E-book scams rise (buying or stealing content)

[rogue_librarian]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

My problem with this is that people assume that since it is on Amazon, it is OK. And that is wrong.

It's not, actually. There is only so much that you, as the average consumer, can be expected to learn about a certain product. I am buying at a reputed store precisely because I don't have to check those details. To give you a brick-and-mortar store analogy: I am buying something new in a regular store. Do I need to check where the merchandise came from, that it didn't fall off a truck somewhere, that selling the item in question does not violate anybody's patent or other intellectual property rights? No, I don't, and most people couldn't, and certainly couldn't be bothered to. The simple fact that it's on sale carries a presumption of legality. Purchasing those goods usually makes me the lawful owner (bad faith excepted).

I don't really see why buying ebooks at Amazon should be any different. They didn't have the rights to sell that book in my country? Gee, too bad, go sue the publisher (or somebody else).

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

I see it less of "assuming it's ok" and "not knowing how to go about checking it".

PD rules are INCREDIBLY convoluted and rarely make any kind of sense. There's not -- that I know of -- a big list that's easy to check. You have to track down publishing date, author death date, and then start digging through Mickey Mouse exceptions and start doing all kinds of math, and at the end of the day, it's still a crapshoot.

I guess I haven't really thought things through. But maybe somebody will make that list.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by rogue_librarian

I am buying at a reputed store precisely because I don't have to check those details. To give you a brick-and-mortar store analogy: I am buying something new in a regular store. Do I need to check where the merchandise came from, that it didn't fall off a truck somewhere, that selling the item in question does not violate anybody's patent or other intellectual property rights? No, I don't, and most people couldn't, and certainly couldn't be bothered to. The simple fact that it's on sale carries a presumption of legality. Purchasing those goods usually makes me the lawful owner (bad faith excepted).

The problem is that this isn't just any store, it is a store that will sell whatever other people bring there, and it is a store that doesn't have the resources to check if every item has fallen off the truck or not, and there are known cases where it turned out that some of the sold items had had such a trucking accident.

[Namekuseijin]

No pain, no gain. Easy copying means a vast shallow subculture of shameless copying and recycling.

[rogue_librarian]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

The problem is that this isn't just any store, it is a store that will sell whatever other people bring there ...

So it's a thrift store, or a second-hand dealer. No matter, I still buy at "Amazon", and have a contract with them, and no amount of small print is going to change that. I am certainly not required to check into the legality of their offerings; any legal problem is, well, their problem.

... and it is a store that doesn't have the resources to check if every item has fallen off the truck or not

Believe it or not, that's really not my concern. If they want to accept certain goods unseen, that's fine with me. That way indemnifying and holding harmless their customers just becomes another business expense.

... and there are known cases where it turned out that some of the sold items had had such a trucking accident.

Are we talking about physical goods here? I couldn't care less in this case. In my jurisdiction buying from a licensed commercial seller makes me the new owner, end of story. The previous owner, in case he should have been different from the seller, needs to take it up with the thief / seller, but not me as the buyer. "Acquisition in good faith" is a grand concept

[anamardoll]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

The problem is that this isn't just any store, it is a store that will sell whatever other people bring there, and it is a store that doesn't have the resources to check if every item has fallen off the truck or not, and there are known cases where it turned out that some of the sold items had had such a trucking accident.

Half Price Books asks for your phone number and a driver's license number, and that's about all they do to "verify" that you're allowed to sell them the books you bring in.

Maybe Amazon should have a higher standard to check submissions, but I'm honestly not sure how that would work. IF the work is already sold in eBook form on Amazon, they could cross check a new submission against an existing book -- that could be done easily with a program.

But this would ONLY weed out things that (1) are already being sold on Amazon and (2) are not allowed to be resold by a different publisher. That's a pretty small section of the Venn diagram, and it would also flag a false positive on PD books!

If the book DOESN'T already exist in eBook form on Amazon -- like, for example, the J.K.R. books, they wouldn't be able to cross-check content. They'd be in the position of asking the "publisher" to prove that they wrote the book.

How does an indie author prove that they wrote a book in a manner than Amazon can easily check/verify?

I think this is a situation where the existing system (policing by users) works fine. Yes, some things slip through the cracks, but the whole "there oughtta be a law" people lobbying for Amazon/buyers to change their habits have perhaps not thought through how very onerous any alternative system would be.

[TimW]

This one stayed up for a few weeks. "Catcher in the Rye" has been put up and taken down about three times. (Same publisher) The last "Catcher" was disguised with an Oliver Twist cover.

[TimW]

I didn't know the pictures would be that large. My apologies.

[anamardoll]

This one stayed up for a few weeks. "Catcher in the Rye" has been put up and taken down about three times. (Same publisher) The last "Catcher" was disguised with an Oliver Twist cover.

That's an amusing irony on the cover disguise.

[TimW]

Originally Posted by anamardoll

This one stayed up for a few weeks. "Catcher in the Rye" has been put up and taken down about three times. (Same publisher) The last "Catcher" was disguised with an Oliver Twist cover.

That's an amusing irony on the cover disguise.

Ironic indeed, "the Artful Dodger" in action...