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grumbles · 02-03-2012, 08:42 PM

Sigh...

I have never committed an act of piracy in my life. In fact I've only been at sea once (twice actually, going and returning.) However, if one would like to call the act of accessing a work under copyright without compensation to the creator, then, yes. Frequently.

I have (at last count) about 1100 cds and probably at least that many books. About 75-80% of them were purchased used. The publisher, label, author or performer received absolutely nothing (but the government did pick up sales tax.)

Now, some will say that I have the physical objects in my possession but that is to miss the point. Books are not like ordinary objects that you use. The only value of a book is to read it and unless you happen to like to hoard books (which I do), once read, a book has virtually no value whatsoever. The only value is its resale value or the ability to give it to someone else. An ebook that is infested with DRM becomes completely useless, once read. This makes it a very poor value for the buyer. It is also very bad for authors. I can't remember the number of authors I discovered because someone passed me a book and said "you might find this interesting." According to some, if I do this with an ebook, I am committing a crime. What utter rubbish!

Now I do in fact buy ebooks. In fact I was looking back through all the books that I purchased from Kobo over the last two years, including the books that I bout from Baen, it appears that I buy about 75 books a year. But I have fairly tight conditions on what I will buy. I will not buy a book with a list price greater that $10. I have a limited amount of money to spend on books so that's all I will spend on a book. I will not buy a book that is agency priced. I had some Chapters-Indigo gift cards and some discount codes for Kobo. There were some Len Deighton books that I wanted to buy. The books were well within my budget, but because they are agency priced, I could not use the discounts. Sorry No Sale! I acquired the books by other means. It is of no consequence whether I found the as used paperbacks or as files on the net. I read the books and the publisher received nothing. I don't care.

Digital distribution is proving to be a very disruptive technology. Trying to impose physical restrictions on digital distribution is just plain stupid. Only accountants and bean counters would try it. But then they are the people who talk about "piracy" and "intellectual property." It isn't. And do keep in mind that a copyright is not property but only a state granted monopoly (that was once granted for a limited period but now seems to be stretching out to eternity.)

02-03-2012, 08:42 PM	#213
grumbles Addict Posts: 238 Karma: 1500000 Join Date: Nov 2009 Location: Toronto Device: Pandigital Novel (Black), T-2 and 3, Nexus 7	Sigh... I have never committed an act of piracy in my life. In fact I've only been at sea once (twice actually, going and returning.) However, if one would like to call the act of accessing a work under copyright without compensation to the creator, then, yes. Frequently. I have (at last count) about 1100 cds and probably at least that many books. About 75-80% of them were purchased used. The publisher, label, author or performer received absolutely nothing (but the government did pick up sales tax.) Now, some will say that I have the physical objects in my possession but that is to miss the point. Books are not like ordinary objects that you use. The only value of a book is to read it and unless you happen to like to hoard books (which I do), once read, a book has virtually no value whatsoever. The only value is its resale value or the ability to give it to someone else. An ebook that is infested with DRM becomes completely useless, once read. This makes it a very poor value for the buyer. It is also very bad for authors. I can't remember the number of authors I discovered because someone passed me a book and said "you might find this interesting." According to some, if I do this with an ebook, I am committing a crime. What utter rubbish! Now I do in fact buy ebooks. In fact I was looking back through all the books that I purchased from Kobo over the last two years, including the books that I bout from Baen, it appears that I buy about 75 books a year. But I have fairly tight conditions on what I will buy. I will not buy a book with a list price greater that $10. I have a limited amount of money to spend on books so that's all I will spend on a book. I will not buy a book that is agency priced. I had some Chapters-Indigo gift cards and some discount codes for Kobo. There were some Len Deighton books that I wanted to buy. The books were well within my budget, but because they are agency priced, I could not use the discounts. Sorry No Sale! I acquired the books by other means. It is of no consequence whether I found the as used paperbacks or as files on the net. I read the books and the publisher received nothing. I don't care. Digital distribution is proving to be a very disruptive technology. Trying to impose physical restrictions on digital distribution is just plain stupid. Only accountants and bean counters would try it. But then they are the people who talk about "piracy" and "intellectual property." It isn't. And do keep in mind that a copyright is not property but only a state granted monopoly (that was once granted for a limited period but now seems to be stretching out to eternity.)