# Pirates Selling Ebooks



## Lissa Bryan (Feb 8, 2013)

Hello, everyone,

I discovered a site today that's actually selling copies of pirated books for less than two dollars each. I informed my publisher to see if these guys were somehow a legitimate seller and they jumped on it immediately with DMCA take-down notices.

The site has books by hundreds of authors. I'm not going to link it because I don't want to give them free publicity. If you're an author & would like to visit to see if your books are listed, please send me a PM and I'll give you the link.

This feels worse to me than ordinary piracy because they're making money off authors who will never see a dime in royalties from the sale of their book. The public thinks they're buying legitimate copies for a bargain-basement price, so it's possible this site is siphoning away sales from legitimate retailers.


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## Pearson Moore (Mar 14, 2011)

If you give us the site URL we can do something.  Otherwise, all you're saying is that there are pirates out there, but we already know that.  Please provide the Internet address!


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## Lissa Bryan (Feb 8, 2013)

Okay... I'm sure you can understand why I'm reluctant to do so.

http://www.fantasticebook.com/

Barbara Elsborg told me the site is based in China and they completely ignore DMCA take-down notices. My suggestion is to file a complaint with Google, which I've heard has a "take-down, ask questions later" policy and the site would have to prove they're not violating copyright... and good luck with that. That's probably the only way we can fight them: make sure they don't show up in a search engine.


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## George Berger (Aug 7, 2011)

Lissa Bryan said:


> Barbara Elsborg told me the site is based in China and they completely ignore DMCA take-down notices.


They may be operated out of the PRC, but the site itself is hosted on a server in Frankfurt, Germany, FWIW. Contacting their host might force them to move, but there are probably more productive uses of your time, to be honest.

The same people also run abcebook.com, and probably others.


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## Guest (Mar 10, 2013)

Lissa Bryan said:


> Hello, everyone,
> 
> I discovered a site today that's actually selling copies of pirated books for less than two dollars each. I informed my publisher to see if these guys were somehow a legitimate seller and they jumped on it immediately with DMCA take-down notices.
> 
> ...


This *is* ordinary piracy. The file sharers are always about making money despite their left-wing, idealist rhetoric about "liberating" information. If you don't think these creeps are making money off stolen, shared content - take a gander at that fat slob Kim Dot Com who is a like a caricature of a greedy fat cat.

A call to a copyright lawyer is in order, especially if they're ignoring takedown notices.

Also, there's a thing called Contributory Copyright Infringement, which means that it's illegal to contribute to the commission of this crime. So, the payment processors (PayPal, Visa, Mastercard) are obligated to cease doing business with them.

You can, also do a "whois" search on the URL to discover the ISP. If they are engaged in illegal activity, the ISP should shut them down right quick once they are presented with evidence from publishers of wrong-doing.

I feel your pain! Good luck!

P.S. - Lots of people here will be sympathetic to your plight as I most certainly am, but there are a lot of people here who are hostile toward authors who want to own their own property. Contrary to the fantasies told by the pro-piracy gangsters, these sites do have an impact on sales and on your income. I recently saw my sales go up pretty significantly after removing a couple of these profit leaks.

The official KDP Community at Amazon - the one you see when you go to your Bookshelf at KDP - have actually taken down one of these sites recently when it was discovered that a number of authors and publishers there had their stolen work either "shared" for free or a fee there. You might want to see how many KDP authors have had their work stolen from these particular people. (I write mostly non-fic, so it doesn't look like I'm their cup of tea this time... for which I am grateful.)


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

ProfessorAplomb said:


> P.S. - Lots of people here will be sympathetic to your plight as I most certainly am, but there are a lot of people here who are hostile toward authors who want to own their own property.


I wouldn't say we're "hostile." We do like to articulate the other side of the argument, so that people can look at all the ideas floating around out there and make informed choices. Hopefully none of us get angry about it!


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## Guest (Mar 10, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> I wouldn't say we're "hostile." We do like to articulate the other side of the argument, so that people can look at all the ideas floating around out there and make informed choices. Hopefully none of us get angry about it!


What "other side of the argument." If someone steals my work, reassigns the copyright, pretends that they're my publisher, then steals money out of my bank account, there is no "other side" of the argument.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

ProfessorAplomb said:


> What "other side of the argument." If someone steals my work, reassigns the copyright, pretends that they're my publisher, then steals money out of my bank account, there is no "other side" of the argument.


Well, I suppose it depends on what kind of question you ask about the situation. If the question is, "is it theft?" then no, I don't think there's much of an argument. It is theft. But if the question is, "should I do anything about it?" then you can have a reasonable argument. The question moves from being largely factual to something more nuanced. An individual author's priorities, ethical outlook, available resources, and so forth come into play and may generate different answers from person to person.


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## Jude Hardin (Feb 5, 2011)

Thanks for the link. One of my Thomas and Mercer titles is on there, and I've alerted my production manager. Maybe Amazon can get these thieves copyright infringers shut down.


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## Aaron Pogue (Feb 18, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> Well, I suppose it depends on what kind of question you ask about the situation. If the question is, "is it theft?" then no, I don't think there's much of an argument. It is theft. But if the question is, "should I do anything about it?" then you can have a reasonable argument. The question moves from being largely factual to something more nuanced. An individual author's priorities, ethical outlook, available resources, and so forth come into play and may generate different answers from person to person.


Academically, "Is it theft?" is open to discussion, too. Legally, the answer is no. It's copyright infringement. The law has never recognized copyright infringement as "theft." Instead, it's its own sort of crime.

There's a significant difference between depriving someone of ownership of a thing, and just taking advantage of someone else's ownership of a thing. In ProfessorAplomb's example, if someone "stole" his work, then he would no longer have it (and no longer be able to make _any_ money off of it).

Instead, someone unlawfully profited from his work and thereby (potentially) lessened his ability to profit off his own work--both of which can be criminal actions--but calling it "theft" is demonstrably inaccurate.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Aaron Pogue said:


> Academically, "Is it theft?" is open to discussion, too. Legally, the answer is no. It's copyright infringement. The law has never recognized copyright infringement as "theft." Instead, it's its own sort of crime.
> 
> There's a significant difference between depriving someone of ownership of a thing, and just taking advantage of someone else's ownership of a thing. In ProfessorAplomb's example, if someone "stole" his work, then he would no longer have it (and no longer be able to make _any_ money off of it).
> 
> Instead, someone unlawfully profited from his work and thereby (potentially) lessened his ability to profit off his own work--both of which can be criminal actions--but calling it "theft" is demonstrably inaccurate.


Good point, Aaron -- thank you.


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## Aaron Pogue (Feb 18, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> Good point, Aaron -- thank you.


Umm...I quoted you, and then got all pedantic.

I hope I didn't come across as arguing directly with you. I just wanted to get in on the conversation.


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## Shalini Boland (Nov 29, 2010)

Lissa Bryan said:


> Hello, everyone,
> 
> I discovered a site today that's actually selling copies of pirated books for less than two dollars each. I informed my publisher to see if these guys were somehow a legitimate seller and they jumped on it immediately with DMCA take-down notices.


Thanks for the heads up. All my books are on there!


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## ScottC (Mar 23, 2012)

Every time I see this... DMCA take-down notices... I wonder what it means/stands for

Does anyone have a boilerplate message to send to request the book removal

Thanks


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Aaron Pogue said:


> Umm...I quoted you, and then got all pedantic.
> 
> I hope I didn't come across as arguing directly with you. I just wanted to get in on the conversation.


Not at all. You didn't come off as pedantic, and more importantly, I think you're correct.


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## Guest (Mar 10, 2013)

ScottC said:


> Every time I see this... DMCA take-down notices... I wonder what it means/stands for
> 
> Does anyone have a boilerplate message to send to request the book removal
> 
> Thanks


ScottC - look here for template of DMCA takedown notice to send: http://www.squidoo.com/dmca-takedown-notice-template


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## intinst (Dec 23, 2008)

ScottC said:


> *Every time I see this... DMCA take-down notices... I wonder what it means/stands for*
> 
> Does anyone have a boilerplate message to send to request the book removal
> 
> Thanks


Digital Millennium Copyright Act


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> Not at all. You didn't come off as pedantic, and more importantly, I think you're correct.


You guys were fine. It was actually the guy accusing others of hostility who came off as...well, hostile.


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## Guest (Mar 10, 2013)

Adam Pepper said:


> You guys were fine. It was actually the guy accusing others of hostility who came off as...well, hostile.


If you will take the time to look at the comments I got when I reported a costly incident with ScribD on Feb 28, you will see some open hostility from crime advocates. At least, one of these people has posted openly about property he has pirated. Then, you will see that this accusation of hostility from some is well-founded.

The people who advocate piracy often participate in these crimes - and they are adamant about protecting what they see as their "right" to pirate. So, they are hostile to anyone who objects to their own property being pirated and shared or resold - just like thieves may feel they have the right to come in your house and take your stereo and will retaliate against you if you talk about prosecution. Criminals are hostile toward people who don't like crime.

If you post about piracy incidents here, you have people monitoring your activity and telling you what you should be doing with your time... as if you don't know how to run your own business. If you post about it in some other writers forums (where maybe more authors are either making more money or have higher moral standards), you may get some assistance from other victims. I've seen it happen a couple of times recently. But, for some reason - not here... lots of hobbyists here, I suspect. This is why I suggested that the OP try another forum where there may be more cooperative people... here you can see it's about 50/50 (50% helpful and 50% hostile).

It's interesting, too, when people who aren't being talked about read themselves into a comment like you did... I think this says something about you.


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## ScottC (Mar 23, 2012)

Excellent... and thanks for the info on what it stands for.



ProfessorAplomb said:


> ScottC - look here for template of DMCA takedown notice to send: http://www.squidoo.com/dmca-takedown-notice-template


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

ProfessorAplomb said:


> It's interesting, too, when people who aren't being talked about read themselves into a comment like you did... I think this says something about you.


Enlighten me. What does it say about me?


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

ProfessorAplomb said:


> If you would take the time to look at the comments I got when I reported a costly incident with ScribD on Feb 28, you will see some open hostility from pro-crime advocates. At least, one of these people has posted openly about property he has pirated. Then, you will see that his accusation of hostility from some is well-founded.
> 
> The people who advocate piracy often participate in these crimes - and they are adamant about protecting what they see as their "right" to pirate. So, they are hostile to anyone who objects to their own property being pirated and shared or resold - just like thieves may feel they have the right to come in your house and take your stereo and will be angry with you if you talk about prosecution. Criminals are hostile toward people who don't like crime.
> 
> If you post about piracy incidents here, you have people monitoring your activity and telling you what you should be doing with your time... as if you don't know how to run your own business. If you post about it in some other writers forums (where maybe more authors are either making more money or have higher moral standards), you may get some assistance from other victims. I've seen it happen a couple of times recently. But, for some reason - not here... lots of hobbyists here, I suspect. This is why I suggested that the OP try another forum where there may be more cooperative people... here you can see it's about 50/50 (50% helpful and 50% hostile).


Monitoring your activity? I'm not sure exactly what that means. If you're on the KB a lot, you naturally get a sense of what people tend to post about, especially if they don't post often and only tend to show up on certain threads. Some members are particularly interested in certain issues. Getting that sense about someone from reading their posts hardly counts as "monitoring [their] activity," does it? That phrase sounds all police-statey.

I find it perplexing that you think people who advocate ignoring piracy are themselves consumers of pirated goods. No doubt some individuals are, but I suspect it's not the norm among artists. For instance, I haven't pirated anyone's intellectual property since the days when I exchanged "mix tapes" with friends in high school (the issue of piracy just didn't occur to me back then).

But my decisions about how to handle my own IPs aren't dictated by my practices as a consumer. Instead, I've gathered as much information as I can about piracy and tried to make an informed decision about what approach is most likely to generate the most income for me. KB was very helpful to me in that process.

Those of us who suggest that actively combating piracy may not be the best approach are not necessarily "pro-piracy" (though some may be). We're certainly not "pro-crime" in some larger sense. I don't spend my time on the street corner advocating murder and mayhem.

Lastly, I think it's offensive to label the people on KB as "50% helpful and 50% hostile." Those of us who post to point out the possible downsides to combating piracy are also trying to be helpful: most people find it helpful to hear both sides, so they can consider the issue fully before taking action. If they choose to go the route you're going, that's fine. No one's going to be angry about it. For instance, if you sue Scribd, I'm sure we'll all be interested to hear how it goes. That would be new and valuable insight for us. So far as I know, no KBer has conducted a copyright-infringement suit and reported back on it.

And why can't Adam comment? Threads are open conversations, not one-on-ones.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Thanks for the info, Lissa.


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## JHall (Mar 7, 2013)

Does this site actually give you the ebook you pay for? I've read of similar sites that will take your money, but then never give you anything in return (on the KDP forum). 

Also, if you want to stop these guys, you would need to get in contact with their host, or the people that process their transactions.


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> And why can't Adam comment? Threads are open conversations, not one-on-ones.


Yes, open conversations are one of the things that makes this a great forum. The free exchange of opinions and ideas given constructively with mutual respect: great!

Shouting others down. Jumping to conclusions about others opinions and views, besmirching others ethics and morals, and generally acting like an arrogant ass, not so great.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

JHall said:


> Does this site actually give you the ebook you pay for? I've read of similar sites that will take your money, but then never give you anything in return (on the KDP forum).


Who knows? I think sometimes you get malware or a virus for your troubles.


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## Christopher Bunn (Oct 26, 2010)

You know, this thread kind of makes me sad. Pirates really have changed a lot, and not for the better. Whatever happened to the days of plundering ships and walking the plank and parrots?


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Christopher Bunn said:


> You know, this thread kind of makes me sad. Pirates really have changed a lot, and not for the better. Whatever happened to the days of plundering ships and walking the plank and parrots?


I'm thinking given the choice between old-school piracy and this new stuff, I'll take the new stuff any day.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

Lissa Bryan said:


> Okay... I'm sure you can understand why I'm reluctant to do so.
> 
> http://www.fantasticebook.com/
> 
> Barbara Elsborg told me the site is based in China and they completely ignore DMCA take-down notices. My suggestion is to file a complaint with Google, which I've heard has a "take-down, ask questions later" policy and the site would have to prove they're not violating copyright... and good luck with that. That's probably the only way we can fight them: make sure they don't show up in a search engine.


They will ignore any takedown notices. They have been operating for ten years.

Domain Name ..................... FANTASTICEBOOK.COM
Name Server ..................... f1g1ns1.dnspod.net
f1g1ns2.dnspod.net
Registrant ID ................... whois-protect
Registrant Name ................. WHOIS AGENT
Registrant Organization ......... DOMAIN WHOIS PROTECTION SERVICE
Registrant Address .............. 3/F.,HiChina Mansion,No.27 Gulouwai Avenue
Dongcheng District,Beijing 100120,China
Registrant City ................. Beijing
Registrant Province/State ....... Beijing
Registrant Postal Code .......... 100120
Registrant Country Code ......... CN
Registrant Email ................

Start lots of online rumours about them stealing credit card details and infecting buyers with a virus. If enough claims are made then many virus and web protection apps will blacklist them.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Paypal is very quick about dealing with this. Here's the link to fill out the infringement report. All you do is email it to them and they'll take all their access to credit cards away. They will also insist the site take down your books specifically. I have just submitted my form to Paypal for the books of mine I found on the site. I've also sent a takedown notice, but I'm sure it will be ignored.

From Paypal's email to me:

Any person or business that requests PayPal to assist in asserting its copyright, patent, trademark, or any other work protected under federal law, must first complete PayPal's Infringement Report Form. The form is attached to this email or can be accessed at the following URL:
https://cms.paypal.com/us/cgi-bin/?cmd=_render-content&content_ID=ua/InfringementRpt_full&locale.x=en_US.

The completed form with your signature can be submitted via email to [email protected] or by fax to: 1-402-537-5774.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> Paypal is very quick about dealing with this. Here's the link to fill out the infringement report. All you do is email it to them and they'll take all their access to credit cards away. They will also insist the site take down your books specifically. I have just submitted my form to Paypal for the books of mine I found on the site. I've also sent a takedown notice, but I'm sure it will be ignored.
> 
> From Paypal's email to me:
> 
> ...


They don't use PayPal - I just checked. They use credit cards only - which means that you can reverse sales. In some ways that makes matters worse although if enough sales are stopped they will lose merchant facilities.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

DarkScribe said:


> They don't use PayPal - I just checked. They use credit cards only - which means that you can reverse sales. In some ways that makes matters worse although if enough sales are stopped they will lose merchant facilities.


They have the paypal logo on their site.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> They have the paypal logo on their site.


Someone must have already taken action as if you follow the prompts to checkout PayPal is not an option.

http://www.fantasticebook.com/index.php?main_page=checkout_payment


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

DarkScribe said:


> Someone must have already taken action as if you follow the prompts to checkout PayPal is not an option.
> 
> http://www.fantasticebook.com/index.php?main_page=checkout_payment


On the other site, owned by the same company, paypal is still showing: www.abcebook.com

I did a little further research and found that you can apply directly to Mastercard and have them shut down the site's access to Mastercard. Here is a copy of the email I sent if anyone wants to use it as a template. It includes all the info required by Mastercard.

Dear Sir or Madam:

The following websites are infringing my intellectual property rights and using Mastercard as the payment processor:

www.abcebook.com
www.fantasticebooks.com

Here are links to my intellectual property on those sites:

http://www.abcebook.com/index.php?main_page=advanced_search_result&search_in_description=0&zenid=8879723cacb4d0ed5921511873d6f341&keyword=elle+casey&x=0&y=0
http://www.fantasticebook.com/index.php?main_page=advanced_search_result&search_in_description=0&keyword=elle+casey&x=20&y=4

The products being infringed are ebooks of the following titles:

After the Fall © 2012
Apocalypsis, Book 1 © 2012
Between the Realms © 2012
Clash of the Otherworlds © 2012

Author of all titles: Elle Casey

Evidence that the infringing products can be purchased using Mastercard is the shopping cart system that allows for a person to use a Mastercard to buy the books. Screenshots of the Mastercard logo on the two sites attached to this email.

Attestation:

To the best of my knowledge, as the rights holder of these works, these websites are not licensed or otherwise authorized to sell the products in question. Evidence that I own the copyright is present on the site itself and inside the books. As Elle Casey, author, I am the owner of the copyrights to these ebooks.

ETA: email address for Mastercard infringement:[email protected]


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Here is the document from Mastercard describing the process:

http://www.mastercard.com/us/wce/PDF/MasterCard_Anti-Piracy_Policy.pdf


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Aaaand here's the one for Visa:

http://corporate.visa.com/about-visa/security-and-trust/intellectual-property-rights.shtml?ep=v_sym_ReportBrandAbuse&symlinkref=http%3A%2F%2Fwww%2Egoogle%2Efr%2Furl%3Fsa%3Dt%26rct%3Dj%26q%3D%26esrc%3Ds%26source%3Dweb%26cd%3D1%26ved%3D0CDQQFjAA%26url%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww%2Evisa%2Ecom%252FReportBrandAbuse%252F%26ei%3D1BI9UaXzD4WS7Ab0%2DIHQDw%26usg%3DAFQjCNGxBxE91NKUtV1BRKSH%2DAAYmeUL5w%26sig2%3D3Lz1Oo2AmZYhr3lCdUgVsg%26bvm%3Dbv%2E43287494%2Cd%2EZGU


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> On the other site, owned by the same company, paypal is still showing: www.abcebooks.com


abcebooks.com is showing as a domain for sale here. It has links to various legitimate POS for eBooks but not pirated copies. Maybe you have already had some success.

Addendum:

It is listed as a US website, not the same details as the Chinese pirate. It is also for sale at US$12,100

Administrative Contact:
Whois Privacy Protection Service, Inc.
Whois Agent ()
+1.4252740657
Fax: +1.4259744730
PMB 368, 14150 NE 20th St - F1
C/O abcebooks.com
Bellevue, WA 98007
US


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

DarkScribe said:


> abcebooks.com is showing as a domain for sale here. It has links to various legitimate POS for eBooks but not pirated copies. Maybe you have already had some success.
> 
> Addendum:
> 
> ...


Take the "s" off the end. My mis-spell. It's www.abcebook.com


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> Take the "s" off the end. My mis-spell. It's www.abcebook.com


Aha. Got you.

Still a US site, but different address.

Domain Name: ABCEBOOK.COM

Registrant:
registrant_org: YourJungle Privacy Protection Service
registrant_name: Whois Agent
registrant_email: 
registrant_address: 6140 Tutt Blvd, #160
registrant_city: Colorado Springs
registrant_state: CO
registrant_zip: 80923
registrant_country: US
registrant_phone: 1.720.921.8850


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

DarkScribe said:


> Aha. Got you.
> 
> Still a US site, but different address.
> 
> ...


I'm pretty sure it's the same company as fantasticebook.com because they have the same funky spelling all over the site and the exact same design. If you pull up an Elle Casey search on the two sites in two different windows and click between the two windows, you'll see they're duplicates. Effers.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> I'm pretty sure it's the same company as fantasticebook.com because they have the same funky spelling all over the site and the exact same design. If you pull up an Elle Casey search on the two sites in two different windows and click between the two windows, you'll see they're duplicates. Effers.


I think that you are right, they seem to have a lot that is similar.

I have just purchased a few hundred dollars worth of books from the Chinese site and am in the process of having Visa Card Services reverse the sale. I have linked to your copy of the letter and given my reason as discovering that they are selling goods that they do not hold the rights to sell. Two of my staff are doing the same thing. (We are not downloading.) After a few complaints like this Visa will suspend their merchant facilities. I have done this successfully before.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

DarkScribe said:


> I think that you are right, they seem to have a lot that is similar.
> 
> I have just purchased a few hundred dollars worth of books from the Chinese site and am in the process of having Visa Card Services reverse the sale. I have linked to your copy of the letter and given my reason as discovering that they are selling goods that they do not hold the rights to sell. Two of my staff are doing the same thing. (We are not downloading.) After a few complaints like this Visa will suspend their merchant facilities. I have done this successfully before.


That is SWEET. Thank you. You're hard core, man. Good on you. I'd be afraid to give them my credit card #.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> That is SWEET. Thank you. You're hard core, man. Good on you. I'd be afraid to give them my credit card #.


Thank you.

There is really no risk, I cannot be charged, not even fees, once I have made a complaint and requested that the transaction not go through. Credit cards are a lot safer than most people realise - it is the banks who carry the risk. What they sometimes do is issue a new card with a different number if they feel that the card might be compromised - which can be annoying, but a small price. It is often the simplest, fastest and most effective way of dealing with scammers and pirates. Chop them off at their financial knees.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

The only thing I'd counsel for anyone using cards to do this is:

1) Have an ID theft subscription somewhere (they're inexpensive, on the order of 5-15 bucks a month depending) just to watch for any tomfoolery. (I see this as antivirus when you're visiting shady parts of the web. Just an extra precaution.)
and 
2) Use a card that has a good fraud department. One of our cards is very aggressive (it's a Barclay's MC) at freezing and verifying unusual transactions. The others tend to be a bit more relaxed.

Outside of that, yes, cards are quite a bit more secure than people would assume.


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## Lissa Bryan (Feb 8, 2013)

DarkScribe said:


> I think that you are right, they seem to have a lot that is similar.
> 
> I have just purchased a few hundred dollars worth of books from the Chinese site and am in the process of having Visa Card Services reverse the sale. I have linked to your copy of the letter and given my reason as discovering that they are selling goods that they do not hold the rights to sell. Two of my staff are doing the same thing. (We are not downloading.) After a few complaints like this Visa will suspend their merchant facilities. I have done this successfully before.


Wow! Thank you so much for going to all that trouble!


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## AllieJeanDS (Mar 11, 2013)

Thanks, Lissa for pointing this one out!


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

Lissa Bryan said:


> Wow! Thank you so much for going to all that trouble!


It isn't trouble -in case anyone hasn't noticed, I don't mind stirring things up.  I also have a very real problem with people who cheat or steal as a way of life, particularly if it affects the publishing industry.

I buy a lot of things online, much from China and have had the occasional problem. Card Services or the Chinese Embassy (complain to them about a Chinese citizen damaging China's international image) have always put things right. The Chinese Government will turn a blind eye to copyright and patent infringement, but they do not ignore credit card or other forms of blatant fraud. They have laws and they enforce them, sometime quite savagely.

Card Services has just sent me a confirming email. The transaction has been stopped and the issue referred to their fraud area.


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## George Berger (Aug 7, 2011)

DarkScribe said:


> Still a US site, but different address.


There's really no point posting or even trying to contact any of the private-registration outfits, as they are literally in no position to do _anything_ useful.

You can see a list of (some of) the other websites hosted on the same server, and they're all... highly questionable. Quite a few have questionable or outright bogus registration details in the PRC, and at least a few are owned by spammers. Lovely part of the WWW, that one.

Oddly, the sites are registered with darn near every registrar on the net, and don't seem to share DNS servers, or... anything. Though some of the registration dates are interesting.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Aaron Pogue said:


> Academically, "Is it theft?" is open to discussion, too. Legally, the answer is no. It's copyright infringement. The law has never recognized copyright infringement as "theft." Instead, it's its own sort of crime.
> 
> There's a significant difference between depriving someone of ownership of a thing, and just taking advantage of someone else's ownership of a thing. In ProfessorAplomb's example, if someone "stole" his work, then he would no longer have it (and no longer be able to make _any_ money off of it).
> 
> Instead, someone unlawfully profited from his work and thereby (potentially) lessened his ability to profit off his own work--both of which can be criminal actions--but calling it "theft" is demonstrably inaccurate.


The legal distinction is for lawyers, not victims. Having one's copyright violated is not de jure theft, sure; but it is de facto theft when you're on the receiving end. Physically taking someone's book or copying and widely distributing it issue in the same result: you, the copyright holder, suffer a loss. So what does that "significant difference" you speak of amount to exactly, when you're out something either way? I say it's rather obvious that there's no significant difference from a numbers standpoint.

I also find it a little off-putting when someone in the e-book distribution business takes what looks to me like a disinterested or even lackadaisical attitude toward copyright infringement.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

FWIW I read nothing disinterested in Aaron's wording, he simply clarified that infringement isn't theft.


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## KP_Webster (Mar 11, 2013)

Hi everyone

I just stumbled across this conversation, and indeed this site, quite by accident, but was intrigued by this conversation.

I just recently self-published and was struck by Mark 'Smashwords' Coker's views on piracy, which are essentially that if piracy results in an author getting more readers, then what's the problem? This is a view shared by Neil Gaiman, who is discussed in this Forbes article entitled 'Is Piracy the New Advertising?'

The argument, summed up in that article, is: '...if people are exposed to your work and enjoy it-even if they originally pirated it-they will eventually buy your work. Perhaps they won't buy the work (book, music, etc) they pirated, but they'll soon enough buy something else.'

This makes perfect sense to me. I don't see the problem at all. If it results in more readers, more people who love your work and talk to other people about you, then it's got to be good. The only downside would be if everybody in the world read only pirated copies of your books, which is never going to happen.

Also, I think that if it is the case that this is a huge business making a lot of money ripping off a massive amount of authors, then yeah, they're going too far and should probably be stopped. But generally, is piracy really something to get that upset about?


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

KP_Webster said:


> Also, I think that if it is the case that this is a huge business making a lot of money ripping off a massive amount of authors, then yeah, they're going too far and should probably be stopped. But generally, is piracy really something to get that upset about?


The size of the business is irrelevant here. Bootlegging is bad no matter how you cut it. Because bootleggers are targeting paying customers.

So the issue in this thread is dealing with something that is certainly an issue for authors, and I don't think that Neil Gaiman or Mark Coker will quibble over that.

Filesharing is a completely different matter, and yes, that does act as advertising.


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

WHDean said:


> The legal distinction is for lawyers, not victims. Having one's copyright violated is not de jure theft, sure; but it is de facto theft when you're on the receiving end. Physically taking someone's book or copying and widely distributing it issue in the same result: you, the copyright holder, suffer a loss. So what does that "significant difference" you speak of amount to exactly, when you're out something either way? I say it's rather obvious that there's no significant difference from a numbers standpoint.
> 
> I also find it a little off-putting when someone in the e-book distribution business takes what looks to me like a disinterested or even lackadaisical attitude toward copyright infringement.


It's a significant distinction. You being so literal yourself, I'm somewhat shocked by your take. Also, I read no value judgement in Aaron's statement. He was clarifying points of fact in order to forward the discussion.


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> The size of the business is irrelevant here. Bootlegging is bad no matter how you cut it. Because bootleggers are targeting paying customers.
> 
> So the issue in this thread is dealing with something that is certainly an issue for authors, and I don't think that Neil Gaiman or Mark Coker will quibble over that.
> 
> Filesharing is a completely different matter, and yes, that does act as advertising.


Interesting point. And I agree that bootlegging is worse than file sharing, or at least less innocent. But I'm wondering who they are selling to? The allure for most pirates is that the item is free. If you're paying, why not use a legit source?


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Adam Pepper said:


> Interesting point. And I agree that bootlegging is worse than file sharing, or at least less innocent. But I'm wondering who they are selling to? The allure for most pirates is that the item is free. If you're paying, why not use a legit source?


The source in this thread is misrepresenting themselves as selling legitimate copies. That's where the difference lies. So the customers they are catering to are just bargain hunting, which is a legitimate thing many of us do when shopping. I can buy a $35 toaster from X or a $25 from Y. Exact same toaster, just $10 cheaper at the second retailer. As someone who does not know any better, why would I not do that?

The customer is certainly not at fault here. Rather the business which has been set up to sell illegitimate copies.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Adam Pepper said:


> Interesting point. And I agree that bootlegging is worse than file sharing, or at least less innocent. But I'm wondering who they are selling to? The allure for most pirates is that the item is free. If you're paying, why not use a legit source?


I imagine they're selling the books at a reduced rate. The OP said most of the prices were under $2, I think.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Aaron Pogue said:


> There's a significant difference between depriving someone of ownership of a thing, and just taking advantage of someone else's ownership of a thing. In ProfessorAplomb's example, if someone "stole" his work, then he would no longer have it (and no longer be able to make _any_ money off of it).


Is that why governments all over the globe are so lax in prosecuting counterfeiting money?

After all, nobody is deprived of enjoying the money they already have.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Andrew Ashling said:


> Is that why governments all over the globe are so lax in prosecuting counterfeiting money?
> 
> After all, nobody is deprived of enjoying the money they already have.


A counterfeit book can still be read. A counterfeit bill must be surrendered immediately when it is discovered.

Fairly large difference.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Mathew Reuther said:


> A counterfeit book can still be read. A counterfeit bill must be surrendered immediately when it is discovered.
> 
> Fairly large difference.


Not the point. This is: no money is stolen, just "reproduced."


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

Andrew Ashling said:


> Not the point. This is: no money is stolen, just "reproduced."


Money might not be stolen, but value is. Counterfeit currency devalues existing currency - it is why flooding a nation with counterfeit bills can be regarded as a form of weapon. Look back to WW2.


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

I'm pretty cranky that Paper Dolls is on there. It takes months to write, edit and produce a book - and when it comes to a series, that series could take years to produce. A massive investment in time.

For someone else to make money out of my time is ----> *stealing*. They're stealing my time, my energy, and everything else I put into my books.

I read elsewhere that authors from various publishing houses have contacted their publishers over this.
Darkscribe, I hope the action you took and the actions that everyone else contacting credit card companies etc works.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> I imagine they're selling the books at a reduced rate. The OP said most of the prices were under $2, I think.


That's exactly it. They market themselves as "discount ebook sellers" and they even go so far as to suggest that they have special deals with the publishers for these "negotiated rates". It's ridiculous. It infuriates me that not only have they pirated my work, they're selling it - bootlegging I guess Matthew wants me to call it. It's an infringement of my rights and a theft of royalties that would have come to me, had someone purchased the book legally.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

ellecasey said:


> That's exactly it. They market themselves as "discount ebook sellers" and they even go so far as to suggest that they have special deals with the publishers for these "negotiated rates". It's ridiculous. It infuriates me that not only have they pirated my work, they're selling it - bootlegging I guess Matthew wants me to call it. It's an infringement of my rights and a theft of royalties that would have come to me, had someone purchased the book legally.


There's just some distinctions and some things are worse than others. Pretending to be selling something legit (thus making people think they are just getting a good deal) is about the worst thing someone can do outside of stripping your work, putting in their own front/back matter and pretending they wrote it themselves.

Not all of us are going to agree on filesharing, fine. But this stuff? I think 99% of us get that this stuff is bad. In general we want these sites, the ones who are selling (or even just using books to phish) shut down if possible.


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## AmsterdamAssassin (Oct 21, 2011)

Although I'm against piracy, I can understand the 'filesharing = exposure' argument by Mark Coker and Neil Gaiman. The main issue is that people who knowingly download paid books for free are not all that eager to pay for books. So, no sales lost that way. Plus, they might enjoy your writing enough to look for other work that might not be pirated.

In effect, exposure is good. Bootlegging books and selling them at a discount, bad. And the thin line is not as thin as it looks.


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## Klip (Mar 7, 2011)

Not entirely on topic   but I wish that writers (who are quick to get excited when they believe their books are being pirated), would not put other people's music on their book-trailers without permission.

Often the music is by far the most compelling part of the trailer, but people don't seem to think it worth-while to consider the artist who made it. Quite apart from payment: Maybe that music is already associated with some other project? Maybe the musician would not want their work to be associated with your book?  But once again it seems to be a case of "If I can do it, why shouldn't I do it."


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

I did hear a nice thing the other day somewhere, and that was someone had mentioned licensing the song they used in their trailer.


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## dalya (Jul 26, 2011)

KP_Webster said:


> Also, I think that if it is the case that this is a huge business making a lot of money ripping off a massive amount of authors, then yeah, they're going too far and should probably be stopped. ...


Because THAT is the job of vanity presses!

.

.

_Thank you folks, I'll be here all week! Don't forget to tip your waitress. Try the veal, it's delicious!_


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

Masha du Toit said:


> Not entirely on topic  but I wish that writers (who are quick to get excited when they believe their books are being pirated), would not put other people's music on their book-trailers without permission.
> 
> Often the music is by far the most compelling part of the trailer, but people don't seem to think it worth-while to consider the artist who made it. Quite apart from payment: Maybe that music is already associated with some other project? Maybe the musician would not want their work to be associated with your book? But once again it seems to be a case of "If I can do it, why shouldn't I do it."


It's simple to find free music that is licensed for commercial use, so it's hard to understand a writer using anything else (if they want something for free).


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

Piracy is not stealing. It's something else entirely. As writers our job is to use words correctly. We obsess over who vs whom and then vs than but then blatantly misuse a term for dramatic effect. It actually weakens the argument. If you want to make a case against piracy, take a rational and factual position based on it being ethically wrong and then (and this is the hard part) prove damages.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Adam Pepper said:


> Piracy is not stealing. It's something else entirely. As writers our job is to use words correctly. We obsess over who vs whom and then vs than but then blatantly misuse a term for dramatic effect. It actually weakens the argument. If you want to make a case against piracy, take a rational and factual position based on it being ethically wrong and then (and this is the hard part) prove damages.


Talk about obsessing ...

I can call piracy whatever I want to call it. You don't decide that for me, sorry. It's stealing royalties from me as far as I'm concerned. You go ahead and call it what you want, and I'm not going to tell you you're wrong. And for those authors who are okay with people infringing their intellectual property, bully for them. I'm not.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> FWIW I read nothing disinterested in Aaron's wording, he simply clarified that infringement isn't theft.


A remark about how piracy is not theft, that there's a "significant" difference between piracy and theft, and that the loss is only potential are usually a prelude to a piracy is okay argument. See Pepper's remarks, for example.



KP_Webster said:


> I just recently self-published and was struck by Mark 'Smashwords' Coker's views on piracy, which are essentially that if piracy results in an author getting more readers, then what's the problem? This is a view shared by Neil Gaiman.... The argument, summed up in that article, is: '...if people are exposed to your work and enjoy iteven if they originally pirated itthey will eventually buy your work. Perhaps they wont buy the work (book, music, etc) they pirated, but theyll soon enough buy something else.'
> 
> This makes perfect sense to me. I don't see the problem at all. If it results in more readers, more people who love your work and talk to other people about you, then it's got to be good. The only downside would be if everybody in the world read only pirated copies of your books, which is never going to happen.


Here's the problem with that view. Gaiman is too clever by half. He thinks he can have the best of both worlds: pirates spreading the word about him and honest people actually paying. But the paying crowd will get the message eventually and they'll start helping him with his "advertising" instead of buying his books. If the authors themselves don't expect anyone to respect copyright-or, worse, claim to be capitalizing on piracy as free advertising-then why should anyone pay for their books? Aren't the people who pay just suckers?


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

WHDean said:


> A remark about how piracy is not theft, that there's a "significant" difference between piracy and theft, and that the loss is only potential are usually a prelude to a piracy is okay argument. See Pepper's remarks, for example.
> 
> Here's the problem with that view. Gaiman is too clever by half. He thinks he can have the best of both worlds: pirates spreading the word about him and honest people actually paying. But the paying crowd will get the message eventually and they'll start helping him with his "advertising" instead of buying his books. If the authors themselves don't expect anyone to respect copyright-or, worse, claim to be capitalizing on piracy as free advertising-then why should anyone pay for their books? Aren't the people who pay just suckers?


I've heard an expression a few times ... something about having cake and eating it too? lol


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

ellecasey said:


> I can call piracy whatever I want to call it. You don't decide that for me, sorry.


You most certainly can call it whatever you want. But if you want to win in a court of law, you'll need to make a stronger case. Do you have any evidence that you've lost royalties?


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Adam Pepper said:


> You most certainly can call it whatever you want. But if you want to win in a court of law, you'll need to make a stronger case. Do you have any evidence that you've lost royalties?


I wasn't aware that KB was a court of law. I know some people would like to think it is, but ... yeah. It's not. This isn't even a legal debate society, so the words I use are at our discretion, to use for expression as we see fit.

I'm confident I could prove damages though, if I ever were in a court of law. But then again, I'm a lawyer, so that could be the reason. (big head and all)


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

WHDean said:


> A remark about how piracy is not theft, that there's a "significant" difference between piracy and theft, and that the loss is only potential are usually a prelude to a piracy is okay argument. See Pepper's remarks, for example.


Except I've made no such argument. I dont think I've made any argument.


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## Adam Pepper (May 28, 2011)

ellecasey said:


> I'm confident I could prove damages though, if I ever were in a court of law.


That would be a landmark case. We'd all be watching intently. The point is that you have no evidence of lost sales. You have evidence of unauthorized downloads. They arent the same thing. They are both ethically wrong in my view but they are different. And one is much easier to prove than the other.


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## Lissa Bryan (Feb 8, 2013)

Masha du Toit said:



> Not entirely on topic  but I wish that writers (who are quick to get excited when they believe their books are being pirated), would not put other people's music on their book-trailers without permission.
> 
> Often the music is by far the most compelling part of the trailer, but people don't seem to think it worth-while to consider the artist who made it. Quite apart from payment: Maybe that music is already associated with some other project? Maybe the musician would not want their work to be associated with your book? But once again it seems to be a case of "If I can do it, why shouldn't I do it."


Perhaps people who do this are self-publishers unaware of the legal implications? My small-press publisher is careful about this sort of thing. I was told I'd have to buy the rights to any music/images I wanted to use in my trailer. (And since I knew I could never afford the music I wanted, I've declined to make one.)

We've even been warned our Facebook/Pinterest/blogs could be targeted for a lawsuit if we "share" photographs on pages/boards promoting our books. The latter is more rare, but it has happened in a few cases. All of us are probably equally guilty when it comes to sharing funny cat pictures or inspiring-phrase-with-sunset images on Facebook, but that's technically copyright violation, even if it's rarely enforced. I make sure all of my promotional sites use only Creative Commons images for that reason.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Adam Pepper said:


> That would be a landmark case. We'd all be watching intently. The point is that you have no evidence of lost sales. You have evidence of unauthorized downloads. They arent the same thing. They are both ethically wrong in my view but they are different. And one is much easier to prove than the other.


Have you read the DMCA? it's a _criminal_ offense to benefit financially from pirated works. It's civil as well, but also a crime. All a plaintiff needs is reasonable suspicion to file suit (simple connect the dots reasoning) and then they have access through discovery to all the defendant's user info and data. The only reason it hasn't been done yet is because the cost to manage a case like this would be astronomical, especially for a single midlist author like me. That doesn't mean it won't happen. It will someday, mark my words. And the plaintiff will win, just like it did against napster.

The point for me is this: I consider it stealing from me, both pirating and bootlegging/conterfeiting. (Whatever you want to call it.) You can crow about how it's not stealing all day and all night for the next thirty days, and it's not going to change squat for me. When my book is read by someone who didn't pay for it or receive it from an author-authorized promotion, I lost royalties on that book. And in some cases, someone else collected it. Period.


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## Guest (Mar 11, 2013)

ellecasey said:


> Have you read the DMCA? it's a _criminal_ offense to benefit financially from pirated works. It's civil as well, but also a crime. All a plaintiff needs is reasonable suspicion to file suit (simple connect the dots reasoning) and then they have access through discovery to all the defendant's user info and data. The only reason it hasn't been done yet is because the cost to manage a case like this would be astronomical, especially for a single midlist author like me. That doesn't mean it won't happen. It will someday, mark my words. And the plaintiff will win, just like it did against napster.
> 
> The point for me is this: I consider it stealing from me, both pirating and bootlegging/conterfeiting. (Whatever you want to call it.) You can crow about how it's not stealing all day and all night for the next thirty days, and it's not going to change squat for me. When my book is read by someone who didn't pay for it or receive it from an author-authorized promotion, I lost royalties on that book. And in some cases, someone else collected it. Period.


If they won't listen to an attorney, then they may end up listening to a judge!

It's pointless to argue morals and ethics with people who don't have a conscience. This is the main reason we must have prisons. It's unfortunate, but the only way to effectively communicate with "sharers" is to prosecute them.

More people are prosecuted than the piracy advocates acknowledge. Most authors or publishers don't go out of their way to publicize this because, after all, these are criminals and they do sometimes retaliate.

I have now read of two cases recently, both in Canada, where pirates retaliated against authors who asked to have their stolen works removed. In one instance, the pirates pirated more of the author's work. In the other, they published the private information of the authors (required on the DMCA takedown notice) to ridicule and to possibly physically endanger them. (By the way, as far as I know DMCA only applies in the U.S. and the pirates in other countries are very nasty about that fact - they're like spoiled children, in fact.) Usually people who steal don't just limit their criminal activities to that one vice - they can be dangerous in other ways besides just to your bank account.

But, something is in the air right now. At the end of February, Pirate Bay was kicked out of Sweden ( http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2415957,00.asp?kc=PCRSS05079TX1K0000993 ). They resurrected about a week later in two other countries, but, at least, they're on the run. And, this is a reflection of changes in laws, not only in Sweden, but elsewhere. For example, on Jan. 31st it was reported that New Zealand is prosecuting its first case against pirates under its new "3 Strikes Law" ( http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/01/31/first-pirate-prosecution-in-new-zealand/ ) New Zealand did a good thing shutting down Kim Dot Com's massive criminals enterprise, as well.

About a week ago, here in the U.S. several big internet service providers implemented the Copyright Alert System ( http://www.copyrightinformation.org/the-copyright-alert-system/what-is-a-copyright-alert/ ) This system tells users they're pirating - not that they don't know, of course, but now they know their ISP knows - and after 5 alerts or so, their bandwidth slows to a crawl for a while. This is more an attempt to remind thieves that they're being thieves and their criminal activity is being monitored. As far as I can tell, there's no prosecution involved, just an attempt to deter crime.

Some big suits with massive awards to the victims have been won, usually by the recording industry. These don't seem to be popular with a lot of people because the damages can be astronomical and there is a perception that musicians already make too much money. You might have heard of those cases, which are fairly rare, but got a lot of press when they occurred.

But, what you don't hear so much about are the cases where book copyright holders sue for several thousand dollars. Those suits are not so impressive, but they are pretty numerous and not well-publicized.

You can bet, if I do sue someone and win, I won't be coming here to report it in any detail and if I did do such a thing, I would do so anonymously because - again - these are criminals. I've seen it in my own life, observing people around me: People who steal often commit violent crimes, too. How many times have you seen true crime shows that start out with a perp who stole money, then had to kill to cover his tracks. So, thievery is not a crime of innocence. And, no matter how many euphemisms are applied to stealing (ie. sharing, piracy, bootlegging, copying, borrowing, bartering, etc.), it's still stealing and if you do it you are a dirt bag crook who belongs behind bars.

And...

Good work, DarkScribe! Interesting technique you have... first time I've seen that used. I hope it does the job.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

The more laws we push for with regards to regulating the internet, the less free we become.

The current laws being proposed in America would make it possible for an unregulated agency to simply decide Elle Casey is a smut peddler. Lights out on her website. No due process. No courts.

You know where else laws like that exist?

China.

Iran.

I'm not going to say that people aren't allowed to have their own particular stances on people doing x, y, or z with copyrighted material. It's absolutely fine that people have opinions which differ.

But I will say that taking away freedom, handing over power to new bureaucracies, and catering to huge corporations (people that view themselves as being in competition with indies *cough*) is probably unhealthy for the vast majority of the citizens of the US.

(For good info on this subject, check out EFF.org . . . they're not pro-piracy, they're pro freedom.)


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> The more laws we push for with regards to regulating the internet, the less free we become.
> 
> The current laws being proposed in America would make it possible for an unregulated agency to simply decide Elle Casey is a smut peddler. Lights out on her website. No due process. No courts.
> 
> ...


I don't even get where you're going with this. It can't possibly be that we need to let pirates be pirates or otherwise we lose our freedom as writers? What?


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

ellecasey said:


> I don't even get where you're going with this. It can't possibly be that we need to let pirates be pirates or otherwise we lose our freedom as writers? What?


No. What we need to be cautious of is supporting initiatives which are supposedly designed to fight piracy, but in all actuality simply remove freedoms and create agencies which answer to nobody in particular, and have nothing to do with legal resolutions. (They're all just administrative things. I'd be like having a huge Amazon to complain to about your competition to and get them blacklisted . . . which, BTW, breaks the internet for the whole world, not just the US.)

Absolutely: if you are against piracy you should continue to work towards actual legal protections, continue to pursue judgements, and by all means work to shut down sites by starving them of revenue, hosting, etc.

I just caution that while our congress is busy "fixing" piracy, they are doing it at the behest of organizations that have a vested interest in getting ALL the consumers to buy THEIR products. They work for the RIAA, the MPAA, and the Big X publishers.

It's more an aside, as I know a lot of anti-piracy people see things the lawmakers are doing and don't evaluate the end results because they buy into "piracy is bad and this will stop it" . . .

Which as we've discussed is a) up for debate and b) unlikely to be true.

In the end, I'm just interjecting that someone being the enemy of your enemy does not always make them your friend. Nor are people who are ostensibly more lax on piracy suggesting that you aren't entitled to puruse legal recourse if you feel you've been damaged.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> ...
> I just caution that while our congress is busy "fixing" piracy, they are doing it at the behest of organizations that have a vested interest in getting ALL the consumers to buy THEIR products. They work for the RIAA, the MPAA, and the Big X publishers.
> 
> ...


I'm no expert, but the RIAA sounds like a good deal to me. It's not like the Big 6, it's a trade organization that record companies belong to, but it's not a recording company itself. It has been instrumental in bringing many high-profile cases against pirates (large and small) on behalf of their member IP owners. I WISH I had an organization like that going after ebook pirates. Maybe someday we will. I'll be signing up if that's ever the case.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

The RIAA works for the big labels. It has done essentially nothing to help indie musicians, and in fact actively works to harm them.

They attempt to kill promotional venues for indies (it'd be like a trade organization taking out bookbub), for example.

The music industry is the worst creative industry in the world, and the big X publishers are trying to emulate the record labels.

In my eyes the people to be worried about are the ones with the money who are actively trying to harm your chosen profession, and not the people who are just regular folks who might be interested in your work if they read some of it.

But that's my perspective.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> The RIAA works for the big labels. It has done essentially nothing to help indie musicians, and in fact actively works to harm them.
> 
> They attempt to kill promotional venues for indies (it'd be like a trade organization taking out bookbub), for example.
> 
> ...


Yes, we have a different perspective on this for sure. To each his own.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Mathew Reuther said:


> The more laws we push for with regards to regulating the internet, the less free we become.
> 
> The current laws being proposed in America would make it possible for an unregulated agency to simply decide Elle Casey is a smut peddler. Lights out on her website. No due process. No courts.
> 
> ...


But is that what we're talking about?

When you see one of your books pirated on a site, _you_ shouldn't be the one to prove that the copyright belongs to you. _They_ should prove to _you_ that they have your written permission.
If they can't provide such proof, they should:
* take your book(s) from their site/shut the site down altogether
* pay damages to you
* face criminal charges in court.

It's absurd that _we_ have to prove anything to _them_.
It's absurd that they get practical immunity when they stop stealing when they get caught (and can continue stealing from people who aren't aware that they're being robbed).


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

DMCA requires no proof, it simply requires a sworn statement that you are not lying that you are the rights holder or a representative thereof. So I'm not sure where you are getting that you need to prove anything to a site hosting your files, be it for pay or not.

Now, how compliant a site is . . . that's another story. Some will takedown properly. Others will not.

But notice that when someone does a takedown on Amazon people come here and post "OMG WTF" . . . so really, the DMCA as it stands now can be used by anyone to hinder anyone else's business on a LEGITIMATE reseller as well.

The more laws we have enacted to "protect" our rights the more they can be used to remove rights from us. It's a vicious circle, and there's a damned difficult time finding any kind of reasonable balance given how different people (and that includes not only lawmakers, but countries across the world) feel about where we should come out.

It's certainly a complex and frustrating issue.


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## L.M. Pfalz (Aug 31, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> When my book is read by someone who didn't pay for it or receive it from an author-authorized promotion, I lost royalties on that book. And in some cases, someone else collected it. Period.


I'm quoting you, but this question is really directed to anyone who has similar views about piracy (or more specifically "filesharing", not selling illegal copies of books). I'm just curious, what is your opinion about public libraries? Would you object to having your book(s) in them, since people would be reading your work for free?


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

L.M. Pfalz said:


> I'm quoting you, but this question is really directed to anyone who has similar views about piracy (or more specifically "filesharing", not selling illegal copies of books). I'm just curious, what is your opinion about public libraries? Would you object to having your book(s) in them, since people would be reading your work for free?


This is the same argument made by many piracy advocates. I'm not sure if you're one of those, even though your post seems to indicate you are, but here's my response:

When you are a library you buy or receive a copy of a book that was purchased or provided legally. It's a paper copy that cannot be duplicated (libraries don't make photocopies of books). When anyone buys a copy of a paper book at a bookstore or online, they can lend it to a friend or re-sell it or give it away. Just that one copy they bought. That's legal and awesome. I love sharing books with friends and family.

Piracy of ebooks, however, is akin to taking that paperback, making unlimited exact copies of it (cover, binding, everything) and putting it online for anyone to take for free. People who pirate ebooks don't buy a copy, send it to one person, and erase it off their hard drive. They make duplicates. Millions of them sometimes.

Amazon's lending service allows borrowing, of only ONE copy of the book at a time. Only one person can have access to it. All of my books are lendable.

I think you know where I'm going with this. You can find my books in a few libraries. They either bought the book themselves, I bought it for them, or one of my fans bought it and delivered it there. The library now owns that book. The only thing I can tell them is that they can't make copies of it, that's it. And I'm perfectly fine with that. I hope it's checked out all year. And I hope the people who check it out and like it will go out and buy the next in series if it's not available at the library, and tell their friends about it.

Library = apples. Piracy = broccoli. They're not even in the same family.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

You hope that the book is checked out all year, meaning you hoppe that everyone who wants to read that sinbgle copy that the library sold gets a chance to, as you recognize that it drives them to want more, to talk about the book, etc.

Yet when given the opportunity for unlimited people to tell people about the book, you balk.

At what point is a single copy being used too much in your eyes?

Would you, for example, want a degradable counter in a book that made it delete itself? (Obviously pirates would find away around this, but I'm curious.)

You want people to buy one copy and lend it over and over again. How is this so very much different than pirates who buy a copy and lend it over and over again?

(Now, obviously, selling those copies is messed up. We all agree on that point. We're just talking about lending/sharing.)


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## Guest (Mar 12, 2013)

The arguments given by piracy-advocates quickly become trite... In a short time doing research on this topic, I seem to have heard every rationale and lame excuse in the book.

Clearly, library lending is not the same as theft. Since my thoughts on this are the same as every other non-criminally minded person, I'll just provide this link:

__
https://19953477001%2Fwhy-libraries-are-different-from-piracy

Obviously, library lending is authorized. On the flip side, pirating is not authorized. Because of all of the piracy, none of my books, either digitally or in print, are available from libraries. Incidentally, one of the genres I write in is historically the most likely to be stolen of all - ever, from public libraries long before the popularity of the web and long before anyone ever heard the term "ebook." So, you cannot get my books at a library. For that, you can thank the thieves.

Here are some more answers to the common often contradictory and always insane arguments given by criminals to attempt to excuse their criminality: http://3dblogger.typepad.com/wired_state/2013/02/copyleftistspirates.html?cid=6a00e54fce13cf8834017c369b38df970b - this is, by no means, a comprehensive list of the stupid things I've heard. But, it's a start.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

Adam Pepper said:


> Piracy is not stealing. It's something else entirely. As writers our job is to use words correctly. We obsess over who vs whom and then vs than but then blatantly misuse a term for dramatic effect. It actually weakens the argument. If you want to make a case against piracy, take a rational and factual position based on it being ethically wrong and then (and this is the hard part) prove damages.


Piracy IS stealing. Stealing - in law - is defined as "taking without the owner's consent". A very simple "legal" definition.

Taken verbatim from a book of current Westminster law:

_In law, theft has a wider meaning than in everyday use and covers 'appropriation' of all kinds such as taking goods, selling them, destroying them, consuming them, lending them to someone who is unlikely to return them, giving them away, altering them in such a way that that they cannot be restored, (for example melting down silverware), pawning them, dishonestly doing anything with them that only the owner is entitled to do. 'Property' includes money and land as well as possessions, or anything of value. _

The disingenuous argument that if the owner still has something then it cannot have been stolen will not stand up in a court of law. I have witnessed verdicts against people for theft of ideas - the most recent being a company who copied designs from a well known designer's clothing. It is one of the many different ways for someone to steal something. There is no requirement in law for a profit to be made or lost. It carries a penalty - if proved - regardless of the amount of money lost by the rightful owner, or the profit made by the thief.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Yes, thank you ProfessorA and Darkscribe.

I'm wasting my time trying to explain to you why I have a problem with people infringing on my intellectual property rights.  I know that going into this.  But here goes nothing:

You're either one of those people who think you're entitled to anything you can get your hands on (so long as you don't get caught), or you're one of those people who feel they should pay for what they use.  I'm in the latter category.  Maybe you're in the former.  It sounds like it.  I'll tell you I have hundreds of songs on my itunes account.  I've paid for all of them.  I've never downloaded a song from the Internet without paying for it.  I support musicians I like.  I expect readers to do the same for me.

People who think they're entitled to things they're not (according to the law) are, in my experience, impossible to convince they're wrong for being thieves.  It's a selfish perspective I'll never understand.  If you are an author who doesn't care if your work is pirated, then by all means, let people pirate it.  Give away a jillion copies to people who will NEVER buy your books because they can get them for free and they know you don't care that they do it.  I am not one of those authors.  I want my readers to pay for my books.  If I give away copies on my terms, that is my prerogative, which I do to increase sales of other books or change rankings or any number of other reasons.  As the copyright owner, I have the right and power to make that decision.  Some jerk who uploads my work to a file sharing site does not.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Your assumption is that people who pirate don't buy media. They buy more than average.

So you're operating from a perspective which doesn't mesh with reality.

I can link to a better source than Tumblr.

How about HuffPo? http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/22/music-pirates-study_n_2526417.html

Still, some people hate it's "liberal bias" so . . .

How about ArsTechnica? Several levels above tumbler in repute, and tech focused and generally apolitical: http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2009/04/study-pirates-buy-tons-more-music-than-average-folks/

TechDirt, same story, techy, apolitical: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20121126/00590921141/dear-riaa-pirates-buy-more-full-stop-deal-with-it.shtml

I get how if you assumed pirates didn't spend money you might be annoyed.

But they do. More than your "normal" customers.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> Your assumption is that people who pirate don't buy media. They buy more than average.
> 
> So you're operating from a perspective which doesn't mesh with reality.
> 
> ...


First of all, you have absolutely NO proof that pirates pay for more media. My experience is opposite of that. Ask any teenager who downloads pirated songs or movies when they're going to start paying for things. Answer: "Why should I pay for it when I can get it for free? I'll use money I make from working to buy stuff I can't get for free." Duh.

And second, imagine how much they'd spend if they actually paid for media! Ohmygosh! When people want things, they find ways to get it. If they couldn't pirate anymore, they'd buy. It's simple.


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## L.M. Pfalz (Aug 31, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> This is the same argument made by many piracy advocates. I'm not sure if you're one of those, even though your post seems to indicate you are, but here's my response:


It was a simple question. I'm not advocating piracy, and I don't appreciate accusations, thanks.



> When you are a library you buy or receive a copy of a book that was purchased or provided legally. It's a paper copy that cannot be duplicated (libraries don't make photocopies of books). When anyone buys a copy of a paper book at a bookstore or online, they can lend it to a friend or re-sell it or give it away. Just that one copy they bought. That's legal and awesome. I love sharing books with friends and family.
> 
> Piracy of ebooks, however, is akin to taking that paperback, making unlimited exact copies of it (cover, binding, everything) and putting it online for anyone to take for free. People who pirate ebooks don't buy a copy, send it to one person, and erase it off their hard drive. They make duplicates. Millions of them sometimes.
> 
> ...


I was referring to libraries lending ebooks, not print books. I admit I have limited knowledge on the rules of libraries lending ebooks, as I haven't done it myself, but I thought unlike print books, ebooks can be checked out by more than a handful of people at a time. If it works similarly to Amazon's lending library, then I guess it's a moot point, but I was under the impression that it didn't work like that.



ProfessorAplomb said:


> Clearly, library lending is not the same as theft. Since my thoughts on this are the same as every other non-criminally minded person, I'll just provide this link:
> 
> __
> https://19953477001%2Fwhy-libraries-are-different-from-piracy


I followed the link and read the article. I'm a little confused why musicians shouldn't be paid for their songs simply because CD's are overpriced and because they can play music live  So some artists should be paid for their work but others shouldn't?

And just FYI, no laws are broken if an author decides to upload their work to torrent sites or wherever, since they own their own rights. Not all file sharing is done by the criminally minded. It's not for everyone, obviously. It's a personal choice that each author can make for themselves. But it's not automatically wrong or criminal.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> First of all, you have absolutely NO proof that pirates pay for more media. My experience is opposite of that. Ask any teenager who downloads pirated songs or movies when they're going to start paying for things. Answer: "Why should I pay for it when I can get it for free? I'll use money I make from working to buy stuff I can't get for free." Duh.
> 
> And second, imagine how much they'd spend if they actually paid for media! Ohmygosh! When people want things, they find ways to get it. If they couldn't pirate anymore, they'd buy. It's simple.


Elle, Mathew just posted some proof. From the _HuffPost_ article:

"According to a Columbia University study published this weekend, frequent users of peer-to-peer "piracy" networks in the U.S. legitimately purchase 30 percent more music than non-P2P users."

I didn't bother to follow the other links, since my opinion on the issue is already established, but if they cite similar studies, that's markedly better evidence than the hypothetical teenager you're using, which is no evidence at all. The problem with using "common sense" to draw conclusions about how people behave is that people's behavior often defies what would at first appear to be common sense.


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## Guest (Mar 12, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> Elle, Mathew just posted some proof. From the _HuffPost_ article:
> 
> "According to a Columbia University study published this weekend, frequent users of peer-to-peer "piracy" networks in the U.S. legitimately purchase 30 percent more music than non-P2P users."
> 
> I didn't bother to follow the other links, since my opinion on the issue is already established, but if they cite similar studies, that's markedly better evidence than the hypothetical teenager you're using, which is no evidence at all. The problem with using "common sense" to draw conclusions about how people behave is that people's behavior often defies what would at first appear to be common sense.


That proves nothing... certainly it proves nothing with regard to books. And, it brings me to one of the piracy-advocates' arguments that irks me the most: "But, we're helping you with your marketing!"

I am a writer and researcher - I'm not a rock star, nor do I want to be one. I am very low key and I have my own methods of marketing. I don't do book tours. I don't do speeches. I make money entirely from royalties. Some of my work is a little dry - it's not the kind of thing I see a lot of the writers who advocate for piracy doing - but, they're probably not making much money at their writing, either.

The marketing of my books starts before I write them. You see, I went to school for that and I have some background in marketing and copywriting. And when some reprobate who belongs behind bars steals my work and either gives to people or resells it, it wrenches my marketing plan away from me. Consequently, it damages my sales. I don't need a survey to tell me that because I have my own sales reports to show that this is the case.


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## B. Justin Shier (Apr 1, 2011)

ellecasey said:


> You're either one of those people who think you're entitled to anything you can get your hands on (so long as you don't get caught), or you're one of those people who feel they should pay for what they use.


What about my position? 
I believe I cannot stop digital piracy.
I believe no government or collection of governments could stop digital piracy.
I believe my readers should pay for what they can and pay me later for what they cannot.
I believe piracy has increased the number of people willing to pay for my work.
Am I not permitted a category?



ellecasey said:


> If they couldn't pirate anymore, they'd buy. It's simple.


I don't find it so simple.

Consumers without money cannot purchase anything.
Consumers without access to specific proprietary content conduit cannot purchase content exclusive to that conduit.
Consumers in regions that lack a legal marketplace for specific content cannot purchase said content legally.
Readers in regions that censor specific content can purchase but not consume specific content.

Ain't it a crazy world?

B.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

L.M. Pfalz said:


> It was a simple question. I'm not advocating piracy, and I don't appreciate accusations, thanks.
> 
> And just FYI, no laws are broken if an author decides to upload their work to torrent sites or wherever, since they own their own rights. Not all file sharing is done by the criminally minded. It's not for everyone, obviously. It's a personal choice that each author can make for themselves. But it's not automatically wrong or criminal.


I accused you of nothing. Re-read the post.

I agree with you. An owner of intellectual property is the ONLY one with the right to distribute it. If he or she wants to do that via a torrent site, that is his or her right. It's not wrong to exercise your rights. No one here is saying that. Pirates, however, do not have that right. They cannot exercise my rights for me. Not without buying them away from me.



Becca Mills said:


> Elle, Mathew just posted some proof. From the _HuffPost_ article:
> 
> "According to a Columbia University study published this weekend, frequent users of peer-to-peer "piracy" networks in the U.S. legitimately purchase 30 percent more music than non-P2P users."
> 
> I didn't bother to follow the other links, since my opinion on the issue is already established, but if they cite similar studies, that's markedly better evidence than the hypothetical teenager you're using, which is no evidence at all. The problem with using "common sense" to draw conclusions about how people behave is that people's behavior often defies what would at first appear to be common sense.


Becca, did you read that study or the article? I did. First of all, it wasn't Columbia University who did the research, it was a separate group, American Assembly who is just located there. Name drop alert. And I found it hilarious that the alleged non-piracy group who bought less music, actually had a huge percentage of pirated work on their computers (ripped from friend's CDs and received by email, etc.). A full 55% of the non-pirate group was pirated. Talk about a crock.

Here's another choice bit from the article: "Of course, correlation is not causation. It's possible, for example, the most avid music fans are also the most likely to be drawn to peer-to-peer networks. Perhaps without those networks they would have purchased even more music from legitimate services."

My point exactly. But of course, pirates won't agree with this part of the article. Or recognize that every single person in the survey was a pirate of music.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

B. Justin Shier said:


> What about my position?
> I believe my readers should pay for what they can and pay me later for what they cannot.
> I believe piracy has increased the number of people willing to pay for my work.
> Am I not permitted a category?
> ...


Although I feel that here is some possible merit in the theory that piracy increases an author's exposure to a reading public I cannot accept that the rather nebulous research that is based on music piracy extends unchanged to book piracy. Music pirates are more likely to be young and possibly prepared to purchase new releases rather than wait for a "safe" pirated version to become available. This seems to be the case with many of the students on campus where I lecture. Book pirates have no incentive to purchase once they find a source of free reading material.

As for having no money - when they need to they find a way to purchase something that they really want they usually can. If that was not so then heroin/cocaine etc. - which are not cheap drugs - would not be the problem that they are today.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

B. Justin Shier said:


> What about my position?
> I believe I cannot stop digital piracy.
> I believe no government or collection of governments could stop digital piracy.
> I believe my readers should pay for what they can and pay me later for what they cannot.
> ...


Justin, if you want to make your work available to the world for free, go for it! That's your right as the copyright holder. As for me, no one decides for me what I give away and what I sell. That's my decision alone.

Believe what you want about people who pirate your work. I've had conversations on file sharing sites with pirates. The ones I've talked to aren't these pollyanna consumers who you want to believe they are. They don't care about your efforts or about your need to support your family. They see your book, they want it, they take it. They're special. Other jerks have to pay for it, but not them.

What exactly causes a person to live his life taking, taking, taking for free and then one day wake up and say, "Hmm. I think I'll pay Justin for his books this year."? Some kind of copyright epiphany? Birth of a first child? Becoming best friends with a writer?

There are people out there who will pirate stuff, no matter what anyone says or does. And there are people out there who will only do it if they think they won't get caught; and if they fear they might be caught, they won't do it. We cannot stop the first group very easily, but we sure as heck can stop the second. And I think that's a much bigger group. It's called a deterrent. Lawsuits and groups like RIAA that go after people for breaking the law are deterrents. I am pro-piracy-deterrents. You are free of course to be the exact opposite.

As for the second large group you mentioned, those who are censored and so on, I still do not agree that piracy is okay. You can give your books away to everyone in the Emirates if you want. That's your choice. I won't be if I can help it.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

http://www.themillions.com/2010/01/confessions-of-a-book-pirate.html

For fun, one of the filesharing sources from a few years back.

Note at the end where it points out that people who go into histrionics about piracy encourage pirates to upload all their works and keep them uploaded, just to irk them. Not really strange when someone wants to call you a criminal that you then go and say, "fine, let's start with you..."

And I'll point out that there's a reason the RIAA/music is the focus of so many studies. They have been the loudest and more obnoxious anti-piracy folks for years. In some respects the most successful, but only really at a macro level. (Napster, for example.)

As there's more noise around them they get more attention, and with that scrutiny comes more studies. The Big X publishers have taken a distant fourth in intensity behind the RIAA/MPAA/Games, and as such they get less attention.

Doesn't mean that the same rules don't apply to consumption.

But I can state my belief that it's highly unlikely (given that most people live paycheck to paycheck) that MORE money would get spent on luxuries than was already spent.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

JRHenderson said:


> "Your Honour, I'm pleading 'not guilty' to the charge of theft. Although the store detective found hundreds of dollars worth of things in my pockets that I didn't pay for, when I _do_ actually pay for a couple of candy bars, I spend 30% more than other customers..."


1) e-goods have no production cost.
2) will you accept an industry-wide 30% cut in revenues in exchange for people no longer breaking the law?

(ETA: before someone starts quoting me cover prices and layout, only the master copy costs anything, the rest are free, assuming no bandwidth issues arise at any point.)


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## B. Justin Shier (Apr 1, 2011)

ellecasey said:


> Justin, if you want to make your work available to the world for free, go for it! That's your right as the copyright holder. As for me, no one decides for me what I give away and what I sell. That's my decision alone.


My belief is that it is not my choice. Just as a property owner on the East Coast can not demand a hurricane not sweep their house away, I cannot keep my work from being pirated. My wants do not matter. My desires do not matter. Reality matters. So I cope with the circumstances.



ellecasey said:


> There are people out there who will pirate stuff, no matter what anyone says or does.


And if the trends continue, they will soon comprise over 50% of the world's population.

B.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

DarkScribe said:


> Although I feel that here is some possible merit in the theory that piracy increases an author's exposure to a reading public I cannot accept that the rather nebulous research that is based on music piracy extends unchanged to book piracy. Music pirates are more likely to be young and possibly prepared to purchase new releases rather than wait for a "safe" pirated version to become available. This seems to be the case with many of the students on campus where I lecture. Book pirates have no incentive to purchase once they find a source of free reading material.


What does the type of media have to do with anything? This statement made no sense. "Safe" pirated version? Youtube ripping takes 3 minutes, and videos are usually out BEFORE albums may be purchased. It's FAR easier to get your hands on music than books, and yet people still buy music, and as we see from the studies, more of it than average.



> As for having no money - when they need to they find a way to purchase something that they really want they usually can. If that was not so then heroin/cocaine etc. - which are not cheap drugs - would not be the problem that they are today.


More often than not these things are purchased through engaging in other illegal activities such as dealing, prostitution, and robbery.

I am not sure how you feel on this subject, but I would rather someone download a book from a pirate site than hold a gun on someone to buy it from my website


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> http://www.themillions.com/2010/01/confessions-of-a-book-pirate.html
> 
> For fun, one of the filesharing sources from a few years back.


Oh boy. Your pirate:

Pirates know they're thieves: _"In truth, I think it is clear that morally, the act of pirating a product is, in fact, the moral equivalent of stealing..."_

Guess those deterrents do work: _"I've debated doing [pirating] some newer authors and books, but I would need to protect myself better and resolve the moral dilemma of actually causing noticeable financial harm to the author whose work I love enough to spend so much time working on getting a nice e-copy if I were to do so."_

Gotta love this one: _"Perhaps if readers were more confident that the majority of the money went to the author, people would feel more guilty about depriving the author of payment."_

I'm a thief. I know it. I only pirate things I think I won't get caught pirating. I am sticking it to the man, not the author. I'd never stick it to the author, really. Or maybe I would. And cause him financial harm in the process. But I'd admit to being a thief if I did.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

B. Justin Shier said:


> My belief is that it is not my choice. Just as a property owner on the East Coast can not demand a hurricane not sweep their house away, I cannot keep my work from being pirated. My wants do not matter. My desires do not matter. Reality matters. So I cope with the circumstances.
> 
> And if the trends continue, they will soon comprise over 50% of the world's population.
> 
> B.


And they won't be reading in English, which is the language I write in. Not a very compelling argument from where I'm sitting, but it could mean something to someone else.

You're comparing a thief to a natural disaster. Thieves can be deterred and prosecuted. Hurricanes cannot. Sorry, that's one of those apples and broccoli comparisons again.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> I am not sure how you feel on this subject, but I would rather someone download a book from a pirate site than hold a gun on someone to buy it from my website


I would rather someone bought your book than a lump of crack. But that's just me...


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## Vukovina (Mar 30, 2012)

[Moved to the correct thread. Thanks, ellecasey.]


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## Vukovina (Mar 30, 2012)

Aaa, you're right. It's my own fault. But I swear most [anti-]piracy threads read the same after a few pages...


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

ellecasey said:


> Oh boy. Your pirate:
> 
> I'm a thief. I know it. I only pirate things I think I won't get caught pirating. I am sticking it to the man, not the author. I'd never stick it to the author, really. Or maybe I would. And cause him financial harm in the process. But I'd admit to being a thief if I did.


It's an interesting read. But it remains one person's opinion, and he's talking about the stance of the uploader in specific. Some of the things will be more or less true of individuals.

Things I think that reduce piracy for indies which we commonly end up doing:

1) Using perma-free titles to introduce a series.
2) Pricing at a lower point than tradpub (note he references $10 as a personal breakpoint, even for an omnibus) generally does outside of a select few or promos.

Where we run into problems:

1) Going world-wide permafree is hard.
2) We get stuck with higher prices in some markets because of the taxes/fees lumped onto our titles by some resellers, and this makes us again a more ripe target.

Now, obviously not everyone uses free promos, permanent or not. And some people price lower or higher. But as a general rule in the indie world we're already much, much better off where piracy is concerned than tradpub, where charging $15 for an ebook is "normal" and there's almost never any opportunity to get even an inexpensive novel, let alone a free one.

In addition, the one thing he mentions about "sticking it to the man" is something that can work in our favor at times. If it's clear we are indie (and for many of us it really is, our names, or some small press are in the books) we are more likely to generate sales from downloaders with a specific mindset. Some people are very much anti-corp, and they appreciate indies, and will go out of their way to buy if they discover they've enjoyed an indie song/movie/book/game.



ellecasey said:


> I would rather someone bought your book than a lump of crack. But that's just me...


God that sounds like awesome jacket copy. LOL



ellecasey said:


> You're on the wrong thread. The question your answering was on the thread started by Matthew. He's all over this one too, same arguments, different thread.


Actually that one has some interesting differences. I find the discussion of specific revenue points that are more/less attractive to pirate interesting.


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Vukovina said:


> Aaa, you're right. It's my own fault. But I swear most [anti-]piracy threads read the same after a few pages...


You're right. And that's why I am outta here! And why I avoided that other one. 

G'night y'all. Here's wishing you zero pirated copies of your work if you believe as I do, or a gabillion pirated copies of you feel the opposite.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

ellecasey said:


> You're right. And that's why I am outta here! And why I avoided that other one.
> 
> G'night y'all. Here's wishing you zero pirated copies of your work if you believe as I do, or a gabillion pirated copies of you feel the opposite.


Night Elle. Thanks for the discussion. I'll say a little wish on the first star I see that nobody pirates you tonight.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Folks, piracy threads always stir the emotions here....I appreciate the restraint that has been shown here so far.  Haven't had to throw my yellow card yet....

Betsy


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> "I also find it a little off-putting when someone in the e-book distribution business takes what looks to me like a disinterested or even lackadaisical attitude toward copyright infringement."


One who can do disinterested economic analysis does not lose that ability when he publishes an eBook. Such analysis is often a very good basis for subsequent advocacy.



> "The argument, summed up in that article, is: '...if people are exposed to your work and enjoy it-even if they originally pirated it-they will eventually buy your work. Perhaps they won't buy the work (book, music, etc) they pirated, but they'll soon enough buy something else.'"


That's an interesting hypothesis. Any reason to accept it?



> "1) e-goods have no production cost."


E-Goods have a very low marginal cost of production. They can have a significant total cost of production.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Terrence OBrien said:


> One who can do disinterested economic analysis does not lose that ability when he publishes an eBook.


I think the insinuation was that because he's connected to Draft2Digital it's wrong for him to have an opinion which might even get close to thinking that piracy is anything but evil.

*shrug*

I see no reason that having a specific position at a specific time or location means you have to develop a specific attitude about a spcific problem.

If I'm making myself non-specific enough. 



JRHenderson said:


> Let's start again, shall we?
> 
> Value of digital goods that somebody might buy in one week = $50
> Value of digital goods that someone can download from a torrent site in a week = $1000s & $1000s
> ...


If value of digital goods purchased is already equal to maximum discretionary income then there's no more money to be had anyway, so there's no actual sales lost.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> Becca, did you read that study or the article? I did. First of all, it wasn't Columbia University who did the research, it was a separate group, American Assembly who is just located there. Name drop alert. And I found it hilarious that the alleged non-piracy group who bought less music, actually had a huge percentage of pirated work on their computers (ripped from friend's CDs and received by email, etc.). A full 55% of the non-pirate group was pirated. Talk about a crock.
> 
> Here's another choice bit from the article: "Of course, correlation is not causation. It's possible, for example, the most avid music fans are also the most likely to be drawn to peer-to-peer networks. Perhaps without those networks they would have purchased even more music from legitimate services."
> 
> My point exactly. But of course, pirates won't agree with this part of the article. Or recognize that every single person in the survey was a pirate of music.


I did look at the study, though I didn't read the whole thing -- it's way too long. I'm not bothered by the "Columbia University," thing, though I suppose "a research group housed at Columbia University" would've been better. As for the 55% pirated music in the "non-piracy group," I'm not finding that part of the study. I don't see any "piracy" vs. "non-piracy" group comparisons. They did a P2P-user vs. non-P2P-user comparison, but the percentage of pirated music in the latter group was nowhere near 55%. If that's the graph you were looking at (on p. 20), perhaps you combined "ripped" with the two illegal sources (downloaded for free and copied from friends or family). I take "ripped" to mean ripped off your own CDs, since if you ripped music off a friend's or family member's CD, then you'd be copying from a friend or family member. But maybe I'm just not seeing the portion of the study you're referring to. It would take several hours for me to read through the whole thing carefully.

That said, even a quick look shows lots of interesting info. One thing that stood out at me is that under a certain age a very large majority of responders admitted to some piracy. But the data is more fine-grained than that. For instance, while tons of responders had pirated, only a small percentage had pirated all or almost all of a large collection of music. To me, that's the most telling bit. I think much of the concern surrounding piracy draws the idea that pirates are pirates and payers are payers, but this study shows pretty clearly that not many people are 100% thieves. Most people mix their illegal acquisitions with legal ones.

Lastly, I see a lot of this sort of conflation in this and other recent KB threads: "My point exactly. But of course, pirates won't agree with this part of the article." But people who are taking the let's-reconsider-fighting-piracy position in these threads are not necessarily themselves pirates. I'm not, as I've said before. Why the assumption that we are? Can't one see potential value in something one chooses not to do? Many of ProfessorA's posts refer to "piracy-advocates." Maybe some people are advocating piracy, but that phrase is certainly too simplistic to describe my position or the one BJS articulated upthread. These simplifications of the other side's identity and stance don't allow for a real exchange of ideas.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Terrence OBrien said:


> E-Goods have a very low marginal cost of production. They can have a significant total cost of production.


See my ETA.


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## Guest (Mar 12, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> Lastly, I see a lot of this sort of conflation in this and other recent KB threads: "My point exactly. But of course, pirates won't agree with this part of the article." But people who are taking the let's-reconsider-fighting-piracy position in these threads are not necessarily themselves pirates. I'm not, as I've said before. Why the assumption that we are? Can't one see potential value in something one chooses not to do? Many of ProfessorA's posts refer to "piracy-advocates." Maybe some people are advocating piracy, but that phrase is certainly too simplistic to describe my position or the one BJS articulated upthread. These simplifications of the other side's identity and stance don't allow for a real exchange of ideas.


There is nothing to "reconsider." There is nothing to discuss. This is the hard, cold, indisputable fact: You do not get to decide what to do with my property.

There is no discussion about this.

If you break into my house and try to steal one of my manuscripts, there would be even less discussion... I'll leave it to your imagination. It's exactly the same thing when you steal online - the only difference is you're less likely to end up with buckshot in your back side. Again, there is no discussion to be had about this.

How about if we discuss cutting off your right arm? Is that a discussion we could have? Do you want to negotiate? Kick around some hypotheses about how this might actually be beneficial to you?


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> "(ETA: before someone starts quoting me cover prices and layout, only the master copy costs anything, the rest are free, assuming no bandwidth issues arise at any point.)"


The cost of reproduction and transmission of bits is very low. The cost of producing the content that is being reproduced and transmitted can be significant. Both the bits and the content they encode are in play. The low cost bits have no value without the content.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

Mathew Reuther said:


> What does the type of media have to do with anything? This statement made no sense. "Safe" pirated version? Youtube ripping takes 3 minutes, and videos are usually out BEFORE albums may be purchased. It's FAR easier to get your hands on music than books, and yet people still buy music, and as we see from the studies, more of it than average.
> 
> More often than not these things are purchased through engaging in other illegal activities such as dealing, prostitution, and robbery.
> 
> I am not sure how you feel on this subject, but I would rather someone download a book from a pirate site than hold a gun on someone to buy it from my website


The type of media has everything to do with the issue as the type of consumer for each type of media can differ greatly.

As for a safe pirated version it seems that you are not very familiar with current trends in piracy. There has been a push for some time for some newly released media to be deliberately infected with malware that traces the downloader. Many people who cheerfully admit to downloading all manner of music and video - not so much in the way of eBooks - shy away from new releases on certain streams until feedback from "known" personalities verifies it as safe. Notice that even popular apps like Vuze etc., have radically changed their approach to user interaction. Big topic for some time now on campus. A lot of people have had their computers seized and been offered a "buy it at our price" or "face us in court" option. Most agree to purchase, even at exorbitant pricing. The court fines can be a lifetime issue.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

DarkScribe said:


> The type of media has everything to do with the issue as the type of consumer for each type of media can differ greatly.
> 
> As for a safe pirated version it seems that you are not very familiar with current trends in piracy. There has been a push for some time for some newly released media to be deliberately infected with malware that traces the downloader. Many people who cheerfully admit to downloading all manner of music and video - not so much in the way of eBooks - shy away from new releases on certain streams until feedback from "known" personalities verifies it as safe. Notice that even popular apps like Vuze etc., have radically changed their approach to user interaction. Big topic for some time now on campus. A lot of people have had their computers seized and been offered a "buy it at our price" or "face us in court" option. Most agree to purchase, even at exorbitant pricing. The court fines can be a lifetime issue.


This is fascinating stuff, and I'd love to know more. Cite a source that isn't yourself.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

Mathew Reuther said:


> This is fascinating stuff, and I'd love to know more. Cite a source that isn't yourself.


Do a search on back issues of the Melbourne Age or the Sydney Morning Herald. Look at followups to the stories about huge fines for music piracy. There is a considerable amount of discussion as to whether those posting such tracking apps were breaking the law themselves.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

DarkScribe said:


> Do a search on back issues of the Melbourne Age or the Sydney Morning Herald. Look at followups to the stories about huge fines for music piracy.


Let me know when you've found any. I do the research to support my arguments. You do it to support yours. Makes it easier.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

Mathew Reuther said:


> Let me know when you've found any. I do the research to support my arguments. You do it to support yours. Makes it easier.


No, I don't play those games. You can do your own research - it isn't exactly a new issue.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

DarkScribe said:


> No, I don't play those games. You can do your own research - it isn't exactly a new issue.


There have been a HANDFUL of cases in which the RIAA has managed to win against private citizens here.

Which is why I find it fascinating that in Oz they can apparently just take your PC and hold it for ransom.

Again, I cited my sources. You can cite yours.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

No one here has to cite sources or care whether anyone believes/agrees with their posts.  You can believe Dark Scribe's comments or not based on what he presents.

Let's move on, gentlemen.

Betsy


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

Mathew Reuther said:


> There have been a HANDFUL of cases in which the RIAA has managed to win against private citizens here.
> 
> Which is why I find it fascinating that in Oz they can apparently just take your PC and hold it for ransom.
> 
> Again, I cited my sources. You can cite yours.


The do not "just take your PC and hold it for ransom" - I did not suggest that it was as simple as that.

They need to obtain a court order, a warrant, and they need to raid with member of the BSA (Business Software Alliance) or similar, the Federal Police and the local Police. Not a simple process. They need to make sure of their facts and self installing "phone home" software is one of their tools. After several highly publicised court cases they began issuing "Letters of Demand" to people who were known to have a substantial amount of illicit software AND who were uploading (seeding) that software for the use of others. Those people were offered a choice - a bluff if you choose to regard it in that manner - buy the software or face a law suit. Our own organisation was caught out, we were installing more Adobe products than our licence allowed. It was bad management, not attempted piracy. We paid up.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

ProfessorAplomb said:


> There is nothing to "reconsider." There is nothing to discuss. This is the hard, cold, indisputable fact: You do not get to decide what to do with my property.
> 
> There is no discussion about this.
> 
> ...


Your self-assurance is most impressive.


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

A question to those who are not against piracy:

In a world where people are increasingly buying digital versions of books (as opposed to print versions) and in the case of those saying that there's nothing we can/should do about book piracy - what happens if such piracy sites become mainstream? What if piracy sites gain a legitimacy simply because they are so widespread? What if the vast majority of readers started using these other sites (that pay you, the author, no commission)?

Would you still believe piracy was ok and actually benefited you?


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Anya said:


> A question to those who are not against piracy:
> 
> In a world where people are increasingly buying digital versions of books (as opposed to print versions) and in the case of those saying that there's nothing we can/should do about book piracy - what happens if such piracy sites become mainstream? What if piracy sites gain a legitimacy simply because they are so widespread? What if the vast majority of readers started using these other sites (that pay you, the author, no commission)?
> 
> Would you still believe piracy was ok and actually benefited you?


We've evolved through varying changes in distribution models thus far as humans. We'll continue to evolve as channels change.

What if there's "Netbooks" a la "Netflix" where people pay a subscription to download and read books at their leisure?

What if there's "digital romance of the month" clubs where the romance of the month is sent to you if you don't reply "no thanks" to the newsletter?

What about books being beamed to your reader in serial installments supported by ads, like a TV show?

We can't tell where the next leaps and bounds of distribution will carry us. What we can do is work within the framework of whatever we have.

But counterfeit goods have existed much longer than the internet, and will continue to exist. Somehow we still manage to design, create, manufacture, advertise, etc.


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## AllieJeanDS (Mar 11, 2013)

Wanted to let you guys know that the fantasticbook.com site looks like its been taken down. Thanks for everyone's hard work on targeting these thieves.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

Anya said:


> A question to those who are not against piracy:
> 
> In a world where people are increasingly buying digital versions of books (as opposed to print versions) and in the case of those saying that there's nothing we can/should do about book piracy - what happens if such piracy sites become mainstream? What if piracy sites gain a legitimacy simply because they are so widespread? What if the vast majority of readers started using these other sites (that pay you, the author, no commission)?
> 
> Would you still believe piracy was ok and actually benefited you?


OK if I comment without taking a stand on piracy?

It's simple. With today's technology and government regulations, and accepting the scenario as given, people would stop investing money publishing and retailing eBooks. The investment would be a loser. Any author would be on his own. No more complaining about KDP reporting delays.

I don't know if authors would stop writing. Many would. But I suspect many also find significant noncommercial rewards. In that case, everyone would be a hobbyist. Those who continue would do it because they like it.

Paper publishing would see a resurgence, and commerce would deal in physical paper.

Change technology and government involvement, and anything is possible.



> "Would you still believe piracy was ok and actually benefited you?"


Piracy would benefit people in the short term. In the medium and long term, they would lose. Few would understand that the folks who want the goods for free are even more self-interested and acquisitive than the producers of the goods. In a stand-off, the producers will dismiss them, abandon them, and go do something else.

I'd be interested in any ideas on how eBooks could be economically viable under the exact scenario presented and under current technology and government regulations. Note the scenario said the majority of readers were using the sites, so government was sitting on its heels and not using tools at its disposal.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

I forgot the other one which is like virtual busking. "Pay me what this is worth to you."


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Anya said:


> A question to those who are not against piracy:
> 
> In a world where people are increasingly buying digital versions of books (as opposed to print versions) and in the case of those saying that there's nothing we can/should do about book piracy - what happens if such piracy sites become mainstream? What if piracy sites gain a legitimacy simply because they are so widespread? What if the vast majority of readers started using these other sites (that pay you, the author, no commission)?
> 
> Would you still believe piracy was ok and actually benefited you?


Anya, I said this on Mathew's thread earlier today:



> I don't think pirates are doing something justifiable, much less noble. But piracy may also help me. So the question is this: what attitude should one have to an activity that, if it got out of hand, would be damaging to all, but so long as it remains reasonably contained, may well be helpful?
> 
> I think education is a good idea: remind people that producing information is time-consuming, and that information-producers won't be able to keep producing if they don't get paid for doing so. Remind people that downloading pirated files is dishonest and illegal. Occasionally cracking down on the most flagrant offenders is probably also a good idea.
> 
> [. . .] the ideal situation for writers (if you're thinking in terms of maximizing profit) may be to sustain exactly what we have: some piracy, but not of Napster-style pervasiveness. If so, that's a morally and logistically challenging goal.


I don't consider myself to be "not against piracy." If I weren't against piracy, I would get my books and music for free, which I don't. But neither am I a black-and-white thinker. To me, this is a situation full of grayness and contradiction. Thus, my stance on piracy has been influenced by many different thoughts:

1. Piracy is unethical.
2. Most pirated downloads do not represent lost sales, just as most KDP Select downloads don't represent lost sales.
3. If piracy got crazy out of hand (Napster level), it would eat into sales.
4. Visibility and word of mouth are the two most valuable sales generators in existence. The more "buzz" there is around my book, the better.
5. Some pirates probably also buy books.
6. Those who never buy books may recommend books they've read to others who do pay for them.
7. Digital piracy cannot be stopped. It can at best be limited.
8. Providing illegal free downloads, while unethical, is not as unethical as bootlegging or plagiarism.
9. I'm happy to think of my current book as a loss leader.
10. Chasing down pirate sites and trying to get my books taken down is time-consuming.
11. A number of people whose intelligence I admire (such as Neil Gaiman) say not to worry about piracy.
12. Books are a human right, and there are people who really can't afford them.
13. My book is affordable and readily available, which may make it a less attractive target for piracy.
14. My book has already been up on a torrent site for months.
15. I've given away tens of thousands of copies myself.
16. Etc.

As you can see, my attitude is a mixture of personal moral principles, facts, assumptions, marketing truisms, pragmatic considerations, and details about my book. Some of these things are contradictory. It's not as simple as being for or against piracy. It's about recognizing the reality of the situation, including the moral messiness of it, taking in all these factors, and coming to a balanced, reasonable stance as best I can. This to me is more useful than pondering a hypothetical that I firmly believe is never going to happen. (I think there's too much money at stake for traditional publishing and the film and music industries to allow piracy to get out of hand in the way you're describing.) Thinking in terms of a hypothetical like that would generate a position appropriate for that situation, not for the actual situation we face.


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## Guest (Mar 12, 2013)

It would be interesting to know how many of you who are pro-piracy or consider it a "grey area" (which sounds like the making of an After School Special, if I ever heard one!) actually earn your living solely from writing? How many of you went to college and got an education so that you could become a professional writer?

My guess is not many.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

Anya's question is a good one. It's quite valuable to explore different scenarios. It's good to have an idea of what can happen, even if we don't envision the exact scenario happening.

The last ten years have shown us that many things most people said would never happen did indeed happen. A more robust examination of what could have happened might have allowed us to avoid what did happen.



> "It would be interesting to know how many of you who are pro-piracy or consider it a "grey area" (which sounds like the making of an After School Special, if I ever heard one!) actually earn your living solely from writing? How many of you went to college and got an education so that you could become a professional writer?
> My guess is not many"


While I think the economic effects of unchecked piracy are very detrimental to society, I'd apply benign neglect to it at current levels. Not sure how the sorters would label me. I don't earn my living solely from writing, and I did not go to college to become a professional writer. The main reasons I went were the Viet Nam war, sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll. And even then I ended up in the Marine Corps. Could it have been the sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll?

How does any KB poster's source of income and educational background affect the issue?


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## Klip (Mar 7, 2011)

Becca, I really like your stance. It is similar to mine. 

Something else to add is that although I believe it is wrong to share a person's work without permission, I'm more worried about the mechanisms that may be used (in the future) to curb this sharing. 

The  things which make digital technology so incredibly successful and useful, are also the reasons why piracy is possible. Attempts to curb piracy may very well freeze the very things which make digital technology so useful to us.

I think we are going to see a lot more draconian attempts to stop people pirating software, music, movies, and books. These may involve invasion of privacy, attempts to "lock" formats in ways that are not as easy to circumvent as DRM is.  And I think that although the behaviour that these mechanisms will be attempting to curb is, in fact, wrong, I think the "fix" will be a lot worse, and will hurt everyone, not just pirates.

Sledgehammer.

There is not much I can do about it though, so I can just watch, and wait, and see what happens.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

http://www.uncollege.org/about/

(A.K.A. what does getting an English degree have to do with writing?)


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

I have just read that those sites were possibly not for the purpose of downloads but were for the purpose of stealing credit card information - which is a whole other ballgame.

@ Allie, that's good news the site has been taken down.

@ Mathew - many of those changes may well happen, and I'm sure authors will receive their due royalties.

@ Terrence - agreed.

@ Becca - I can see where your going with your stance, but it's mostly on a different train of thought than the scenario I posted. My main problem with that site is that it was making money from downloads AND it looked 'legitimate' rather than looking like a pirate site.
I agree with most of what you said, but others I see a different point of view.

1. Piracy is unethical.
*Yes, although I'm personally not concerned with the ethics of it. Some people have little money and for them the ethics-line blurs when it comes to downloading digital goods. *

2. Most pirated downloads do not represent lost sales, just as most KDP Select downloads don't represent lost sales.
*At the moment, probably not. But it's not a level comparison with KDP. Authors normally wouldn't put their entire catalogue of books up for free at any one time. They put up one book for free as part of a strategy.
Piracy has the potential to harm individual authors - not so much at the moment, but yes if any pirate site gains a bit of 'legitimacy'. For authors making 1000s per day, they *might* be able to absorb the piracy. But in the case of pirate links going viral for the books of an individual author (who isn't making more than a $1000 a month, a pirate site such as that could significantly eat into their income.) An author may have spent 5 years creating a 10-book series, at significant loss to their income - and then have pirate sites listing the entire series.*

3. If piracy got crazy out of hand (Napster level), it would eat into sales.
*Yes.*

4. Visibility and word of mouth are the two most valuable sales generators in existence. The more "buzz" there is around my book, the better.
*No argument.*

5. Some pirates probably also buy books.
*Unsure. Seems more likely they wouldn't if they can access them for free - unless they wanted the print version. Where's the incentive?*

6. Those who never buy books may recommend books they've read to others who do pay for them.
*Unsure.The Napster experience showed that people will be influenced by their peers.*

7. Digital piracy cannot be stopped. It can at best be limited.
*Yes. And I don't agree with any draconian methods of stopping it.*

8. Providing illegal free downloads, while unethical, is not as unethical as bootlegging or plagiarism.
*I'm personally not concerned with the ethics. My ethics will be different than the ethics of someone from a third-world country who doesn't have enough to feed their family this week.*

9. I'm happy to think of my current book as a loss leader.
*But what if all your books were losses?*

10. Chasing down pirate sites and trying to get my books taken down is time-consuming.
*Yes and not worth it.*

11. A number of people whose intelligence I admire (such as Neil Gaiman) say not to worry about piracy.
*He has print sales, movies sales and a huge fan base. But I still think he's right - at the moment. Sites like the ones posted in this thread a definite concern. I think piracy also has the potential to harm individual authors who don't make a huge income, even if it doesn't harm authors overall.

Also, if certain genres of books have more potential to be downloaded at piracy sites of the future (which could be YA books) then authors would be less likely to write the books in those genres that are going make them less money in the long run. Which harms readers, as they could end up with less choices in the future.

Also, piracy sites harm readers when they download viruses or when they have their credit card details stolen. I don't believe piracy is totally harmless for readers.
*

12. Books are a human right, and there are people who really can't afford them.
*No argument.*

13. My book is affordable and readily available, which may make it a less attractive target for piracy.
*The number of downloads per day when a book is free over when it is 0.99c would suggest free is immeasurably more attractive than even a dollar.*

14. My book has already been up on a torrent site for months.
*My first book too and I don't care, but it stings seeing the next there as well. But in general, I don't care, don't look and don't think about it.*

15. I've given away tens of thousands of copies myself.
*As part of a strategy.*


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> "12. Books are a human right, and there are people who really can't afford them."


How did that happen? If a person has a right to a book, who has the obligation to write it and give it to him?

When did it become a human right?

Suppose nobody writes books? Is his right being denied?

If I take my book off KDP, am I violating someone's human right? Whose?

Is it OK to opt-out of doing the labor to fulfill the guy's human right?


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## 54706 (Dec 19, 2011)

Terrence OBrien said:


> How did that happen? If a person has a right to a book, who has the obligation to write it and give it to him?
> 
> When did it become a human right?
> 
> ...


Ha, ha. Yeah. ^^ This. Seriously.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, put forth by the UN: http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/index.shtml

Nowhere in there does it include books. Article 24 says humans have a right to rest and leisure, but it doesn't say I have to provide them the means for it at my expense.

The books I write are for entertainment only. The only people who have a right to them are the ones who don't violate my copyright to get them; but even then, it's not a "human right". It's a right to spend your money as you see fit to while away your free time.


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## L.M. Pfalz (Aug 31, 2012)

ProfessorAplomb said:


> It would be interesting to know how many of you who are pro-piracy or consider it a "grey area" (which sounds like the making of an After School Special, if I ever heard one!) actually earn your living solely from writing? How many of you went to college and got an education so that you could become a professional writer?
> 
> My guess is not many.


Regarding "grey area", I think it's naive to think that anything in this world is all black or all white. Earlier in the thread you linked to an article (I'm still not sure if it's an article you wrote or just agreed with), where it implied it's okay for musicians to get pirated because "CD's are overpriced" and they have a secondary source of income playing live. That's producing your own gray area, whether you wrote the article yourself or merely agree with what was said in it.

IMO, if you give your book away in some large scale capacity (free promos, permafree, libraries) it's hypocritical to turn around and say you don't agree with people downloading your book for free on other sites. Why are some people allowed to read it for free and others aren't? I'm not talking about if you give a few copies away as a giveaway or to reviewers. But if you have 1000, 5000, or 10000+ free downloads or free reads by your own doing, why are those readers allowed to read them for free and others aren't? This is one example of a gray area. It would be like standing on a street corner handing out books to random people, only to deny someone based on some inconsequential detail like hair color or age.

I don't see what one's educational or income level has to do with this topic. You can't prove that people who illegally downloaded your book would have otherwise bought it if the pirating sites weren't available. That can't be counted as lost income, because you never had it in the first place. This profession is a gamble no matter what. There is no guaranteed income for anyone. It's easy to target pirating and blame it for loss of sales or your lack of success or whatever, but there's no proof that that's money out of your pocket. Ethically, of course it's wrong. It's also illegal. It's up to each individual author to decide if it's a battle they want to fight in regard to their own work. I don't condone it, but time _is_ money, and my choice is to not waste time trying to stop a runaway train that is piracy. My time is better spent writing and promoting to potential _buyers._


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> " Why are some people allowed to read it for free and others aren't? I'm not talking about if you give a few copies away as a giveaway or to reviewers. But if you have 1000, 5000, or 10000+ free downloads or free reads by your own doing, why are those readers allowed to read them for free and others aren't?"


Why? Producer's self-interest. It's an exercise of property rights designed to further the producer's self-interest. The producer decides which free venues further his self-interest, and he makes the product available under the conditions of those venues. If a venue does not further his self-interest, he does not make it available.

Who decides the producer's self-interest? The producer.


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## L.M. Pfalz (Aug 31, 2012)

Terrence OBrien said:


> Why? Producer's self-interest. It's an exercise of property rights designed to further the producer's self-interest. The producer decides which free venues further his self-interest, and he makes the product available under the conditions of those venues. If a venue does not further his self-interest, he does not make it available.
> 
> Who decides the producer's self-interest? The producer.


The free product remains the same though. It also sends a message to readers/downloaders. Free is free to many people. A lot don't realize "free" means "free under my conditions". So if it winds up on a torrent site during or after it's been free, the author partly has himself to blame. If you don't want your work to be given away for free, then don't offer it for free in the first place. If it winds up showing up on pirate sites when you've never given your book away for free, then that's when an author might wanna take action if they so choose. Offering a book for free though, draws the free-seekers, not just potential book buyers. It's a gamble. And saying that _these_ 5000 people are allowed to read my book, but these other 5000 aren't just seems silly to me. What if someone downloaded your book when it was free as a Select promo and then accidentally deletes the file from their account before they got to read it? If they regain it through a venue other than Amazon for free, does that reader become some horrible pirate that should be stopped at all costs? Is it a "you snooze, you lose" scenario? I get that it's an issue of control, but I also see the hypocrisy in it.

I also wonder about lending books to friends and family, which seems to be okie dokie by almost everyone here. But think about this. If you sold 50,000 books and each one of those people lent their copy to 3 friends or family members, that equates to 150,000 _potentially_ lost sales. The gray area keeps getting grayer.

And don't even get me started on lost royalties regarding used books 

When we put our work out there in public we give up some of our control over it, whether we like it or not. We can go with the flow, or spend a lot of time, energy, and even money in trying to regain control but is this the best use of our resources? Again, this is something an author needs to decide for himself. If, by chance, you got your book taken down from every illegal source out there, and your sales stay the same or worse, go down, has the battle been won? Was your time and energy well spent?


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## Guest (Mar 12, 2013)

L.M. Pfalz said:


> Regarding "grey area", I think it's naive to think that anything in this world is all black or all white. Earlier in the thread you linked to an article (I'm still not sure if it's an article you wrote or just agreed with), where it implied it's okay for musicians to get pirated because "CD's are overpriced" and they have a secondary source of income playing live. That's producing your own gray area, whether you wrote the article yourself or merely agree with what was said in it.
> 
> IMO, if you give your book away in some large scale capacity (free promos, permafree, libraries) it's hypocritical to turn around and say you don't agree with people downloading your book for free on other sites. Why are some people allowed to read it for free and others aren't? I'm not talking about if you give a few copies away as a giveaway or to reviewers. But if you have 1000, 5000, or 10000+ free downloads or free reads by your own doing, why are those readers allowed to read them for free and others aren't? This is one example of a gray area. It would be like standing on a street corner handing out books to random people, only to deny someone based on some inconsequential detail like hair color or age.
> 
> I don't see what one's educational or income level has to do with this topic. You can't prove that people who illegally downloaded your book would have otherwise bought it if the pirating sites weren't available. That can't be counted as lost income, because you never had it in the first place. This profession is a gamble no matter what. There is no guaranteed income for anyone. It's easy to target pirating and blame it for loss of sales or your lack of success or whatever, but there's no proof that that's money out of your pocket. Ethically, of course it's wrong. It's also illegal. It's up to each individual author to decide if it's a battle they want to fight in regard to their own work. I don't condone it, but time _is_ money, and my choice is to not waste time trying to stop a runaway train that is piracy. My time is better spent writing and promoting to potential _buyers._


The laws on pirating are not black and white and it would be wise of you and others to understand that. If you think piracy is a grey area and might not really be stealing, then you might be in for a rude awakening.

Well, one thing education level has to do with this discussion right off is related to reading comprehension... I made it pretty clear that I did not write the article I linked to, which was about the theft of books - it's one of many similar articles - if you put "Why libraries are not piracy" in a search you'll find a bunch of them mostly written by authors who oppose having their work stolen. The author mentions something about CDs by comparison. I don't think he or she is advocating their theft, just stating that writers don't usually have much other income apart from royalties on their writing... they don't do concert tours or sell t-shirts.

I never advocate the theft of anything. I don't think being too poor to buy something is a reason for stealing. And, this wacko "books are a human right" thing - well, that's a new one! I'm going to make a special note to add it to my list of insane pro-piracy arguments. No one is obligated to write a book and give it to someone else.

You say:_ I don't see what one's educational or income level has to do with this topic._ - Well, what it has to do with it is this: There are a few of us who spent years and thousands of our own dollars learning to research and write, honing our abilities, studying other languages even, in my case. And, my royalties are my sole income. I don't have a lot of options, not only because of the economy, but other factors which are my business.

It is a cruel, crass and despicable thing to talk casually about stealing money from anyone, but especially from those of us for whom this is our entire lives and livelihoods.

If you could remember or reference what I said in my posts, it was that I do not make use of libraries for my books. I don't "give" anything away. I never have. But, I did, in fact, pull the few books I had in library distribution out because of piracy and after learning more about piracy advocates like yourself who see this as a "grey area" in which stealing might be "okay." My books are all very reasonably priced and priced to the market. The Kindle and other electronic devices have made books very economical for people, especially those who read a lot. But, even if they were in libraries, it would be because I authorized them to be there - not because they were stolen and put there. Libraries actually purchase the books, then use them in an authorized manner, making them available on a limited basis to readers. There is a big difference between libraries and stealing, which has already been explained to you very clearly by me and others here. Maybe slow down a little when you read and try to really comprehend what is being said and that will help you. Also, since you bring it up... I've never done promotional give-aways on my books because I don't really write the kind of books that would benefit from that kind of marketing. I'm mainly a researcher who writes non-fiction. I've never even done Select and I'm very skeptical about it since it, too, seems to be a way for material to end up being pirated far and wide.

Regarding this: _ You can't prove that people who illegally downloaded your book would have otherwise bought it if the pirating sites weren't available._ I don't expect you to go back and read every single word I wrote, so I'll repeat what I said about this, also... I personally - let me stress "me" - "I" - found that when one of my pirated books was removed from a couple of sites that my sales on that book immediately went up. In fact, it looks like I was losing a few hundred dollars a month on that one book - a few hundred dollars that I need to keep a roof over my head and not end up foraging for food in the woods. Yes, I know that's "anecdotal," but that is my experience, it's not a survey conducted by copyleftists to encourage pirates' fantasies to the contrary, but it's the truth. So, to reiterate for you: My experience is that it does, in fact, hurt sales in a noticeable way. It might not be so noticeable if I were J.K. Rowling, but I'm not J.K., although, she, too, is an outspoken opponent of piracy because she earns her income from writing books.

Furthermore, on this same topic - the law most certainly *does* see each illicit download as a lost sale to the author.

And, yes, everyone can cope with this problem in a different way. Anyone who thinks that I and many others like me can be bullied, intimidated or even slightly persuaded not to fight for our incomes, our professions that we've literally spent a lifetime and thousands of dollars and years in school preparing for and what has become an entire way of life is naive and wasting their time.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

OK, stepping in here.

Discussions of piracy are always emotionally charged.  This one has preceeded remarkably well and has been the kind of discussion we strive to have here at KindleBoards.

However, please refrain from attributing characteristics to other members; discuss the posts not the people.  I don't want this thread to blow up after all this time.

Strong feelings are fine, but please keep the discourse civil.

Betsy


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## Guest (Mar 12, 2013)

I would like to encourage those of you who are against the theft of property to look into the arguments made by piracy-advocates. Those of you who think you're not pro-piracy, but living in a grey area might benefit from it, too, because the arguments you make are exactly the same as those made by the pirates.

The arguments are insane, but they are what helped me make the decision to do things like pull all my books out of library distribution and never go "free." 

Some of the arguments include things like "libraries are piracy" and "used books" are piracy. Maybe it will help you understand how the pirates think. And, if you're one of those who thinks these are grey areas, it will help you understand that this is not a grey area, at all. It's the philosophy of piracy, which is the philosophy of criminals.


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## Lissa Bryan (Feb 8, 2013)

I'd like to mention that while fantasticebooks.com is down, their other site, abcebooks.com is still in operation.


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## Tuttle (Jun 10, 2010)

Anya said:


> 5. Some pirates probably also buy books.
> *Unsure. Seems more likely they wouldn't if they can access them for free - unless they wanted the print version. Where's the incentive?*


I know people who pirate who also buy things they pirate. I know people who pirate who pirate way too much and just won't care about the creators. I know people who used to pirate and stopped when they got a job. I know people who only pirate when there is DRM. I know people who buy physical copies and download electronic copies. I know people who only pirate when they cannot afford what it is and prefer paying.

Pirating isn't only about the cost. The large scale people are more likely to not also buy, but the people who don't mass download, and who actually read what they download, I really do know people who donated money to Jonathan Coultan because of liking his music even though they got it all for free via creative commons who also do pirate games and TV shows. Things like the HumbleBundle for indie games work well, people don't just pick them up free, and people who are frequently pirates often pay for them. It's more complicated than "yes" or "no".

Is the culture acceptable the "you only get paid if you're good" culture? No. But people do actually go out and buy things after pirating, because they _want_ to support the author because of liking the story, because they have money available now that they didn't before and will buy either the same or later books now (more frequently later). Because the author has made it clear that they agree with culture changes and the person wants to support that (see authors buying _Wool_ because of the print only agreement as an example for culture changes being supported that isn't controversial.) Because the books are now available, at all, not print only, or not blocked out of their country.

DRM and ease of access are as large of reasons for people pirating as the money. If its cheap, DRM-free, and easy to purchase for whatever people what to read it on, then it'll make a big difference.

Minimizing is worth it, worrying too much, you probably lose more money from time from your other writing and marketing, because its just that complicated of a problem that you're dealing with. It's not people going and stealing from a store, and the ethics of it aren't the same. People don't react the same, and to treat it like the exact same is to deny what is going on, because people who pirate aren't the same people who'd go and steal from a store.



> 6. Those who never buy books may recommend books they've read to others who do pay for them.
> *Unsure.The Napster experience showed that people will be influenced by their peers.*


People don't say "Pirate this book or this music or this game" they say "I liked this book or this music or this game" or "have you read this?" It's up to the person who they're recommending it to to determine how they're getting it.

People who pirate a lot are more likely to know people who pirate a lot, but they also know people who don't or who only minimally do (people are not "pirate everything" or "pirate nothing", and are not "pirate everything for their entire life" if they pirate anything ever).

Fighting piracy hurts more than it helps in many cases. This isn't because piracy is good, its because the things that you are taking with it are bad. Spending your time worrying about that instead of writing is bad. Blocking free speech is bad. Declaring what people can do at levels beyond "don't pirate" is bad. Shutting down websites because someone else did something wrong is bad.

It's not a good use of your time if you are an author to spend it chasing down websites for every book or stressing about who might be giving it away instead of writing. It'll happen either way. Writing is what matters. This isn't about good or bad, its about what is. (Taking down the sites selling the books is totally worth it though)


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## AriadneW (Feb 16, 2013)

Personally if I found one of my books on a torrent site I wouldn't lose sleep. Selling them would be another story.  I can understand both sides of the argument though.

Just as an aside New Zealand was mentioned in one of the posts. The law here favours the complainants in some ways because you are guilty until you can prove you're innocent which isn't easy.  However the cost to lodge a copyright infringement notice is $25 and the person has to receive the third in order for you to take them to the tribunal. Added to that there is a period of time after which the notice lapses so it's entirely possible for them to get a warning and either stop or hide what they're doing and you have to start all over again which is probably why 3000 infringement notices by RIANZ (our local equivalent of the RIAA) has only netted 2 people and of the $75,000 they've spent on infringement notices they've recouped $1100 which was basically their costs.


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## L.M. Pfalz (Aug 31, 2012)

ProfessorAplomb said:


> Some of the arguments include things like "libraries are piracy" and "used books" are piracy. Maybe it will help you understand how the pirates think. And, if you're one of those who thinks these are grey areas, it will help you understand that this is not a grey area, at all. It's the philosophy of piracy, which is the philosophy of criminals.


Considering you posted this after my post, shall I assume you're directing this at me? For one thing, if you're gonna put something in quotes, it should have actually been said. I sure never said "libraries are piracy" and "used books are piracy".  The argument comes down to loss of royalties/money for the author. Would you be anti-piracy if you saw a huge boost in sales because of it? Obviously, this all comes down to what the author is losing and the assumption that somehow hypothetical income equals _real_ income. I'd like to live in a world where that's actual true...I'd be rich! 

Look, I've already said this is a choice each author has to make for themselves if they want to go after pirates or not. Having an open discussion on controversial topic doesn't mean people are trying to "bully" you into changing sides. Frankly, you're the one who seems to be getting personal and insulting to those who disagree with you. Worry about your work, I'll worry about mine, every other author will worry about their own. Simple, yes?

One more thing...



ProfessorAplomb said:


> The laws on pirating are not black and white and it would be wise of you and others to understand that. If you think piracy is a grey area and might not really be stealing, then you might be in for a rude awakening.


I think you made a typo here. I think you meant to say "The laws on pirating are black and white", if I'm understanding your argument. Yeah, it's reading comprehension and all that


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## Guest (Mar 12, 2013)

L.M. Pfalz said:


> Considering you posted this after my post, shall I assume you're directing this at me? For one thing, if you're gonna put something in quotes, it should have actually been said. I sure never said "libraries are piracy" and "used books are piracy".  The argument comes down to loss of royalties/money for the author. Would you be anti-piracy if you saw a huge boost in sales because of it? Obviously, this all comes down to what the author is losing and the assumption that somehow hypothetical income equals _real_ income. I'd like to live in a world where that's actual true...I'd be rich!
> 
> Look, I've already said this is a choice each author has to make for themselves if they want to go after pirates or not. Having an open discussion on controversial topic doesn't mean people are trying to "bully" you into changing sides. Frankly, you're the one who seems to be getting personal and insulting to those who disagree with you. Worry about your work, I'll worry about mine, every other author will worry about their own. Simple, yes?
> 
> ...


No, I was not directing my comment at you, it was a general one... If I were directing it at you, I would have quoted you. Instead, I addressed it to two different classes of people on this board (1) those who disapprove of piracy and (2) those who consider some aspects of piracy a grey area.

Yes, that was a typo. Congratulations on catching it .

I do not appreciate you continuing to disparage my character... I realize you don't know me and I am here anonymously, but I have said repeatedly that I do not believe in stealing. I do not believe in piracy, either, for those who wish to make that distinction. And, I would never think it was all right, even if I were benefiting from it in some way (And, I have yet to hear a serious professional claim that it is beneficial in any way.) I am not religious, but I am a person of high ethics and integrity to such an extent that it rubs some people the wrong way sometimes. But, I make no exceptions for the acceptance of thievery or piracy on any grounds, whatsoever - now, I don't think I could be any more unequivocal than that!

I have experienced, personally - again, I as in me - some bullying on this board from piracy advocates. That's a fact.

This board is a mixed bag when it comes to this subject. DarkScribe, ElleCasey and some others have done a wonderful job helping the OP with her concerns. I've seen similar things on on other boards where you don't get the backlash, what I call hostility. It is completely absent on other boards, and if I moderated a forum for writers I'd take efforts to chill the piracy talk, unless it was about methods of eliminating the problem. It's wrong. It's an illegal act to pirate and condoning it might be construed as encouraging criminal activity.

I am now blocking you - you may not be a pirate or a piracy advocate, but you go on the list with a few others and if I venture back to this board although I'm not sure why I should, I will not be reading any further comments from you.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

ellecasey said:


> Ha, ha. Yeah. ^^ This. Seriously.
> 
> The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, put forth by the UN: http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/index.shtml
> 
> ...


Well, to some extent it's a figure of speech -- of course books aren't a human right in the way the right to medical attention and food are human rights. That said, I think both art and storytelling are fundamental to what it means to be human. Arguably, they are one of the few things shared by every human society. While it would be foolishly pompous to argue that people need *my* book in particular, I do think that books (and other forms of art, and perhaps narrative art, especially) are really important. The fact that some stories provide little more than passing entertainment doesn't diminish their importance, IMO. I'm going to stick to my guns in asserting that stories matter a great deal, and that people need them.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> "When we put our work out there in public we give up some of our control over it, whether we like it or not. We can go with the flow, or spend a lot of time, energy, and even money in trying to regain control but is this the best use of our resources?"


How do we decide if writing books is the best use of our resources? How far does that standard reach? What does the "Best Use" standard say?

We can go with the flow on lots of stuff, but it's reasonable to first look where it's flowing. Then we make our decision. There is no virtue in mindlessly flowing.



> " I'm going to stick to my guns in asserting that stories matter a great deal, and that people need them."


Could be. But that need doesn't impose an obligation on anyone to provide them.


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

Lissa Bryan said:


> I'd like to mention that while fantasticebooks.com is down, their other site, abcebooks.com is still in operation.


Not from here. It is listed as a "For Sale" domain, the same as fantasticebooks.

Edit - correction.

No, same mistake as yesterday. it is acebook, not acebooks and it is still up.

Looks as though it needs a few reversed credit card sales and letters of complaint. One problem is that although it is clearly a related site, it is not in the jurisdiction of the Chinese Government. The Chinese Government acted yesterday according to Asia domains who list the fantasticebooks domain for sale.

As a matter for consideration, the Chinese Government (not Hong Kong) lists bootlegging and credit card fraud as offences that can attract the death penalty - depending on the extent of loss. I am less keen to complain to embassies now.


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## A.A (Mar 30, 2012)

Becca Mills said:


> Well, to some extent it's a figure of speech -- of course books aren't a human right in the way the right to medical attention and food are human rights. That said, I think both art and storytelling are fundamental to what it means to be human. Arguably, they are one of the few things shared by every human society. While it would be foolishly pompous to argue that people need *my* book in particular, I do think that books (and other forms of art, and perhaps narrative art, especially) are really important. The fact that some stories provide little more than passing entertainment doesn't diminish their importance, IMO. I'm going to stick to my guns in asserting that stories matter a great deal, and that people need them.


Becca, I agree with you on that point. I interpreted what you said as you saying that in an ideal world, people should be able to access education and literacy (and books as entertainment). As a reader and an author, I do think books are so important.

While I don't believe that the specific books of any specific writer should be freely accessible, I do believe that access to books (and the literacy needed to read those books) is vitally important in human society.

I just don't see piracy aligning with any of that.
Digital books can already be obtained for free. Project Gutenberg, Amazon Select and lots of others. So on that point I agree with Elle and Terrence.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

DarkScribe said:


> Not from here. It is listed as a "For Sale" domain, the same as fantasticebooks.


Good stuff.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Anya said:


> Becca, I agree with you on that point. I interpreted what you said as you saying that in an ideal world, people should be able to access education and literacy (and books as entertainment). As a reader and an author, I do think books are so important.
> 
> While I don't believe that the specific books of any specific writer should be freely accessible, I do believe that access to books (and the literacy needed to read those books) is vitally important in human society.
> 
> ...


Yes, that's all very true, Anya. There are plenty of legally free books of all types. But sometimes there's that _particular _book that really, really does it for you, you know? And no other will take its place.

I don't think you and I disagree about this stuff to any great degree. I enjoyed reading your thoughtful response to my endless numbered list of disordered ideas.


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## L.M. Pfalz (Aug 31, 2012)

Terrence OBrien said:


> How do we decide if writing books is the best use of our resources? How far does that standard reach? What does the "Best Use" standard say?
> 
> We can go with the flow on lots of stuff, but it's reasonable to first look where it's flowing. Then we make our decision. There is no virtue in mindlessly flowing.


Perhaps I was unclear so I'll reiterate. As writers trying to make a career in writing, we have resources to help with that, i.e. our time (which is perhaps most precious), energy, and money. As I said originally it's up to each author to decide where they want to utilize these things. Some authors are passionate about stopping piracy and wish to spend their time and energy (and depending how far it goes, their money as well) trying to do so. That's their right, but it's not a priority for me. Again, not saying I condone piracy, but it's a battle I don't personally feel is the best use of my resources right now. I'm keeping an eye on it, so to speak, but for now I'm going with the flow and perhaps others want to as well. That doesn't mean it's being done mindlessly or without care. No one can see into the future and know where the current state of piracy will lead. It's something I don't personally want to waste my energy worrying about. I worry enough as it is 

Oh btw, just in case there's any confusion, when I say "piracy", I mean sites offering books for free, *not* sites like the OP mentioned who are profiting from authors' work. No one should profit off another author's work, and they should definitely be taken down ASAP. I don't think anyone is in disagreement there.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

L.M. Pfalz said:


> Oh btw, just in case there's any confusion, when I say "piracy", I mean sites offering books for free, *not* sites like the OP mentioned who are profiting from authors' work. No one should profit off another author's work, and they should definitely be taken down ASAP. I don't think anyone is in disagreement there.


I don't think you'll find many who disagree with that. Boot-legging and plagiarism bother me way more than piracy.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> I don't think you'll find many who disagree with that. Boot-legging and plagiarism bother me way more than piracy.


I think we've got (near as I can tell) universal agreement on those things being undesirable.

The only thing we don't necessarily agree upon there is how much investment we should make combating these things. Outside of some emails to various places I'm not interested in spending time dealing with them. Others are more willing to go further, and that's good.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Mathew Reuther said:


> 1) e-goods have no production cost.
> 2) will you accept an industry-wide 30% cut in revenues in exchange for people no longer breaking the law?
> 
> (ETA: before someone starts quoting me cover prices and layout, only the master copy costs anything, the rest are free, assuming no bandwidth issues arise at any point.)


What you're saying is that the writing in and of itself has no value, and that the time you spend studying, practising, and actually writing is worthless. So, when we buy a hardcover we're only buying paper and what is written on it doesn't add to what it's actually worth. Hm.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Andrew Ashling said:


> What you're saying is that the writing in and of itself has no value, and that the time you spend studying, practising, and actually writing is worthless. So, when we buy a hardcover we're only buying paper and what is written on it doesn't add to what it's actually worth. Hm.


No. You're smarter than that.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> "Oh btw, just in case there's any confusion, when I say "piracy", I mean sites offering books for free, not sites like the OP mentioned who are profiting from authors' work. No one should profit off another author's work, and they should definitely be taken down ASAP. I don't think anyone is in disagreement there."


Anyone who gets a book for free profits from an author's work. Profit can be denominated in money or economic goods.

I never challenge anyone's choice of what they do with their own time and resources. I dont care. I often challenge them when they tell me what to do with mine.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

Andrew Ashling said:


> What you're saying is that the writing in and of itself has no value, and that the time you spend studying, practising, and actually writing is worthless. So, when we buy a hardcover we're only buying paper and what is written on it doesn't add to what it's actually worth. Hm.


The marginal cost argument is the same for both eBooks and paper. A hardcover costs $2 to print. Transmission of an eBook has a very small cost. Neither cost includes consideration of content.

We see the same idea applied to drugs. A drug may cost a billion dollars to develop, but it only costs the factory a quarter to produce each pill. So people want the drug for a quarter.

It can also be applied to software and games. People tell us about low marginal cost of the medium carrying the content. Then they justify taking the content for the cost of the medium.

It actually applies to all kinds of products, not just IP goods. Most products have both a development and assembly cost.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Terrence OBrien said:


> Anyone who gets a book for free profits from an author's work.


Depends on how poorly written it is. 

I've paid for some books I should have been paid to read. LOL.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

Profit is the difference between acquisition cost and market price. Satisfaction measures the utility an individual finds in the profit. Lack of satisfaction with either money or economic goods does not negate profit. Profit can be observed. Satisfaction can only be reported.


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## L.M. Pfalz (Aug 31, 2012)

Terrence OBrien said:


> Anyone who gets a book for free profits from an author's work. Profit can be denominated in money or economic goods.
> 
> I never challenge anyone's choice of what they do with their own time and resources. I dont care. I often challenge them when they tell me what to do with mine.


Are you implying that's what I did? That wasn't my intent at all. I said in both my posts about "resources" that it's up to each author to decide how they wish to spend theirs. I was just sharing how I feel about my own.

I get what you're saying in terms of profit. The thing is, those who take books and resell them illegally are targeting book buyers, whereas free file sharers target people who are looking to get something for nothing. Again, this goes back to the idea that people who download free books illegally aren't guaranteed _buyers_ even if pirating sites weren't available. Whereas if these bootlegging sites successfully make sales, that _is_ money directly taken from authors, since the money actually exists and has been exchanged for goods. Hypothetical money buys nothing.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Terrence OBrien said:


> The marginal cost argument is the same for both eBooks and paper. A hardcover costs $2 to print. Transmission of an eBook has a very small cost. Neither cost includes consideration of content.
> 
> We see the same idea applied to drugs. A drug may cost a billion dollars to develop, but it only costs the factory a quarter to produce each pill. So people want the drug for a quarter.
> 
> ...


Yep. Which is the dry but perfectly logical and instructive version of the argument I tried to make. What is stolen in this case is not the manner of delivery but the intellectual content.

Here is the artistic version of the same argument:

A lady asked Picasso in a café to draw her. He took a paper napkin and made a sketch of her. He asked 50 francs.
"But, Monsieur," she protested, "it took you all of five minutes to make that picture."
"No, Madame," Picasso replied, "it took my whole life."


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Andrew Ashling said:


> Yep. Which is the dry but perfectly logical and instructive version of the argument I tried to make. What is stolen in this case is not the manner of delivery but the intellectual content.
> 
> Here is the artistic version of the same argument:
> 
> ...


I see no stealing in this analogy. I merely see Picasso putting a price tag on something and having a consumer reject it.

It may make for pretty words, but it's irrelevant to piracy.

You're trying to make a case for your sacred words being stolen every time someone downloads a pirated copy. Fine, you can believe that. But what you CANNOT do is prove that you have lost a penny in sales which you would have otherwise made.



Terrence OBrien said:


> Profit can be observed. Satisfaction can only be reported.


Satisfaction and profit interact. To wit: satisfied customers buy sequels, while dissatisfied one return titles . . . hence negating profit.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> I get what you're saying in terms of profit. The thing is, those who take books and resell them illegally are targeting book buyers, whereas free file sharers target people who are looking to get something for nothing. Again, this goes back to the idea that people who download free books illegally aren't guaranteed _buyers_ even if pirating sites weren't available. Whereas if these bootlegging sites successfully make sales, that _is_ money directly taken from authors, since the money actually exists and has been exchanged for goods. Hypothetical money buys nothing.


Both book buyers and sharers are on the same demand curve. Both are willing to pay up to a given price. But it's rational for both to pay the lowest available price including transaction costs. There is no difference. The profit would depend on price.

The downloader's actions can be analyzed separate from any consideration of author or web sites. We can also look at t without passing judgement on anything. It's not normative. It's observation.



> "Satisfaction and profit interact. To wit: satisfied customers buy sequels, while dissatisfied one return titles . . . hence negating profit..


No. Profit and satisfaction are separate. Profit comes from the initial transaction. Satisfaction is a function of profit. Profit is not a function of satisfaction. Profit exists regardless of satisfaction.



> "Yep. Which is the dry but perfectly logical and instructive version of the argument I tried to make. What is stolen in this case is not the manner of delivery but the intellectual content."


Dry? What can I say? It's not called the dismal science for nothing.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Mathew Reuther said:


> I see no stealing in this analogy. I merely see Picasso putting a price tag on something and having a consumer reject it.
> But what you CANNOT do is prove that you have lost a penny in sales which you would have otherwise made.


As far as we know the consumer bought the picture.

I don't need to prove anything. Even if an author decides to give free copies to all members of this board except you, that still doesn't give you the right to steal his book.

And by the way, neither can _you_ prove that the victim of theft _hasn't_ lost a small fortune in sales.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Terrence OBrien said:


> Both book buyers and sharers are on the same demand curve.


1) I don't believe this to always be the case. Some sharers are a) just interested in sharing and b) only interested in free things. Neither of these types of sharers is going to be on a book's demand curve.
2) For those who ARE on the same demand curve, the difference is that one falls off the reader curve (which is accessible only through buying or sharing) as soon as their disposable income is gone. The other is still able to read, comment, discuss, review, and otherwise word-of-mouth for an author.



> Both are willing to pay up to a given price.


Yes, as above, sometimes they are unable to do so. Sometimes they simply choose not to because they're not actually interested in the specific item, just the fact that it is an item.



> But it's rational for both to pay the lowest available price including transaction costs.


But this consideration must including intangibles. It's worth x to be able to buy using PayPal, for example. They assign y value to availability in paperback. They seek out z retailer and are willing to pay list price. "Lowest" price in this case may be significantly higher because they want to go to a local brick and mortar store and pay with a gift card for their ebook. You have to factor in time, gas, etc. They might be doubling (or more) the price of the book because to them, the "lowest" price for all their intangibles needs to be included.



> Analysis of the downloader's actions can be analyzed separate from any consideration of author or web sites.


Nothing exists in a vacuum.



Andrew Ashling said:


> As far as we know the consumer bought the picture.


You assume so, that's fine.



> I don't need to prove anything. Even if an author decides to give free copies to all members of this board except you, that still doesn't give you the right to steal his book.


Yes, and just because you can't smoke pot in Germany doesn't stop thousands upon thousands of Germans visiting Dutch drive-through weed windows. Morality, ethics, laws . . . all of these things are not black and white. People are different. They have different value systems, and different codes of conduct.

I buy books by authors sometimes not because I love the books, but because I love the authors. Logic dictates that this is foolish. Yet my morality points me towards support of these individuals for the ideas they express outside of their novels.

I reject pointless laws. Doesn't make me an immoral person. Just means my morality deviates from societal norms.

For example, I believe in the extension of full state and federal rights to homosexual couples who decide to marry. This is currently illegal. I reject these laws. My morality refuses to accept that this is the correct way to conduct a modern society.

Again. Many people try to claim I am immortal for wanting people whose sexual orientation does not match "normal" (whatever that is, LOL) to have rights which equal those my wife and I share. I reject their stance. I am secure in the morals I embrace.



> And by the way, neither can _you_ prove that the victim of theft _hasn't_ lost a small fortune in sales.


Research tends to indicate that this is not the case. My personal experience meshes with what I've seen studied. While I can't give an absolute, I am thus led to believe that a download does not, and never will, equate to a lost sale.

On the balance I believe that people who are pirated make more in new sales than they pay out in lost sales. There will be some exceptions to this. Mainly for specific reasons. (Poor content being a good one.)


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Terrence OBrien said:


> No. Profit and satisfaction are separate. Profit comes from the initial transaction.


http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/profit

Please copy and paste which one of these definitions of profit you are using.

Because as near as I can tell NONE of them survive a return.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

DarkScribe said:


> As a matter for consideration, the Chinese Government (not Hong Kong) lists bootlegging and credit card fraud as offences that can attract the death penalty - depending on the extent of loss. I am less keen to complain to embassies now.


Wow. Good to know.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> "1) I don't believe this to always be the case. Some sharers are a) just interested in sharing and b) only interested in free things. Neither of these types of sharers is going to be on a book's demand curve.
> 2) For those who ARE on the same demand curve, the difference is that one falls off the reader curve (which is accessible only through buying or sharing) as soon as their disposable income is gone. The other is still able to read, comment, discuss, review, and otherwise word-of-mouth for an author."


They are definitely on the same demand curve. That's by definition. I won't be responding to your subsequent points since they are based on a faulty understanding of the demand curve.

Note that transaction costs I included consider all those intangibles you mention.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> Wow. Good to know.


Ah, I missed the edit.

My uncle is career State and has worked Asia forever. (Speaks Chinese fluently, for example.)

There are more than a few countries in Asia where I would not believe it safe enough to live because of the state of human rights. China is high up on that list.

Which doesn't mean I don't eventually want to go. But just on vacation, and while behaving myself.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Terrence OBrien said:


> They are definitely on the same demand curve. That's by definition. I won't be responding to your subsequent points since they are based on a faulty understanding of the demand curve.


I have to put up with you not understanding profit though.

Ok.


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

Mathew Reuther said:


> http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/profit
> 
> Please copy and paste which one of these definitions of profit you are using.
> 
> Because as near as I can tell NONE of them survive a return.


No. I'm using economic terms. You won't find much in the online dictionary.



> "I have to put up with you not understanding profit though."


No. It's a choice.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Terrence OBrien said:


> No. I'm using economic terms. You won't find much in the online dictionary.


The key to communication is using language which is understandable, Terrence.

I can say green is blue and how dare you not know that.

Doesn't make me a good conversationalist.

ETA: Feel free to paste in your own definition of every term which you believe may be misunderstood if you want to continue to use your own definitions of things. Will make it easier for people to actually talk to you.

But I maintain: people who download to download are not on a demand curve with people who download with intent to acquire a specific article. To those people, it doesn't matter WHAT they are downloading. And profit does not survive return. There is no gain. It is a zero.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Mathew Reuther said:


> Andrew Ashling said:
> 
> 
> > As far as we know the consumer bought the picture.
> ...


No, I don't. I merely said that _as far as we know_ she bought it. Which means we have no way of knowing either way.

_You_ assumed she refused to pay the price Picasso put on his work, although you have no way of knowing that. You assume. You speculate. You suppose. You try to sell your conjectures for reality. You make statements as if they were facts, although you can't prove them.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Gentlemen...

Move on to the next point you're going to disagree on.

Betsy
KBoards Moderator


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

Mathew Reuther said:


> The key to communication is using language which is understandable, Terrence.
> 
> I can say green is blue and how dare you not know that.
> 
> Doesn't make me a good conversationalist.


Agree. It' difficult when the parties lack a common understanding of pertinent terms.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Andrew Ashling said:


> No, I don't. I merely said that _as far as we know_ she bought it. Which means we have no way of knowing either way.
> 
> _You_ assumed she refused to pay the price Picasso put on his work, although you have no way of knowing that. You assume. You speculate. You suppose. You try to sell your conjectures for reality. You make statements as if they were facts, although you can't prove them.


The initial refusal was when she balked. That's not an assumption. He said "pay me x" she said "uh, hold on now" . . . that is, by definition, not paying for the item.

We don't know how it ended. I'm prepared to stipulate that she did if you like. All that means is that in a face to face transaction someone bought something from an artist. Again, nothing to do with piracy.

You're trying to make grand points about the value of your words, and that's fine, as I said.

I simply don;t agree with you that you've lost money if someone downloads.

I in fact believe that if your stuff is good the downloads will turn into sales.

Now, that DOES somewhat assume you don't pull a Salinger and become a recluse. You do need to keep writing. SO it's certainly not going to help "one hit wonders" as much as it will help people who continue to have even moderately prolific careers.



Terrence OBrien said:


> Agree. It' difficult when the parties lack a common understanding of pertinent terms.


Your call as to whether you give enough of a crap to try and define your terms. I'm not the one saying you're not worth talking to. *shrug*


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Too ... much ... testosterone ...

Eyes ... glazing ... over ...


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## Terrence OBrien (Oct 21, 2010)

> "Your call as to whether you give enough of a crap to try and define your terms. I'm not the one saying you're not worth talking to. *shrug*"


No. Transaction costs are too high.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Becca Mills said:


> Too ... much ... testosterone ...
> 
> Eyes ... glazing ... over ...


 

Too much of something, for sure.

Yous guys, don't you have anything better to do?

Betsy

Betsy


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> Too much of something, for sure.
> 
> Yous guys, don't you have anything better to do?
> 
> ...


I'm reading a new book while doing this. The book is at least informative, and less arcane than attempting to determine if Terrence is talking about accounting (like a normal person) or economic (like a wonk) profit.

I find Andrew's theories on the value of intellectual creations more compelling, honestly, but I try not to discriminate.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

I think this thread has approached shark-jumping levels...

Betsy


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Just try to follow that up with a meaningful argument.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> Just try to follow that up with a meaningful argument.


My 55 pound dog has a tail that sticks up.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Mathew Reuther said:


> The initial refusal was when she balked. That's not an assumption. He said "pay me x" she said "uh, hold on now" . . . that is, by definition, not paying for the item.
> 
> We don't know how it ended. I'm prepared to stipulate that she did if you like. All that means is that in a face to face transaction someone bought something from an artist. Again, nothing to do with piracy.
> 
> ...





> You're trying to make grand points about the value of your words


No, I don't. Prove it if you think I did somewhere. Again, you're supposing.



> Again, nothing to do with piracy.


No, it goes to you not understanding that there are other values besides the material goods involved. You implied there was no theft because ebooks are easy to make and copy. There are other considerations, a.o. the earning capability of the writer.



> I simply don;t agree with you that you've lost money if someone downloads.
> I in fact believe that if your stuff is good the downloads will turn into sales.


You're welcome to your assumptions.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Mathew Reuther said:


> My 55 pound dog has a tail that sticks up.


Bet that's an eyeful.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Becca Mills said:


> Just try to follow that up with a meaningful argument.


I think that cat is being exploited.

Betsy


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I think that cat is being exploited.
> 
> Betsy


Perhaps. But more to the point, that cat has a cute wee pooper.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Andrew Ashling said:


> No, it goes to you not understanding that there are other values besides the material goods involved. You implied there was no theft because ebooks are easy to make and copy. There are other considerations, a.o. the earning capability of the writer.


Say it cost $4500 to make a book.

It cost $0.00 to sell it on Amazon for $0.99, and a profit of $0.35 was realized. After which a return was processed, negating that profit. (Look at me arguing two things at once.)

It then cost $0.00 to have it downloaded from a torrent site. No profit was made.

There's zero difference in how much the book cost before and after these two transactions. There is no cost associated with selling the book for $0.99 on Amazon, nor one with having it downloaded online.

The difference is how much money you make both directly and indirectly. One is easier to track than the other. Both have potential for profit. (Even the return has potential for indirect profit still, as your sales rank would have been affected, there might have been an also-bought triggered, they still might say your name in the company of others, they might mention not liking a book they read and spurring interest.)



> You're welcome to your assumptions.


Observations.

There are multiple things which I have downloaded and then purchased. Including the original and all follow-ons. So I'm not talking about maybes. I'm talking about observed behaviors. And I'm not the only person I know who has done this. I'm not the only author, musician, filmmaker, etc. Not by a long shot.



Becca Mills said:


> Bet that's an eyeful.


It make a tempting target for toddlers. We have to watch out for:



Betsy the Quilter said:


> I think that cat DOG is being exploited.
> 
> Betsy


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Sorry, I don't review poopers.  Unless they're books...

Betsy


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> Sorry, I don't review poopers. Unless they're books...
> 
> Betsy


There's a whole genre of pooper books.

"Bathroom Readers"

ALl those books full of silly facts or short anecdotes.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Mathew Reuther said:


> It make a tempting target for toddlers.


I bet both parties would be rather surprised.


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## Andrew Ashling (Nov 15, 2010)

Mathew Reuther said:


> Say (&#8230


You should write fiction.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Andrew Ashling said:


> You should write fiction.


As amusing as the one-liner may be, I can't really see where you take issue with the fact that it costs you no more to give away 500,000 copies of a novel for free than it did to sell three.

It certainly cost me nothing more than some few hours of time setting up listings to give away thousands of books during select promos. I did not actually need to pay a dime in order to do this, therefore I have spent nothing more than what I already out into producing those titles.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> Say it cost $4500 to make a book.
> 
> It cost $0.00 to sell it on Amazon for $0.99, and a profit of $0.35 was realized. After which a return was processed, negating that profit. (Look at me arguing two things at once.)
> 
> ...


You're getting caught up with balance sheets. That's why you missed Terrence's point.

Company A has an exclusive contract to sell software to Acme Inc. Company A copies Company B's IP and sells it to Acme. Company B sues. Company A's defence is that Company B couldn't have profited from Acme because Company B couldn't have sold the IP to Acme in light of Company A's exclusive contract. Company A gets laughed out of court. Company B is awarded damages.

That analogy illustrates why the "no sale was lost" theory about piracy is nonsense. The fact that x bought the book from someone else or no expense was put on the IP owner as a result of the transaction is irrelevant. What matters is who profited from what.

Now substitute Company A "sold" Company B's IP to Acme for Company A gave Acme Company B's IP for "free" and you see why the claim that no one profits from copied e-books is also nonsense. Acme profited by having the IP and Company A profited in brownie points. Similarly, when people "share" e-books they're really "trading" e-books. E-books are the currency and the profit is the utility gained by the traders. Much like Amazon cut out the middle man for authors, pirates cut out the middle man owed royalties-i.e., you-and their profit is the money saved by cutting you out.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

I assume you're on about bootlegging. That's been decided. We all hate it.


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## WHDean (Nov 2, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> I assume you're on about bootlegging....


Not exclusively. But I take it that I didn't express it well or you didn't understand the point, so I'll leave it at that.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Mathew, in case your toddlers get too up-close and personal with your doggie's rear, I thought I should provide this handy tutorial on how to express a dog's anal glands (courtesy of _How to Empty Your Dog's Anal Sacs for Dummies_, http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/how-to-empty-your-dogs-anal-sacs.html):

If you're not 110% sure you want to take on the task of expressing your dog's anal glands, don't hesitate to turn the nasty job over to trained staff at your veterinary office. The cost is minimal, especially compared to the damage you could cause (and the smell you'll be exposed to).

If you insist on expressing the anal sacs yourself, here's how to do it:

1. Suit up with a clothespin, heavy-duty rubber gloves, welder's apron, rubber boots, and tongs so that you look like Michael Keaton changing diapers in Mr. Mom.

Okay, you don't need to go to these extremes, but the fluid is stinky and nasty, so wear old clothes and nose plugs if you need to.

2. Fold several paper towels together in a huge wad.

You want an absorbent pad to catch the liquid.

3. Lift your dog's tail [Not necessary with your dog, of course. -- Becca] and place the paper towels over his back side (and wonder when commercial television will pick up on this type of ad).

Note the position of the dog's anus in relation to the paper towels.

4. Use your thumb and forefinger to gently squeeze at the 4 o'clock and 8 o'clock positions, using the anus as the clock face.

Keep your face out of the way!

5. Throw away the paper towels.

Disposing of the towels in a covered trash basket is a good idea.

6. Wash and rinse your dog's rear end really well.

Expressing the sacs during bath time makes sense, always remembering that a clean doggie rump is a healthy doggie rump.

_____________________

That's it! Now, a serious question. Do I need to post the illustrations as well?


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> That's it! Now, a serious question. Do I need to post the illustrations as well?


I think that would get us both banned.



I have tried, and she does actually need to have it done (he said smelling the fishy air) but we take her to the vet because it doesn't go well with 55 pounds of dog fighting me to get off her butt. 



WHDean said:


> Not exclusively. But I take it that I didn't express it well or you didn't understand the point, so I'll leave it at that.


It gets muddled. I'm trying to discuss purely file-sharing since we've all agreed that both bootlegging and plagiarism are generally bad, bad things that we all dislike (with variations coming in amount of time we'll devote to dealing with them) . . .

As such, I have been focused on the file-sharing issue. So to re-read what you wrote and pull out the last little bit (which appears to be the relevant part):



WHDean said:


> Similarly, when people "share" e-books they're really "trading" e-books.


To some extent, this is true if looked at on the level of "I have this, and someone else has that, and another person has another thing, and so on until people who are looking for something specific can find it" rather than a "here, I have x, can you give me y" . . .



> E-books are the currency and the profit is the utility gained by the traders.


I don't need any "currency" to obtain a book. It's not an explicit requirement to bring a copy of a book to the table to get a different book.

As for equating profit to utility, I will do what I can to meet you somewhere on this, but I can't call it profit. I can say that someone who downloads a book may gain pleasure or entertainment if (and this is an if, because they may not) they read it. (As an aside, they may also gain anger, disappointment, or irritation . . . we just hope not.)

None of these things is a profit though. Not in any definition I know of. Again, I'm willing to look from a different perspective, but I can't automatically equate the reading of a book to profit.



> Much like Amazon cut out the middle man for authors, pirates cut out the middle man owed royalties-i.e., you-and their profit is the money saved by cutting you out.


Authors sacrifice to Amazon in order to be in Select all the time so that they can give away copies for free. They cut themselves out voluntarily in exchange for superior marketing power (freebies) . . .

Yes, you don't control filesharing, but it also doesn't demand exclusivity. It doesn't get price-matched either. That means you have an outlet through which your books are available to those who cannot see the value in paying an unknown for their work, or who do not have the cash to buy a copy, while still selling to the people who are conventional shoppers.

As I've said before: piracy breeds both word of mouth and conventional shoppers who step over after being convinced of value.

Many authors give copies away for reviews. Some small subset of authors pay for them. Some pirates leave reviews as a sense of "paying back" the author.

There's loads of value in file-sharing in my opinion.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Mathew Reuther said:


> I think that would get us both banned.
> 
> 
> 
> I have tried, and she does actually need to have it done (he said smelling the fishy air) but we take her to the vet because it doesn't go well with 55 pounds of dog fighting me to get off her butt.


Pft. Used to do it to my ninety-pound dog when I was seventeen. Just saying.


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

Becca Mills said:


> Pft. Used to do it to my ninety-pound dog when I was seventeen. Just saying.


I was going to say something really cheeky about me (not you, I swear) but I'll just leave it with stating that she's really not OK with even the vets doing it.


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Becca Mills said:


> Pft. Used to do it to my ninety-pound dog when I was seventeen. Just saying.


Did you have a couple toddlers dancing excitedly around your feet asking what you are doing to doggy? 

Betsy


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## DarkScribe (Aug 30, 2012)

Mathew Reuther said:


> I think that would get us both banned.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


My problem with the concept of eBook piracy leading to potentially rewarding exposure is the simple logistics.

Most eBook readers are not computer literate. Most simply own eReaders. When you buy an eReader you get to Amazon - or whatever other breed of reader's store - via a menu item. If you use that eReader you can search on the store for free eBooks. As the blurb that comes with the eReader makes a major point regarding the huge number of free eBooks available, a lot of those owners are going to look for freebies. If they like an author, they might make their next search for more material from that author, find that it has a (relatively) small fee attached and go ahead and purchase. They tell their friends and family about the newly discovered author. The friends and family tell other eReader enthusiasts. Good system.

With a downloader/pirate things are different. Firstly, most pirated eBooks are in bundles, not individual books. Some contain thousands of eBooks. Jump onto any file sharing service and search. You can download every New York Times Best Seller for the past twenty years - often in a single download. Search on Amazon and find some bundles that have eight or ten thousand eBooks. How is this likely to give an author exposure? Who is an online pirate likely to tell? One or two people close to him/her. Pirates tend to keep their activities out of the public eye for fear of prosecution. They might make a point of mentioning an author who impressed them to some friends or acquaintances - who as associates of someone with the know-how to find pirate copies - will very likely jump online and obtain it the same way - by searching for the same files that the person who recommended the book downloaded.

I really can't see genuine "word of mouth/exposure" value (to the author) in piracy.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Mathew Reuther said:


> I was going to say something really cheeky about me (not you, I swear) but I'll just leave it with stating that she's really not OK with even the vets doing it.


You assumed I was talking about expressing my dog's anal glands. What a gentleman! 



Betsy the Quilter said:


> Did you have a couple toddlers dancing excitedly around your feet asking what you are doing to doggy?


Well, occasionally. But I was always careful not to explain in too much detail.


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> Did you have a couple toddlers dancing excitedly around your feet asking what you are doing to doggy?
> 
> Betsy


P.S. Oh dear! That doesn't look like a "flesh wound"!


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Becca Mills said:


> P.S. Oh dear! That doesn't look like a "flesh wound"!


 

It's just a sprain, though the official review of the x-ray won't be until tomorrow. I just hadn't babied it enough so it was still swelling a lot. It's certainly a big ol' boot.... But no crutches.

Betsy


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> It's just a sprain, though the official review of the x-ray won't be until tomorrow. I just hadn't babied it enough so it was still swelling a lot. It's certainly a big ol' boot.... But no crutches.
> 
> Betsy


I'm sorry to hear it's sprained, but thank goodness no break. How long do you have to sport the boot?


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## Betsy the Quilter (Oct 27, 2008)

Becca Mills said:


> I'm sorry to hear it's sprained, but thank goodness no break. How long do you have to sport the boot?


I dunno; I went to one of those strip mall urgent care centers because it was close and they had x-ray on site and I was pretty sure it was only a sprain. In seven days I'm supposed to go to my regular doctor who will tell me how long to wear the boot. It does seem to help. And it is quite impressive.

Betsy


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## Becca Mills (Apr 27, 2012)

Betsy the Quilter said:


> I dunno; I went to one of those strip mall urgent care centers because it was close and they had x-ray on site and I was pretty sure it was only a sprain. In seven days I'm supposed to go to my regular doctor who will tell me how long to wear the boot. It does seem to help. And it is quite impressive.
> 
> Betsy


I'll say! You'll be able to clump around KB and keep order good and proper!

Er ...

<quickly shoves anal-gland jokes under the nearest carpet>

<good thing that's not her favorite carpet>


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

It reminds me of Inspector Gadget's villain.

Only with a boot, and not a claw.



DarkScribe said:


> Most eBook readers are not computer literate.


I can go along with this to some extent. "Most" being more than 50% is probably relatively accurate. The finer we try and tune that number the harder it gets to pinpoint, of course. (Also depends on what we consider adequate facility with technology.)



> Most simply own eReaders. When you buy an eReader you get to Amazon - or whatever other breed of reader's store - via a menu item. If you use that eReader you can search on the store for free eBooks. As the blurb that comes with the eReader makes a major point regarding the huge number of free eBooks available, a lot of those owners are going to look for freebies. If they like an author, they might make their next search for more material from that author, find that it has a (relatively) small fee attached and go ahead and purchase. They tell their friends and family about the newly discovered author. The friends and family tell other eReader enthusiasts. Good system.


It is more or less possible to search for a free book depending on the store you frequent and your facility with the system. I'd stipulate that users with a greater degree of computer literacy in general will find a greater ease of discovery via freebies, regardless of platform.



> With a downloader/pirate things are different. Firstly, most pirated eBooks are in bundles, not individual books. Some contain thousands of eBooks. Jump onto any file sharing service and search.


I'm with you to some extent. I have enough experience with this to say that there ARE large bundles, but a large number of individual books/authors are also available.



> You can download every New York Times Best Seller for the past twenty years - often in a single download.


Or "x" books in "y" genre and the like, yeah.



> Search on Amazon and find some bundles that have eight or ten thousand eBooks. How is this likely to give an author exposure?


Depends on if the author's work is read. If it IS read, then this is the equivalent of a freebie, and the normal rules apply. They review, or chat about the title, or big up the author if they liked it.

If it is NOT read then this is equivalent to nothing having ever happened in regards to that author. Or, if you'd like, equivalent to dropping a freebie into the 2532 "to read" books in the pile of a Goodreads member. Essentially, there is no effect whatsoever.



> Who is an online pirate likely to tell? One or two people close to him/her. Pirates tend to keep their activities out of the public eye for fear of prosecution.


When was the last time you produced your e-reader to say "look I just finished this book, you can see my receipt" . . .



> They might make a point of mentioning an author who impressed them to some friends or acquaintances - who as associates of someone with the know-how to find pirate copies - will very likely jump online and obtain it the same way - by searching for the same files that the person who recommended the book downloaded. I really can't see genuine "word of mouth/exposure" value (to the author) in piracy.


I think you're needlessly gloomy here. Pirates are normal people. They're not hermits.

You're busy imagining pirates as weird clandestine freaks. But seriously, they're just normal people. If you move past the oddball, (demonizing) prejudices and you'll find it gets a lot easier to see how word of mouth doesn't change based on acquisition method.

Imagine that Sue, your neighbor from two doors down is a pirate and she watches episodes of American TV shows. Doesn't make her strange, just means she likes to watch stuff that hasn't made it down under yet.

*shrug*


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## Carol (was Dara) (Feb 19, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> 12. Books are a human right, and there are people who really can't afford them.


I'm not picking on you specifically, Becca, but I see this argument made frequently and it really bothers me. It conjures up an image of authors stomping on some impoverished person's hand and saying, "I don't care if you haven't eaten in three days - you owe me $0.99!" But in reality, ereaders are luxury items unlikely to be owned by someone without a dollar to spare and the internet, particularly Amazon, is awash in more legally free content than any one reader could ever wade through. So the argument becomes, not that it's a basic right to read, but that it's a basic human right to read any title the reader wants at no charge. By the same argument, it's a basic human right for me to have a pair of Louis Vuitton shoes that I desperately want but could never afford. I'm not trying to trivialize your argument. I genuinely want to know how owning one specific title or brand free of charge can seriously be considered a "right".

Here's an example. When my kids were babies we went through a rough patch financially and the state supplied us with vouchers for free food. Only the vouchers limited us as to what food items and brands were approved. We were usually required to get the cheapest brands and it had to be healthy items, like milk, fruits, and veggies. My point is that although we were given things for free, there were limits on what we could have. I never felt entitled to the brand of my choice and it never occurred to me to help myself to a nicer brand of baby formula when nobody was looking - although granted, thirty 8 oz cans of it would've been tricky to sneak inside my sweater.

But the books of authors who choose not to upload their own works to file sharing sites and who don't want them uploaded by others without their knowledge or permission are like those expensive brands. There are tons of readily available alternatives out there for people who can't or won't pay - not the least of which is to simply email the author, explain your situation, and request a free copy, maybe promising an honest review in return. Many of us would supply the free copy without hesitation. All we (or rather, I) want is that courtesy. That respect that says, "I acknowledge this belongs to you and I think enough of you as a fellow human being not to take what's yours without asking." As you can see, for me this is 5 % about money and 95 % about principle. It's not bankrupting me when people pirate me; it's disrespecting me. I'm not a fan of saying such-and-so makes me feel violated because I think that trivializes more serious uses of the word. But if I were, "violated" is how I'd say many authors feel about piracy. Because what comes from our imaginations can be intensely personal and we like to imagine we have the right to control it and share it (or not) wherever we like. Never mind that we've shared it with ten thousand Amazon customers already; that was different because the decision was ours and not forced on us. This, and not money, is why it's such a tense topic IMO.


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## AmsterdamAssassin (Oct 21, 2011)

Becca Mills said:


> Perhaps. But more to the point, that cat has a cute wee pooper.


So has my 2.5 year old daughter, but I'm not putting up pictures.

My eyes are glazing over from the argument... Are there any succinct conclusions yet?


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## Mathew Reuther (Jan 14, 2013)

AmsterdamAssassin said:


> So has my 2.5 year old daughter, but I'm not putting up pictures.
> 
> My eyes are glazing over from the argument... Are there any succinct conclusions yet?


We all agree that bootlegging (unauthorized sales of books in any format) and plagiarism (passing another person's work off as your own for sale or not) are bad.

That's about as close as we get to a universal conclusion, and given the thread title itself I think we can say that we're all on the same page.

The rest will, I suspect, never be resolved. Piracy is going nowhere, some people will take umbrage at filesharing, others will see it as relatively benign, or even potentially useful.


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## AmsterdamAssassin (Oct 21, 2011)

Mathew Reuther said:


> The rest will, I suspect, never be resolved. Piracy is going nowhere, some people will take umbrage at filesharing, others will see it as relatively benign, or even potentially useful.


I think it's a balance between the idea of 'exposure' vs. 'lost sales'. Most of us are familiar with the concept of 'loss leaders', making one or more books 'free' to draw people in, so they will buy the paid books. I also think it depends if it's friends sharing files out of 'enthusiasm' or strangers sharing files with strangers with the idea of 'everything should be free'. Also, free downloads do not equal 'lost sales'. I've 'sold' several hundred 'free downloads' of Locked Room and Microchip Murder, but at 99c, like in Germany and the UK, I sell about 1 KillFile per week, if at all. I read in a thread of an author 'pirating' his own work and seeding it on the pirate sites. That might work, because people who might not be tempted by a legitimate free download, might download a pirated book simply because they think they 'stick it to the man' or whatever the current expression is for going against the establishment.


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## Tuttle (Jun 10, 2010)

DarkScribe said:


> They might make a point of mentioning an author who impressed them to some friends or acquaintances - who as associates of someone with the know-how to find pirate copies - will very likely jump online and obtain it the same way - by searching for the same files that the person who recommended the book downloaded.


Based off of the people I know from college, this is a huge false assumption, especially for books.


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