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Originally Posted by HarryT
Yes, absolutely. Buying a book in one format doesn't entitle you to get free copies in any other format. It is illegal to scan or photocopy a book even if you do own a paper copy, and downloading a copy that somebody else has scanned is equally illegal.
It is illegal, but personally I don't regard it as unethical, especially if that book cannot be bought as a commercial e-book. I must stress that this is just a personal opinion - I'm certainly not encouraging you to break the law!
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On the other hand, case-law in the U.S. has shown that it IS legal to copy legally-owned content so that it can be enjoyed on a different device, such as buying a CD and then recording it to a cassette so you can listen in your car, or buying single songs online and then burning your own mix-cds or ripping your legally purchased CDs into MP3 format to put on an MP3 player.
Additionally, case-law has shown that it is legal to videotape or otherwise record TV shows so that you can watch them at a different time.
I see no difference between the legal ability to record CDs onto cassettes and put legally purchased paper books on your Reader.
The legality (or illegality) comes from the source where you procure your copies of the paper books you do own. The people who have posted copies of your legally purchased books do NOT have the legal right to make those copies available, so they are breaking the law in posting them, and you are conspiring to break the law when you download those files.
Like HarryT I certainly think what you're doing is ethical since you've bought the paper copies of the books.
However, I'm not a lawyer and what I am posting is not valid legal advice but only what I (in my non-lawyerly way) have learned from what I've read both in books as well as from various legal sites on the web, and if you're caught and prosecuted, it's your neck on the chopping block, not ours.