There's a better way to beat the ebook pirates

[jgaiser]

For the sake of argument, Steven, let's say that all your books disappeared from the darknet and by some amazing trick no one would be able to pirate your books again.

What kind of an increase in sales would you expect? I'm asking seriously because *I* suspect that most of those taking your books from the darknet probably wouldn't be buying if it wasn't available there. You seem to be under the impression that you're losing money.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

For the sake of argument, Steven, let's say that all your books disappeared from the darknet and by some amazing trick no one would be able to pirate your books again.

What kind of an increase in sales would you expect? I'm asking seriously because *I* suspect that most of those taking your books from the darknet probably wouldn't be buying if it wasn't available there. You seem to be under the impression that you're losing money.

I tend to agree. And though I despise pirate behavior, I think it is something that must be accepted as part of doing business. We must do what we can to stop and discourage it, but it will never go away.

[carld]

One video game company said that 80% - 90% of the games signing on to their servers were pirated. I don't imagine the numbers for ebooks are anywhere near that high, but I'd still bet there's a significant percentage.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by carld

One video game company said that 80% - 90% of the games signing on to their servers were pirated. I don't imagine the numbers for ebooks are anywhere near that high, but I'd still be there's a significant percentage.

So you're say that something more than 50% of readers are pirating books? Seriously?

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

You seem to be under the impression that you're losing money.

I am under the impression I'm losing money. But the amount is absolutely immaterial; the point is that no one cares enough to address an obvious wrong.

Ultimately, it is my choice whether to accept being stolen from, or not. Faced with a world that clearly doesn't care if I'm being stolen from, since they can still get my work regardless... I choose not to accept it.

If I don't produce books... they can't be stolen. Problem solved.

[carld]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

So you're say that something more than 50% of readers are pirating books? Seriously?

I didn't say that. I don't have any idea what the actual numbers are. But, I have looked around at various sites and there are tons of books available, and this doesn't even include torrents, which I won't go near. I'd say if you want something, it's out there, especially if it's recent and popular.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by Steven Lyle Jordan

I am under the impression I'm losing money. But the amount is absolutely immaterial; the point is that no one cares enough to address an obvious wrong.

Fair enough. How do *we* address the obvious wrong? Give us some realistic ideas how to deal with pirates. The publishers have tried all kinds of things themselves and the books are still being pirated.

[jgaiser]

Originally Posted by carld

I didn't say that. I don't have any idea what the actual numbers are. But, I have looked around at various sites and there are tons of books available, and this doesn't even include torrents, which I won't go near. I'd say if you want something, it's out there, especially if it's recent and popular.

Ah.. So you just decided that because all those books are on the darknet a significant number of us *must* be taking them. Thanks...

[rhadin]

Originally Posted by CommonReader
I wonder if people here would be happy to see their own salaries cut dramatically because of "customer demands"? It is always nice to demand that other people should cut back their income.

All I can tell you is that I am currently being paid by my customers what they paid me in 1995 because the value of editing to publishers has declined with industry consolidation. An author who hired me to edit his or her novel would pay me what I charged in 1995 -- and yet they still complain that the rate is too high and they can't afford it.

And although it isn't piracy, the Internet has forced changes in the editing profession by making editing a global commodity and by "dumbing down" the general population so that readers increasingly either do not recognize or do not care whether the correct word is their or there.

[rhadin]

Originally Posted by CommonReader

Do you want to outsource writing and editing to China as well? Let's welcome another industry's drive to the bottom.

Welcome to the world of editing -- the real world where editing is being outsourced to the cheapest provider regardless of ability, knowledge, or anything else. The decisions are being made by the bean counters. One former client of mine, a major publisher, told me that they are being pressured to stop paying for editorial services altogether because the savings would increase shareholder value. The bean counter rationale is that people don't see editorial problems until after they have already bought the book and actually started reading it, which usually occurs long after the return period. Consequently, editing is unnecessary.

[rhadin]

Originally Posted by caleb72

I think editing services are already progressively being exported to India aren't they? Or is that something I misread somewhere.

Quite correct.

[Anke Wehner]

Eh. "Pirates" aren't a hive mind, or monolithic, or whatever of the kind.

It's been said repeatedly already, but let me try another spin of the phrasing:
The people who pirate on principle, publishers and authors don't lose money on, because they would not buy the books in the first place.

Lost sales include cases of "I wanted to buy this, but wasn't allowed to due to georestrictions", or "I'd like to buy that book, but I don't buy anything with DRM on principle", or "I don't buy any ebook costing more than X". Some of those people may turn to piracy to read the book, rather than neither buying nor reading it.

If you fix the problems that drive people in the second group to pirating (or that they use to justify it, depending on the individual), you reduce piracy for a book, but you can't get rid of it entirely, because it doesn't touch the pirates-on-principle at all.

They don't matter.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by jgaiser

Fair enough. How do *we* address the obvious wrong? Give us some realistic ideas how to deal with pirates. The publishers have tried all kinds of things themselves and the books are still being pirated.

The publishers have the greatest tools with which to deal with piracy: Money and influence. They've simply been using those tools in the wrong way, to create DRM systems that don't work and copyright extensions that don't solve the problem.

Instead, publishers should be going to governments and telling them how their industry is being threatened by a lawless, out-of-control system. Then they should be doing what every other industry does that wants government action: Bribery of their leaders.

Ultimately, the structure of the Internet itself is to blame; it was simply never designed for a commerce-based system, as the ease of piracy ably demonstrates. The Web needs to be restructured to allow for an amount of workable security. This is something every government and industry with a web presence should understand and support, so at least they wouldn't be alone in this.

What individuals can do is simple: Support that effort. Tell your leaders that's what you want, and don't whine when you discover that it will cost something to implement... namely, taxes. Since individuals won't police themselves (because someone knows who's pirating all that media), there's no one left but the police to police them.

That's what needs to be done. And I say this... knowing that it will never happen. Or if it ever does, it will be well beyond my ability to care anymore.

So: Have your Lawless Wild Web. Just don't look for any new books from me on it.

[Anke Wehner]

Originally Posted by rhadin

One former client of mine, a major publisher, told me that they are being pressured to stop paying for editorial services altogether because the savings would increase shareholder value. The bean counter rationale is that people don't see editorial problems until after they have already bought the book and actually started reading it, which usually occurs long after the return period. Consequently, editing is unnecessary.

... yeah, it's not like that might cost profits in the long run because people might go, "the books from that publisher are so shoddily edited, I'll avoid them" (or even, "...I might as well go with self-published ebooks for a quarter of the price").
Sometimes I get the feeling a complete lack of common sense is required to rise high in corporate.

[Quexos]

Originally Posted by carld

Edit: That sounds harsher than I meant, my apologies. But, I still don't think your argument holds water at all. Not buying a book isn't even remotely like downloading it off the darknet. I really don't understand why you're even asking the question.

Its ok, it's all for the sake of debating
I guess we'll have to agree to disagree. How can not buying and downloading it not be related ? in both instances no money goes to the author. So if money is the issue here, the two instances are very much related methinks.