hi,
as a homework i am planning on creating an app which lets you manage your dvds.
we want to scan the barcode of the dvd and retrieve information from imdb so that we can create a library object with film title, director, a few actors and so on.

i know java and i know a little about android (probably more in the next weeks).

is it legal to use imdb? its gonna be non-profit, if it ever sees the appstore (since its just a homework)
can anybody suggest a API or another way to use a barcodescanner? (we dont wanna create our own)
also: what is the easiest way to get information from imdb? i guess its not as easy as working with googlemaps... (sending and retrieving information).

Here is the rest api for Imdb: http://imdbapi.com/ which takes either some special imdb movie code or movie title as request parameter and returns an xml or json. For barcode scanner, use zxing.
Your problem is probably this: scanning barcode (UPC/EAN not QR) yields only numbers. So you have to find a way, possibly another online database, that converts these numbers into one of above parameters. You may want to ask this guy how he gets his barcode data: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h05KrEjHW6g

If you want to scan barcode , you can try Barcode Reader for .NET.
It scans, reads various linear & 2D barcode images, including ISO / IEC specified barcodes like Code 39 & Code 39 Extension, Code 128; GS1 specified linear barcodes like EAN-8 & EAN-13, UPC-A & UPC-E, as well as Interleaved 2 of 5, Codabar, and 2D barcodes Data Matrix, QR Code, PDF-417. Supported image formats include Gif, Png, Jpeg/Jpg, Tiff and.NET image objects.