Quote:
Originally Posted by Kajti
Not a thing. DRM-free texts in open formats like HTML, bundling that makes unknown authors less of a risk to check out, more: Baen is doing stuff more right than anybody. But the books are out there, easily gotten, at vanishingly small risk on p2p and zero risk on usenet. The point of paying for an expensive reading device for me was that books then became free. Same with buying a divx-capable TV player, so I could watch shows I download, like jPod from Canada or Ashes to Ashes from the UK, or watch movies others have ripped and made available. And even if copyright fetishists use dark magic to shut down the internet, I've enough books on DVD that I could read a novel a day for decades to come with no problem....
I could plead that I live on a fixed income, or that I require a small fortune in meds every month to stay alive, but why bother? Files are available, so I avail myself of them. QED. If your morality says I'll burn in hell, I can live with that.
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Sigh. Nope, my morality doesn't say you'll "burn in hell"... But you are clearly ignoring the externalities of your behavior. If content creators get paid, they can continue creating good content. If they don't get paid, they can't. Plain and simple.
Do you enjoy reading the content? If so, I believe that you have a moral obligation to support the producers of that content (in a reasonable fashion, to a reasonable degree). In the case of Baen, they actually have a procedure getting reduced-price or even free copies of their stuff. Certainly they're eager to have you download anything they've put out on one of their various "free-in-the-book" CDs -- no cost, no obligation. And that's not "piracy" either (what a bogusly mis-named and mis-used term -- yuck!). If these are the free things you've been downloading, good on ya'.
For the other content, if you have a legitimate case for free or reduced prices, you can get it that way. Visit
www.readassist.org for details. Go that route and you're squeaky-clean legal, and totally moral too.
If either of the above two cases hold, please ignore the final paragraph...
If, on the other hand, you
don't have such a case, shame on you! I don't think you'll burn in hell, but I
DO think you've laid yourself open to the well-deserved scorn of the wider community. If this is the case, I would say that "Kajti is a cheap-a^$%^%* *&^%*&^%% #@)(*^&!!!!" and would encourage all and sundry to join in on the public shaming,
-ing, and
-ing.
Xenophon
P.S. I tend to be rather more flexible about "unavailable-ware" and "abandon-ware." The stuff from Baen is neither. They're the best of the good-guys in this picture; support them so that others will follow!