Quote:
Originally Posted by DiapDealer
The only thing I'm going to say is: the Way Back Machine can't "sell" anyone a book. As such, they can't be guilty of copyright infringement or piracy as some are suggesting. They're archiving the front-end of the store only. They're not archiving the database back-end or the payment processing back-end, or the ebook delivery back-end of a retailer's point-of-sale system. At some point, a link from the Way Back Machine is taking the user back to the retailer's current website to complete the "sale" of a free book. Which means urls still exist on the "real" site that allow the free sale of a book that was previously—but no longer—free. So those urls could be used with, or without the Way Back Machine being involved.
Thus there is no valid "it's the Way Back Machine's bad" argument.
|
Interesting.
So you state that the WBM actually *didn't* archive the book, but only the link to it; and the original giveaway site kept the page up, but removed the link *without* removing the actual book. That would mean that I downloaded the book from the *original* website, and only used the WBM to find the actual link.
Thus, indeed, if you knew the link (by putting it in your favorites and then forgot it, for example), you could still download the book from the official site without using the WBM.
That makes matters even more complicated.
Quote:
|
Given the rareness of the parameters (a book you need to complete a series that you CAN'T get by ANY legal means), I vote "don't care." Anything else is cheating, and falls squarely on the shoulders of the person doing it to own up to it (or to pretend it's justified).
|
This is indeed the case: it's a series of anthologies, released every year (except for 2015, where there wasn't one, for some reason), and after the giveaway is over, there's no way to get those books as they're not in any stores.
It's similar to The Best of Tor.com (which I also have), but those books only cost like €2.50 at any store, after their giveaway is over.
So, maybe the poll should have included books that are still able to be bought as a separate choice. My stance on the issue is this:
- If the book can be bought, you should do so, and not get it through the WBM. I wouldn't call that piracy (especially if the WBM only provides the link to the original book on the original site, and not the file itself), but it would be unethical.
- If the book can't be be bought and it's essentially out of print, I wouldn't mind getting it through the WBM, either using a link, or even a file archived there (if it does that).