[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Penforhire

Okay, but explain to me why you feel digitizing on your own versus downloading the same result is morally any different?

Because when I digitized on my own, for my own use, I did not intend to give it to anyone else and potentially deny the producer a sale. When you took from someone else, you did precisely that. (They don't know you bought a book already. Maybe you didn't.)

Originally Posted by Penforhire

I have everything I'd need to digitize a book but the effort to end up at the same place seems absurd.

And I can build a bicycle from scrap metal... nevertheless, I don't have the right to just take one from someone who stole a bike and saved me the trouble.

Originally Posted by Penforhire

I could see the difference if I was paying a Chinese pirate (land o' scofflaws these days) for his digitized copy. That would be financing piracy. But a "free" download in the wild?

That "free" download isn't supposed to be there, hence, it is theft, illegal product. "I can take a stolen copy because I wasn't going to buy it anyway" is no justification for theft. Neither is the "victimless crime" argument. Theft is theft.

Originally Posted by Penforhire

What is the ethical difference to the fair use I noted for music? The mapping of music media to book media is very accurate to my eye, the same goods in different formats.

Only when you do it for yourself, and not to release "into the wild," where you have absolutely no control over what happens to it. The moment you do that, you have violated the agreement between you and the producer. And if someone gets it from you and sells copies, even if you did not make or sell the copies or profit from them, you will be liable for it.