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Originally Posted by alex_d
However, I feel that the issue is much more serious for books. Indeed, our society recognizes the importance of "book sharing" by funding free book sharing centers across the country (aka libraries), robbing the publishing industry of millions each year. I would support every effort to extend this to the digital realm.
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One significant difference, however, between libraries and e-book "sharing" is that - at least in the UK (I'd be interested to know if it works differently in other countries) - libraries do pay authors for library loans. What happens in this country is that each year a "pot" of money is shared out to authors on the basis of the statistical percentage of library loans for their books. It's not a vast amount, but one SF author friend of mine (sadly no longer around) used to get a couple of thousand pounds a year that way.