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Lost sale is an insidious term brought to bear by people who think the act of copying a file is theft by taking, and not piracy/copyright infringement. For their argument to hold, they must assign value to the object taken, and then claim that they are "out" that value by someone having the file copied.
It's happened with MP3s, and it's happened with movie files, and it's going to happen more and more with Ebooks as Ebooks become more popular.
The fact is , if we remove the illegal version from the mix, and just have a legitimate ebook, and the person decides not to buy it.. it's a decision. It's not a lost sale because I chose not to buy a book from Sony's store. Worse, if I go to amazon and buy a USED book for $.01, does that mean the bookstore lost a sale for the difference between the New book and the Used book? No.
You cannot have a "lost sale" at all, except in the fantasy realm of the RIAA where they use the numbers to concoct damages via creative manipulations of the law regarding theft by taking and damages in civil suits. It's just not possible.
Now, I agree wholeheartedly that piracy is wrong. I agree that not compensating an author for something they wish compensation for is wrong. But I won't go so far as to agree that the concept of the lost sale exists, especially in something as transient as a computer file. It's still wrong, mind you, but the concept of the "lost sale by piracy" is just an invention to allow unreasonable damage figures to come into play.
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