[Hitch]

Elfwreck wrote:

There's something horrifically wasteful about this approach, about insisting that all these powerful digitizing tools can't be used to *increase* access to knowledge; it has to stay a zero-sum game based on the amount of paper that's been paid for.

Oh, puhleeze. Please don't try to turn this discussion into an alleged argument about the "increased access to knowledge." The 'Net and digitization has opened up an entire world of knowledge for anyone who wants it. We're not talking about "knowledge," here; we're talking about entertainment. No one has a constitutional right to be entertained. And I hope that no one is desperate enough to come back with some nonsense about the pursuit of happiness.

There's really no point in continuing the discussion, at least, not on my part. Everyone here who bootlegs or downloads ebooks, whether by copying, scanning, handwriting them out, or lifting epubs or mobis or what-have-you, is taking money from an author. You can call it NOT theft all you want; you can try to justify it by saying it's a "contract violation with Amazon," or that it's "infringement," which you all continually, and incorrectly, claim is NOT a crime; or worst of all, you can rationalize by thinking that those freaking authors don't deserve the money, ANYWAY, but at the end of the day, you're taking something to which you are not entitled because you haven't paid for it.

Is there ANYONE here who is actually acquainted with the legal definition of "theft?" No? Then here you go:

"A popular name for larceny. The taking of property without the owner's consent. People v. Sims Ill.App.3d 815, 331 N.E.2d 178,179. The fraudulent taking of personal property belonging to another, from his possession, or from the possession of some person holding the same for him, without his consent, with intent to deprive the owner of the value of the same, and to appropriate it to the use or benefit of the person taking.

It is also said that theft is a wider term than larceny and that it includes swindling an embezzlement and that generally, one who obtains possession of property by lawful means and thereafter appropriates the property to the taker's own use is guilty of a "theft." Kidwell v. Paul Revere Fire Ins. Co., 294 Ky.833, 172 S.W.2d 639,640; People v. Pillsbury, 59 Cal.App 2d 107, 138 P.2d 320, 322.

Theft is any of the following acts done with intent to deprive the owner permanently of the possession, use or benefit of his property: (a) Obtaining or exerting unauthorized control over property; or (b) Obtaining by deception control over property; or (c) Obtaining by threat control over the property; or (d) Obtaining control over the stolen property by knowing the property to have been stolen by another."

Black's Law Dictionary, Fifth Ed., p. 1324, reproduced here under Fair Use Doctrine. RED emphasis added.

So, you can all sit here and rationalize your THEFT by semantic dissembling all you wish; but without even making it a STRETCH, taking a copy of an ebook without paying for it is theft simply by means of the fact that you've a) taken it without the owner's consent; that you b) have intent of depriving the owner of the value of the same; that you've c) appropriated the book to your own use and benefit; OR d) you obtained the first copy lawfully, and then appropriated it by distributing it, which is also theft; OR e) you've intentionally deprived the owner of the benefit of his property by obtaining it without authorization or f) by obtaining it knowing that it was stolen by another. The whole, strained argument that it isn't "theft" rests entirely on the fact that we're discussing digital copies. If these were printed books, you all KNOW that taking one would be theft, and we wouldn't be having this discussion, now, would we?

There are a very, very few of you here who are what I would call "conscientious objectors." You few "CO's" genuinely oppose copyright law, having a communistic or Marxist view of property belonging to "everyone." Fine. When you give away all of your OWN stuff--your computer, your car, your house--to "everyone," I'll respect your viewpoint. Because until you do that, your whole argument is about how someone else's property magically belongs to YOU.

The rest of you: the bottom line is that you steal these books because you can. If you knew that the courts would actually start prosecuting you, under Federal statutes, and you would do 3-5 years for infringement, as is allowed under those selfsame statutes, you would not do it. You can dress it up in every fancy semantic argument you wish--but you are only committing the crime (and, yes, it's an actual CRIME, not a tort) because you can. Because you're too lazy to go hunt down someone's books second-hand (thereby driving up the price of the second-hand books and encouraging a publisher to reprint those OOP books) and actually pay for them. (Like the Charlaine Harris Lily Bard series, which got reprinted because used editions were bringing upwards of $15 on Ebay's Half.com).

Those OOP books have value to you, but you argue that the author isn't "entitled" to that value. Your argument is that you're entitled to the value of the entertainment by that book; but that author isn't entitled to be paid for your entertainment, sustaining that position with strained, specious arguments about whether you're committing a "tort" or "merely" contractual violations with your "contract" with Amazon, jumping through logistical hoops that don't survive parsing.

Here's the truth: like most humans, you do what's easy. People like to tell themselves, and OTHERS, that they are doing the right thing, but in general, people do what's easiest, obeying the laws of physics, and then either coming up with rationalizations as to why it was the "right" thing all along, or finding other people who agree with what they did to reinforce their justification for having done the easy thing (like the group of pirates here.). It requires the least amount of effort (work) to download a stolen copy. You don't have to make the effort to earn the money; you likely won't be caught or prosecuted; so you click a button and download a copy. If you had to walk into a STORE, and shoplift that copy, you would not do it. Go ahead, try to reconcile THOSE two positions--that it's okay for you to "take" a digital copy, but that you wouldn't take it in print. It all comes down to YOU being prosecuted; to YOU being CAUGHT, doesn't it?

It's easy to be a bobblehead. Doing the right thing? Harder. Developing the ability to think for yourself, not regurgitating a bunch of drivel that someone else fed you, and learning to employ an actual set of morals? Priceless.

I'm done here.