Book Publishers Force Down Piracy Sites

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by taosaur

It obviously works. It's the sole visible means of support for multiple industries.

You are right about that. I can remember when google was a nobody. Until they came out with listing most visited pages first, or always had it - memory too fuzzy. And now they are the biggest advertising firm on the net.

[scrapking]

Originally Posted by xg4bx

secondhand books!? i hope those thieves get shut down, just like all the thieves reading books in the public library for free.

Re-read the OP's comment. He said secondhand *e-books*, which is definitely piracy.

[sbroome]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

Seriously, how can advertising on web pages make so much money? Most every web page has advertisements, I don't even see them, since I have developed a ad-filter in my brain.

You might want to ask google about that.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by taosaur

Mostly specific retailers don't advertise on specific sites. Mostly advertising algorithms target ads to you based on your browsing history and other data, and pay sites based on their traffic with no regard for content.

And it's exactly the "no regard for content" that makes such advertising objectionable.

[taosaur]

Originally Posted by Catlady

And it's exactly the "no regard for content" that makes such advertising objectionable.

Historically, controlling media content by pressuring advertisers has been a tool used for the comfort of (or power plays by) specific interest groups, rather than for the good of society. One thing to keep in mind is that copyright infringement is not remotely the greatest threat facing humanity just now, whereas self-righteous interest groups and overbearing corporations rank right up there.

An EU court just slapped down an industry lobby's attempts to make file hosting sites snoop out copyrighted content for that very reason: individual privacy trumps the 'right' to maximize profits and feel big and in control. Furthermore, entrenched, slow-moving industries' right to profit does not trump the rights of newer industries (such as file exchanges) simply because a lot of people don't understand what the newer industries do. I got hit by the MegaUpload fallout today when I discovered that the files I have linked or personally uploaded on another service, MultiUpload, are no longer available because the chilling effect of the raids frightened that service out of business. What were those files? Scripts and ROMs freely provided by the Nook Color modding and development community to help other people use their devices. No one wants to run that kind of simple, anonymous file-hosting now, and basic internet functionality is impaired or destroyed.

To stop pirates? Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
*sob*

[carpetmojo]

Originally Posted by taosaur

.................To stop pirates? Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
*sob*

Why is everybody ignoring the obvious high-tech solution ?

A Very Big Cannon.

[plib]

Originally Posted by sbroome

What I find fascinating is how often these piracy sites were generating large sums of money from other people's work, which sort of gets rid of the whole "champions of information" reputation they try to create for themselves.

What I find fascinating is that anyone is actually credulous enough to believe the "millions made/lost by/to piracy" numbers that have been proved over and over to have actually been plucked out of mid air.

If it's that profitable maybe the publishers et. al. should just set up a site themselves.

[plib]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

No, you got that wrong. They are doing it on purpose so that those sites can be shut down, because they are making money. And then they complain that they have to pay for advertisement and everybody just ignores the ads, and downloads the book for free instead of following the link to buy it. So they either get customers, or if they don't, they will shut the site down. A win-win situation, right?

Seriously, how can advertising on web pages make so much money? Most every web page has advertisements, I don't even see them, since I have developed a ad-filter in my brain. They blend in into the background noise. When is the last time you actually clicked on an ad? The ones on Youtube are annoying at best if you have to wait 5 seconds to skip them to actually see the movie. I get annoyed by them, I don't even consider clicking on them, even if the content might be interesting. Thank you for DVRs, so I can record my tv-shows, and fast-forward through the ads.

You might profitably (if that's the right word ;-) ) explore the combination of Firefox, AdBlock Plus, NoScript, Ghostery, BetterPrivacy and Do Not Track Plus.

The whole lot can be installed in about 10 minutes and you won't need your brain's ad-filter any more.

[plib]

Originally Posted by scrapking

Re-read the OP's comment. He said secondhand *e-books*, which is definitely piracy.

No. Not until there's been a definitive ruling on whether first sale doctrine applies to ebooks. There's a similar case on mp3's in the works at the moment where the judge refused to give a preventive injunction if I recall correctly.

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by plib

What I find fascinating is that anyone is actually credulous enough to believe the "millions made/lost by/to piracy" numbers that have been proved over and over to have actually been plucked out of mid air.

If it's that profitable maybe the publishers et. al. should just set up a site themselves.

Well, I suspect that whether the site actually made money or not will come up in their trial. Obviously it is impossible to show that the publishers have actually lost any money do to piracy, but it would be equally naive (if not more so) to believe that all the pirate sites exist simply out of the goodness of their own heart.

As for the publishers doing it themselves... maybe they should, but lets keep in mind that publishers do have extra costs that a pirate site does not. They have to recoup costs of editing and promoting and publishing a book, and then there are those pesky royalties....

It might be more doable for an author to work on that model, assuming they can generate enough traffic on their website to generate the ad revenue they need to make a go of it. The advantage of the pirate sites is that by having thousands of books, mp3s, movies, etc, they can attract viewers that advertisers want without having to pay any of that revenue to the creators of said work.

--
Bill

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by plib

No. Not until there's been a definitive ruling on whether first sale doctrine applies to ebooks. There's a similar case on mp3's in the works at the moment where the judge refused to give a preventive injunction if I recall correctly.

Perhaps, but at the same time, I don't think an end to first sale doctrine is actually unreasonable on the part of the publishers (maybe one of their few reasonable demands). After all, this is not Star Trek where it seemed that only one copy of any file could exist at a given time; one file can be duplicated hundreds, if not millions of times in just a few minutes. The only way to transfer a file is in fact to make a copy of said file.

--
Bill

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by bill_mchale

Well, I suspect that whether the site actually made money or not will come up in their trial. Obviously it is impossible to show that the publishers have actually lost any money do to piracy, but it would be equally naive (if not more so) to believe that all the pirate sites exist simply out of the goodness of their own heart.

As for the publishers doing it themselves... maybe they should, but lets keep in mind that publishers do have extra costs that a pirate site does not. They have to recoup costs of editing and promoting and publishing a book, and then there are those pesky royalties....

It might be more doable for an author to work on that model, assuming they can generate enough traffic on their website to generate the ad revenue they need to make a go of it. The advantage of the pirate sites is that by having thousands of books, mp3s, movies, etc, they can attract viewers that advertisers want without having to pay any of that revenue to the creators of said work.

--
Bill

It would make more sense to work with those sort of sites on a profit-sharing basis, a bit like with Spottify. Something being on Spottify doesn't seem to harm sales of mp3s, so it's obviously a completely different market. Megaupload were planning something like that, where creators got paid per download, but obviously that won't be happening now.

[bill_mchale]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

It would make more sense to work with those sort of sites on a profit-sharing basis, a bit like with Spottify. Something being on Spottify doesn't seem to harm sales of mp3s, so it's obviously a completely different market. Megaupload were planning something like that, where creators got paid per download, but obviously that won't be happening now.

Well, I think for some types of media, specifically music, that sort of model works better than it might for something like books. Many people still listen to top-40 radio stations where they likely hear the same songs every day for weeks on end. Even in TV, many people seem content to watch reruns of even mediocre shows. With books however, I doubt many people go out of their way to reread a book they felt was "just ok". Thus without that motivation to get people to return over and over again, some of the revenue models break down. Also true with books because lets be honest, who really wants to have to stay connected to the internet to read a book?

--
Bill

[taosaur]

I'm watching this site, re: alternate distribution models: http://storybundle.com/

Will be interesting to see how it shapes up.

[jmaejr]

So with all these 'piracy' sites being shut down I expect we should see a HUGE increase in sales of books now........