[Rizla]

It's a question of two parts:

First of all: is digital (and I'm talking e-book) copyright incompatible with technology? Piracy has proved resilient. Can piracy be physically halted? The methods of piracy AFAIK are 1) torrents, 2) download sites and 3) usenet.

1) Torrents can be stopped. It is not anonymous. Torrent users are easily identified and open to prosecution.
2) Download sites can be taken down. The famous recent case is megaupload. The owner was dragged from his mansion and held to the ground at gunpoint. Ouch. Yet download sites continue to operate and ply their nefarious wares. But if they can't be taken down, they can be fire-walled like they do in China.
3) Usenet. This is private file-sharing network, but it relies on central servers. These can be taken down too.

So it seems to me that, from a technical perspective, digital copyright is not incompatible with technology. Copyright can continue to be effective in the current technological landscape and the prospects are gloomy for our swashbuckling friends.

The second part of the question is: is e-book copyright incompatible with democracy?

Consider megaupload. It seems it was take-downable because it hosted servers on US soil. The owner was not sufficiently careful regarding the letter of the law. Yet other sites continue. Presumably they operate from countries that do not share a common appliable law on copyright. To finally stop pirates accessing these sites, either 1) a common international law must be agreed upon and applied (i.e. send in the INTERPOL SWAT team) or 2) they are blocked via firewall. It seems to me that fire-walling a country will prove to be damaging to democracy. Do you trust the law-makers? What will they stop? Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

So it seems to me that that realistically digital copyright is incompatible with democracy. The tools to block piracy will also be used to reduce democracy.

That's my take on it. I am opposed to piracy (and incidentally to monopolistic price-gouging, but that's another story), but I am pro-democratic. I expect to see the internet become a less free and more controlled environment. I think that's bad news, and I'd be delighted if anyone can dissuade me of my ominous opinion.