So...here we are in the time of eBook Prohibition. And what we have are not pirates, they are "bookleggers."
As it happens, I keep a copy of Blakemore on Prohibition (3rd edition) on my liquor cabinet. It makes for interesting reading. And the parallels between Prohibition and the DCMA/DRM are instructive, I think.
For example, most people think that under Prohibition, you couldn't have booze. But in point of fact, you could make your own and drink it, and share it with your friends in your own house.
This quote from Blakemore is too good to pass up:
Quote:
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... the result seems to be that one may set up a still in his front parlor window if he wishes, and invite his bibulous frinds to share his hospitality and he cannot be molested unless he sells or transports the liquor he makes.
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If someone gave you some of that good old mountain dew, it appears that you could keep it. The person who gave it to you would be in trouble for "transporting" it from his house to yours. And the government might seize the jug as evidence. But you, your own personal self, would not be in trouble with the law.
Buying liquor was a little dicier. If you
bought liquor from a seller, you could be charged with various kinds of conspiracy, which in the end amounted to conspiracy to sell the stuff. To yourself.
So here's a tip: don't buy ebooks from bookleggers. And bear in mind that a "donation" might be regarded as buying the book.
But so long as you stay clear of purchasing liberated ebooks, it looks like you are not violating any law when you acquire them, whether you brew them at home or get them for free from some other source.
The objection to owning (but not buying) liberated ebooks would seem, therefore, to be a purely moral one, at least in the USA.
Clearly, if you bought the ebook and liberated it yourself, there can be no moral objection to your having done so. You paid for the book, and it is not illegal for you, personally, to remove the DRM. What moral objection could there be to your reading the ecopy rather than in the pcopy?
Now, what if you bought the ebook, and acquired, for free, a liberated copy? I can't see that this is any different from liberating it yourself.
Okay, what if you bought a
print copy? And then you scan it yourself into an etext. Obviously you have the right to do this. So it should follow that you don't need to copy it yourself, but can fairly acquire a free copy from someone else.
So, let's suppose you bought the pbook used? Same result, or so it seems to me. Nothing wrong with getting a etext, so long as you don't pay for it. And this should be true no matter what you paid for the pbook - even a penny - or even if the pbook were given to you.
What it seems to boil down to is this: if you have fairly acquired a copy of the book in any format, you are entitled to possess a liberated etext version of the book.
Notice that if you are in a situation where you buy an original of a book from someone, and at the same time get an ecopy, you are in the moral (and for that matter, legal) clear.
And also notice that it is no defense that the book has not been made available in a "legitimate" ebook version - the pbook is still out there & you can buy that to put a moral foundation under your acquisition of a liberated copy.
Are there any circumstances where you might be morally entitled to own a liberated etext copy without having first fairly acquired an original in some format?
I can only think of one. I keep coming back to the logical point that if you can acquire a liberated copy of an ebook, that means that you should be able to buy some kind of copy of the book, before liberation.
But if you can't, then I believe that is not immoral to acquire a (free) liberated copy.
Aside from that, the moral rule has to be this: if you want the book, somewhere along the line you must have paid for an unliberated copy of it.