told it got illegal. I don't know anyone that has ever got into trouble for this around here, unless the cops were busting them for everything else and they threw that one in too. You cannot sell them in any way. I also just read an article that some artists are putting blocks on their cd's so that you cannot copy them, like they do with DVD's. It states in this article question #2 that it is illegal to give it away. Good luck!