Quote:
Originally Posted by Ben Thornton
This is not my experience. A lot of material that's available illegally is not available legally at all. Much of it seems to come from scanning paper books - by enthusiasts, not people seeking to sell them on.
My point was that where there is a convenient way of getting a high quality copy at a fair price, people will do so - which is the same point that you make about people following the path of least resistance.
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Yes, that is also true. I read what turned out to be one of my favourite books of all time, only to discover that it was first in a short series. I looked high and low for the other books, but discovered that all but the first one was out of print. While I was searching in vain for used copies, I came across all of the books in pdf format. What was I supposed to do?
The publisher wasn't printing them so I was unable to buy them, and even if I had found used copies, the money would have gone to the used book seller, not the copyright holder.
At the time, there was no such thing as an ebook reader, and I would have gladly paid money for an easier to read paper version.
I think I'm correct in saying though that more modern books that have been professionally created by a publisher for sale to owners of ebook readers are also being pirated, and are readily available. If it's for sale on an epublisher's website, it's almost certainly floating around as a torrent too.