[Good Old Neon]

Originally Posted by Harmon

As far as I'm concerned, the only way that a publisher has the right to demand that everyone who wants the book has to buy the book is if the publisher is willing to sell the book to anyone who is willing to buy it.

If a publisher decides to sell a book only through Amazon, locked into the Kindle through DRM, then it has decided not to sell the book to everyone who is willing to buy it.

So in that situation, I'm perfectly willing to get myself a pirated copy for my 505. Moreover, I would be perfectly willing to get myself a pirated copy even if I had a Kindle.

On the other hand, if a publisher has made a book available in several different DRMed formats, even if available at different prices from different distributors, or if the publisher has made the book available in a single nonDRMed format which anyone can buy and convert, then I think that it is wrong to pirate the book.

And as a consumer, you have the right to NOT purchase the book – what you don’t have, and what’s not protected, is your right to take it. Is the book available in hardcopy, if the answer is yes, you have more than enough access to it, so again, stealing is not the alternative.

See, I don't believe that an ebook is the publisher's property, to do with as it wishes. The copyright law gives the publisher the right to decide NOT to sell the book. But it does not give it the right to sell the book to you, but not to me. Once the publisher decides to sell a book, it has to treat all buyers equally. If it decides not to, it has no moral claims to make against any buyer. (I'm not even sure if it has any legal claims, but that's a different thread...)

I’m sorry, but this is beyond ridiculous - please show me where in life’s little handbook it says your heart must be given all that it desires, your every want and need catered to. Are you done? That’s right, it doesn’t.