[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by llasram

Ok, but which is the wrong: the acquisition for free or the lack of author compensation? I really hope we can agree that the author not receiving compensation for their work is the problem.

Actually, the fact that the consumer doesn't want to pay for something they obtained from someone else's labor is the root of the problem. Solve the former, and you solve the latter.

Originally Posted by llasram

Actually, that’s the opposite of what I meant . I was suggesting that there are many cases which are currently illegal and may even strike our initial intuition as “wrong,” but are fully justifiable.

So far, the only "justifications" I've heard are: It's practically nothing; Everybody else does it; and I won't get caught doing it. Your own mother wouldn't buy those excuses.

Originally Posted by llasram

At least in the US, copyright is explicitly a utilitarian, practical system we constructed to compensate content-creators...

Granted, U.S. Copyright Law is antiquated, and has not kept up with the digital era. That's a reason to update and revise it... not to throw it out. Copyright law serves the purpose of guaranteeing proper compensation to a producer of works, and that need is still there.

Originally Posted by llasram

Why would someone want both the hardback and the paperback? Not being facetious here. People find value in having both the p-book and e-book editions of a work or e-book editions in multiple formats, while I can’t think of a single reason I’d want to own both the hardback and the paperback of a book. This suggests to me that these situations are fundamentally different and the analogy is flawed.

Not at all. Think about it: A hardback book tends to be large, heavy, printed on high-quality paper stock with well-crafted covers. Nice for display, but not something you want to damage through handling. A paperback is small, light, cheap. There's no big loss if it is ruined through handling, adverse weather conditions, accidents, or theft... it is considered disposable, whereas a hardback is not. It is easy to see why someone might value a hardback version of a book, yet prefer to have a paperback to take on a beach vacation or on a commuter train.

The same logic is applied to e-books: I have the printed book, but the e-book is more convenient, so I want that, too.

Originally Posted by llasram

Ignoring the analogy, you seem to be assuming the case where the recieved–e-book is an edition assembled by the publisher. I was assuming a pirated edition produced at no additional cost to the publisher whatsoever. In that case the impacts on the author’s bottom-line of just buying the p-book vs. buying the p-book and receiving the e-book are identical.

Not actually... because, just as if you had bought a hardback and got a paperback for free, which would remove the cost of the paperback from the author's profits... you bought a printed book and got an e-book for free. That e-book could have been purchased (if it was a legal product), which would enrich the author. If it was not a legal product, you just supported an illegal venture, which is preventing the author from being paid for his product.

Ease of reproduction makes it easy to pirate, but that does not mean the pirate has the right to duplicate the work, nor that the author doesn't deserve to be compensated for his work. When you receive a pirated copy of even an e-book, you are denying that author due compensation for that e-book.

Originally Posted by llasram

You seem to have missed that I agreed (4) and (5) were wrong and felt (3) was borderline. I think the important thing is not whether or not the recipient pays for the book, but whether or not the author receives compensations. The extremity of your position seems to suggest that borrowing a book from a library of from a friend is wrong as well.

And again, the root of the problem here is your justifications and rationalizations for not paying for someone else's works. It is your refusal to pay that essentially prevents the author being compensated... the problems may trickle through middlemen, et al, but it starts with you. Every e-book consumer needs to understand that.

A library pays a royalty to compensate for the loaning of their books... the author still gets compensated for that. Loaning a personal copy of a printed book is accepted, because the one book was paid for, and it remains one book as often as it is loaned out. The moment someone copies the book and gives away the copies, however, they are violating copyright law.

Originally Posted by llasram

This seems like a pretty shaky assumption. Many publishers have demonstrated awareness that their books are being pirated without noticing their sales dwindle to nothing. I have a hard time imagining that a publisher upon seeing a book being actively pirated would conclude that no market for that book existed.

I didn't say that the publisher thinks there was no market... only that they cannot see how they can adequately profit from that market, because of the existence of pirated copies. If a publisher does not believe a book will profit them (either by cash or reputation), they won't print it. Therefore, every pirated book that a publisher does not believe they can profit from will be a book they won't release, until the pirated editions are considered a non-issue to their bottom line.