Can e-Publishing Overcome Copyright Concerns?

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

god hear you.

not socialist. more like fascist. authoritarian, at the very least.

So, okay... if I'm trying to find a way to protect my intellectual property, I'm a fascist. (I couldn't just be a capitalist?) But if the situation stays as-is, my works get posted to the Darknet, and I potentially lose a significant portion of income, that's fair. I guess there's no way for me to win this situation.

Frankly, I'm at a loss to figure out how to go about making anything more than lunch money in digital publishing without some amount of protection, and not be accused of being a Nazi sympathizer. If I have concerns about the protection of my intellectual property rights, what do you propose I do about it?

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

So, okay... if I'm trying to find a way to protect my intellectual property, I'm a fascist. (I couldn't just be a capitalist?) But if the situation stays as-is, my works get posted to the Darknet, and I potentially lose a significant portion of income, that's fair. I guess there's no way for me to win this situation.

Frankly, I'm at a loss to figure out how to go about making anything more than lunch money in digital publishing without some amount of protection, and not be accused of being a Nazi sympathizer. If I have concerns about the protection of my intellectual property rights, what do you propose I do about it?

If you want to protect your IP, get a lawyer. If you want to control each copy you sell, that's something different.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

No, you misunderstand me. I said that even the most secure system can be violated by a person that has access. I'm not really sure how that can be fixed.

It can't be. The financial pages have regular stories on folks who used their knowledge of the systems to bypass internal controls at their companies to do things they shouldn't have, like the French trader who managed to accumulate something like 40 billion in losses at BNP.

He wasn't trying to be a bad guy or line his own pockets. He was trying to prove his worth as a trader, make money for his company, and get raises and promotions. He started out well, but when his bets turned sour he didn't know what to do.

The fix there isn't the systems -- it's addressing the corporate culture that encourages that sort of behavior. (Though fiddling with the systems to attempt to provide more control will be seen as a lot easier.)
______
Dennis

[zelda_pinwheel]

capitalism

an economic system in which investment in and ownership of the means of production, distribution, and exchange of wealth is made and maintained chiefly by private individuals or corporations, esp. as contrasted to cooperatively or state-owned means of wealth.

fascism

1. A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, stringent socioeconomic controls, suppression of the opposition through terror and censorship, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.
2. Oppressive, dictatorial control.
3. a nationalistic and anti-Communist system of government like that of Italy 1922-43, where all aspects of society are controlled by the state and all criticism or opposition is suppressed.

authoritarianism

a governmental or political system, principle, or practice in which individual freedom is held as completely subordinate to the power or authority of the state, centered either in one person or a small group that is not constitutionally accountable to the people.

China, of which you regularly encourage emulation, is an authoritarian and extremely repressive regime which regularly violates human rights.

i don't accept that my --in fact, the entire world's-- personal freedom and privacy should be compromised because you think your earning money should take precedence, especially since as so many have explained already there is no reason to believe that the two are at all linked.

you yourself have acknowledged that despite your inexplicable alarmist tendencies, your books which are available illegally online continue to sell as well as or better than the others :

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

(...) both books [available as illegal downloads] have slightly higher sales than the others... but only by a minute margin, too small to be conclusive in itself. The sales numbers of most of my books are roughly the same, across the board, as they have been since the SJB went online.

(...)

Overall, I can say that the Darknetting of two of my e-books does not appear to have impacted my sales, positively OR negatively, in any significant way.

perhaps, if you're not rich and famous yet, it's because you're just another writer, like the millions of other writers out there, and writing has NEVER been a good way to make money, including long before the internet existed, and it has NOTHING to do with whether or not your books are available as illegal downloads. who was who recently reminded us of the first piece of advice to give a writer : "don't quit your day job."

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Frankly, I'm at a loss to figure out how to go about making anything more than lunch money in digital publishing without some amount of protection, and not be accused of being a Nazi sympathizer. If I have concerns about the protection of my intellectual property rights, what do you propose I do about it?

Change your concern to a concern of how to make money instead. I am pretty sure that you have to use the same methods as other authors to make money. Look at how people that self publish paper books makes money for example. Worrying about copyright infringement seems to be counter productive.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Nate the great

If you want to protect your IP, get a lawyer. If you want to control each copy you sell, that's something different.

So: The answer to overcoming copyright concerns is to sue everybody? Not particularly helpful, that. (Though I guess it would go with the jackboots I've already been fitted for.)

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

So, okay... if I'm trying to find a way to protect my intellectual property, I'm a fascist. (I couldn't just be a capitalist?) But if the situation stays as-is, my works get posted to the Darknet, and I potentially lose a significant portion of income, that's fair. I guess there's no way for me to win this situation.

Frankly, I'm at a loss to figure out how to go about making anything more than lunch money in digital publishing without some amount of protection, and not be accused of being a Nazi sympathizer. If I have concerns about the protection of my intellectual property rights, what do you propose I do about it?

One question is whether you can protect your intellectual property. Another is how much you need to.

The underlying question is "Do you trust your market?" Do you assume they are for the most part honest, ethical, and willing to pay for value, or do you assume they will cheerfully rip you off given an opportunity?

Yep, your work can be posted to the darknet. So what? How much lost revenue does that cost you? How do you know? (Frankly, you don't know, and you can't know. There is no way you can measure how many folks download from the darknet and read a book of yours instead of buying a copy from you.) And DRM is a flimsy protection, given the folks who seem to live to crack such things.

The way you make more than lunch money from your writing is the way any writer does, from electronic or paper editions -- get higher sales. There's no magic process to insure that. You do what you are doing now, promoting yourself, making yourself as visible as possible to the sort of folks who might like your work, and try to grow your audience to the point where the income is more significant.

Growing your audience helps with the darknet as well. My assumption is that the darknet is a fairly small fraction of the total market. I think most folks are willing to pay for stuff they like. The more folks you reach, the larger the percentage who will buy rather than search the darknet for an illicit copy.
_______
Dennis

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

So: The answer to overcoming copyright concerns is to sue everybody? Not particularly helpful, that. (Though I guess it would go with the jackboots I've already been fitted for.)

Nope.

Lawsuit may be necessary, but it's not the answer. You sue if someone infringes, claiming work you did as their own. It's not a deterrent against simple theft.
______
Dennis

[tirsales]

I appologize in advance for the political and long response.

1. There is nothing more important than human rights and the rights of citizens. NOTHING. The right to live is a direct result from the human rights.
2. No. The protection of a state is NOT more important then human rights. Not the citizen should protect the state - the state should protect the citizen. That is the ONLY reason a state exists. Thus - I dont have to give up freedom to protect a state. At the most I have to give up freedom to protect other peoples right.

I wont even think about discussing those points. They are just matter of fact statements to help understanding my point of view.

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

You mean enact real security on the web? Mmm, oh, I dunno... maybe in an attempt to rein in hackers, viruses, identity theft, copyright infringement and piracy, not to mention maintaining national sovereignty, security and economy?

Yeah, just like e.g. you can walk every street without any precaution without fear of getting robbed? No, you cant. And you never will. Just as the internet will never be free of crime.
No amount of censorship or national despotism could change that. And thus there is NO reason for censorship or despotism.

Originally Posted by pilotbob

What I don't understand is how you "think" it protects you? You did read 1984?

You know how they say, if guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns? I think this applies here too.

BOb

Thanks.

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

And with each one of these technologies, the public has lost a measure of anonymity, privacy, and control, but accepted that in the name of safer streets, lit-up homes, phones that could call anyone in the world, and credit cards usable anywhere we went.

Nope, I did not accept that. And I never will.

We've also seen governments exercise their sovereign right to secure and protect themselves by regulating international access to many common services, like telephones (same notation as above), transportation, banking, etc.

Yeah. Have a look which states.

What makes you think the Internet can't be regulated? There is absolutely nothing to prevent the Internet ending up like that, if governments decide it needs to be done. And you might even learn to like it, when you don't have to sweat viruses, hackers, spam, DDOS attacks, and botnets anymore.

Again: Just as there is no crime out in the real world, there will be no crime in the internet. There was crime in the 3rd Reich, there was crime in Stalins Soviet union, there will be crime in the despotic nation you are describing.

Because, frankly, the whole Anarchy thing we have now isn't solving any of those problems.

It is not? The internet is working, isnt it? You are selling your books, arent you? I can chat in freedom and without fear of repression with you - even about a topic as sensitive as this one is becoming. All this would change.

Originally Posted by pilotbob

Perhaps we should start building all public rest rooms with transparent walls. Perhaps people would then understand why I feel violated knowing my phone can be tapped and my mail can be inspected for no good reason.

BOb

Correct.

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

One word:

China.

1. They wasnt able to close their borders completely - only making it hard to pass the filters

And if China could close up its digital borders, the U.S., say, could do it as well, and rid the country of traffic from Russia, Korea, Nigeria, etc, etc, as they wished.

You are talking censorship here. No, we wont accept traffic from Russia because Russians are evil. Where did I hear this before?

And every country could put up its own digital borde

Yeah! Isolationistic politics! Every nation cooking its own soup, military forces used to prevent people from crossing the border, military forces killing every hacker who attempts to cross the borders, etc

And as I said, it might not be 100% effective, but for all practical purposes, it would do the job of isolating a country to only the traffic they permitted.

Yeah. As if it was possible. There is NO way to control the traffic of a whole nation. It is too much traffic, too much data to even try to filter it. Echelon tried it, it didnt work. The only way would be to filter the complete traffic - which would be complete isolation.

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

The US theoretically could, though not as simply as you appear to imagine.

Not even theoretically.

"Oh", you might say. "We'll only close it to the undesirable traffic!" And you will identify and block that how, exactly, while letting the other stuff through?

Exactly.

And various countries have, for reasons I doubt either of us would agree with. Consider the controls imposed by some of the Islamic states.

Oh I guess some would agree.

There are all sorts of controls that might be imposed as "emergency measures" or "temporary controls". How likely are those controls to be lifted when the situation they were brought about to deal with no longer exists? Police agencies always want more power to fight crime. Think hard before you grant it, because you'll find it hard to take away again.

Agreed. Especially because all those police officers, bureucrats, etc with access to your sensitive data are humans - and are targets of e.g. corruption, mistakes, etc

Botnets, phishes, spam, DDOS attacks -- yep, they're all problems. But none of them have affected me enough to have me calling for putting out the barricades, without carefully vetting what the barricades are and who controls them.

I agree.

Originally Posted by tompe

That is not the reason I have heard from people. What people are afraid of is misuse of the power and false positives. The equivalent to getting on a no-fly list because your name is similar to another name will be very common the more government listen to people.

Correct.

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Actually, with better security systems, being put on a no-fly list because of something so random as a similar name should happen less and less.

Wrong. So far we have only seen an increase in the anmount of false-positives and more impact from each false positive.

No doubt, false-positives suck, especially when you're the false positive. On the other hand, I'd rather be caught as a false-positive than be on the plane that went down because no one caught the true positive.

Yeah. All human rights and rights of a citizen gone, douzens of people arrested without reason or even killed - for the potential of e.g. denying a single attack? An attack that could happen even with those new laws?

But are we getting slightly here, debating terrorist security when the issue is protecting copyright concerns? Or are we just over-reacting a bit, seeing conspiracies around every corner?

Some people here have e.g. said that controlling the internet, censoring the internet, attaching security everywhere, etc would be nice ways of ensuring copyrights.
They would not.

As Dennis pointed out, the government isn't concerned with little guys like us.

You sure? You did have a look at e.g. Guantanamo and people arrested wrongly? Just as a single example. And you be sure that the government wont make any mistakes?

They are also not so efficient as to be able to turn this extra scrutiny against us without our knowing about it. And don't forget, the government isn't a system... it's made up of people like us, doing a job.

Correct. Doing mistakes, etc

Anyway, I don't challenge the fact that increased security/scrutiny requires increased care and oversight.

Which cant be guaranteed.

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Okay, I get you. But systems can be secured, if it is deemed worthwhile. Ask anyone in banking how easy it is to violate their systems and steal someone's money from the inside. They'll tell you they'd have better success robbing a convenience store with a toy gun.

No. No system can ever be secure. There is no security. And believe me: stealing from a bank is not that hard. Especially not if you work for a bank. Examples have already been given.
There is NO absolute security, there can never be absolute security and longing for it can only destroy freedom and live.
A friend of mine works as "white hacker". That means: He hacks computer systems for a living, testing the security measures. So far he hasnt found a single computer system that was safe. And yes, he has tested some that should be.
Not a single one - that means: Those government systems that save all your nice data - the data you want to get saved - arent save as well. Examples of data loss from government systems are more then common - e.g. through technical problems or human mistakes like letting a notebook lie in the train, etc

@DMcCunney: I agree to your last two posts.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

2. Oppressive, dictatorial control.
3. a nationalistic and anti-Communist system of government like that of Italy 1922-43, where all aspects of society are controlled by the state and all criticism or opposition is suppressed.

We're talking about protecting personal intellectual property... not locking people up because they look cross-eyed at a dictator.

When I mention China, it is not with the idea that we should emulate their political system, nor have I ever advocated such... it is held up as only one example of the fact that the internet, like any communications entity, can be regulated by an authority.

If you're so frightened of the very idea of "emulating" China, then fine... don't. Instead, you can emulate the corporate, democratic, capitalistic practices of Verizon and Comcast, who exercise monopolistic control of their communications systems, collect data on who we speak to and what we watch, hold our credit card numbers, can disconnect us at their whim, can refuse us access to communications lines at will, and are answerable to no public entity.

And who, I notice, don't have particularly large crowds with torches and pitchforks at their door, protesting their actions.

They do, however, have government regulations to answer to (thin as they are), preventing them from running rampant over us and charging $30 for a 2-minute call across town. And look... I'm not handcuffed to my cellphone. I can disable the built-in GPS system. I can even (shudder) turn it off at will. Government regulations accomplished that... not the desires of the phone company.

If you really believe that taking steps to protect my intellectual property can only result in the world's population being manacled to their chairs, cameras pointed at them 24-7, and forced to watch propaganda videos until they are sufficiently brainwashed, I can only say that it will take much, much more than a few authors' desire to make a few bucks to accomplish that.

If, on the other hand, you see nothing wrong with a clearly broken system that presently upsets creators, publishers, and consumers alike, and gives no sign that it will magically fix itself, then I suppose you'd enjoy an e-book market that will see no appreciable progress, other than the Kindle, for the next 10 years.

But let's try to keep clear heads here, stop accusing each other of being monsters, and discuss the matter at hand.

Originally Posted by tompe

Change your concern to a concern of how to make money instead. I am pretty sure that you have to use the same methods as other authors to make money. Look at how people that self publish paper books makes money for example. Worrying about copyright infringement seems to be counter productive.

If the solution is print... that's not much of a solution to me. Print makes little practical sense, it is only part of a closed, controlled, wasteful, elitist market, and it is not a direction I would prefer to go in at this time, even if I could. Self-printing, while less wasteful than corporate publishing, is still a wasteful process, too expensive at low volumes to be cost-effective. It is mainly a way to emulate the aforementioned Big Publisher's market, but without the cost-effectiveness of mass production.

This is why I have embraced e-books. However, e-books provide no protection to my intellectual property... they are the equivalent of attaching the complete recipe for Coca-Cola onto the side of the bottle. This also means that my IP is more at-risk than a print published author, who makes the bulk of their money off of print products, which in turn circulate through a Big Publishing machine already regulated to limit intellectual infringement and theft, and can therefore afford to give e-books away for free.

Using the drinks analogy, their Pepsi product is being dispensed at the bar that everyone already patronizes, no recipe for patrons, just a logo and a bill. And the bar doesn't want to sell my Coca-Cola, since they have Pepsi. Patrons can't go home and recreate Pepsi... but they can go home and recreate my Coke, because the recipe is right there.

Of course, they probably won't ever find out about my Coke. But if they do, and it actually turns out to be more desirable than Pepsi, there will be nothing stopping someone else from recreating, rebranding and selling my Coke and making the money from my recipe. Because my IP has no protection.

So: How do I compete with the makers of Pepsi, as well as the makers of Koack? Should I have no legal recourse to protecting my Coke recipe from bootleggers? Is it right for the Big Guys and the thieves to just walk all over me, steal my product, and leave me with scraps?

In short, am I condemned to be the small fish in the big pond, with no hope but that I don't see the big fish coming that inevitably gobbles me up?

(Minor point: I am a citizen, too.)

[tirsales]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

We're talking about protecting personal intellectual property...

And about securing the internet, censorship, etc
Censorship as in "locking out unwanted traffic".

When I mention China, it is not with the idea that we should emulate their political system, nor have I ever advocated such... it is held up as only one example of the fact that the internet, like any communications entity, can be regulated by an authority.

And China is a very good example what happens then.

If you really believe that taking steps to protect my intellectual property can only result in the world's population being manacled to their chairs, cameras pointed at them 24-7, and forced to watch propaganda videos until they are sufficiently brainwashed, I can only say that it will take much, much more than a few authors' desire to make a few bucks to accomplish that.

Well ... you were the one wanting a "secure" and controlled internet.

But let's try to keep clear heads here, stop accusing each other of being monsters, and discuss the matter at hand.

Thats fine by me.

Print makes little practical sense, it is only part of a closed, controlled, wasteful, elitist market, and it is not a direction I would prefer to go in at this time, even if I could.

You dont like a controlled market but you want a controlled internet?

This is why I have embraced e-books. However, e-books provide no protection to my intellectual property...

They do. You did state yourself that you see no loss from the darknet.

they are the equivalent of attaching the complete recipe for Coca-Cola onto the side of the bottle.

Mixing patents and copyright.

Of course, they probably won't ever find out about my Coke. But if they do, and it actually turns out to be more desirable than Pepsi, there will be nothing stopping someone else from recreating, rebranding and selling my Coke and making the money from my recipe. Because my IP has no protection.

... It has. There is a law protecting your work.

So: How do I compete with the makers of Pepsi,

As you stated yourself: The difference is the multi-million-machine, not the media.

Should I have no legal recourse to protecting my Coke recipe from bootleggers?

Is there a copyright law in the US? I believe there is.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

fascism

A point to note on this: Fascism springs from different roots than other forms of authoritarianism.

Some totalitarian regimes stem from the upper class, attempting to preserve and extend existing power. Others stem from the lower classes, arising after successful attempts to depose the former regime and et a better deal for themselves.

Fascism tends to stem from the middle class, and is a centrist, not radical, phenomenon.

China, of which you regularly encourage emulation, is an authoritarian and extremely repressive regime which regularly violates human rights.

It shouldn't be a big surprise, nor should anyone expect it to change significantly.

Different societies have different pattern, and different practices. Things which may seem inexplicable to us happen because, at least at some point, they promoted the survival of the society that practices them.

The key point is that the survival of the society is paramount. The individual may not matter.

We live in and stem from a culture where the individual is important. The critical social unit in China is the family, and the society is based, in part, on a web of relationships between families. Families matter. Individuals generally don't.

Another point to keep in mind is that the system in which you are raised becomes the right and proper one. Consider the custom of arranged marriages. In places that practice them, the marriage is a political and economic alliance between two families, arranged by the families, for the benefit of the families. The wishes of the bride and groom are generally irrelevant to the decision. And for folks growing up in such a system, it's the way things are done, and our practice of marriage being a love match between a man and a woman may be seen as just this side of crazy.

perhaps, if you're not rich and famous yet, it's because you're just another writer, like the millions of other writers out there, and writing has NEVER been a good way to make money, including long before the internet existed, and it has NOTHING to do with whether or not your books are available as illegal downloads. who was who recently reminded us of the first piece of advice to give a writer : "don't quit your day job."

I might have been the giver of that reminder. I know a fair number of published writers. Just about all of them have day jobs, and write on the side. I can think of five offhand who only write. Two have spouses who are the main breadwinners, and aren't entirely dependent on writing for their income. Of the three others, one does mostly media tie-in work (and has a spouse whose day job salary helps smooth the peaks and valleys while he waits for contracts to be signed and checks to be issued), one use to be an editor, and still freelances as an editorial consultant and has had some part time jobs in the past few years, and one is just barely making a living and had to relocate to a lower rent area to help make ends meet.
______
Dennis

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by tirsales

They do. You did state yourself that you see no loss from the darknet.

The fact that I have not suffered a documented loss from the Darknet does not mean that the internet affords me any protection. It means no one's ripped me off yet (as far as I can document, probably an impossibility anyway without some form of--ahem--regulation), but there's nothing stopping them from doing so.

Originally Posted by tirsales

There is a law protecting your work.

But in the present internet, no practical way to enforce that law. So what good is it? There might as well be no law at all.

[tirsales]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

Fascism tends to stem from the middle class, and is a centrist, not radical, phenomenon.

That is correct. However this does not change anything in the discussion - on the contrary.

Different societies have different pattern, and different practices. Things which may seem inexplicable to us happen because, at least at some point, they promoted the survival of the society that practices them.

That is correct. We have differenct traditions from china - and that is one (but not the only) reason why I DONT want chinese internet politics.
Nothing against chinese or china in principal - I just dont know enough about chines politic or tradition and I dont like to judge people by the politics of their nation. I know something about their handling of the internet - and I dont like it.

The key point is that the survival of the society is paramount. The individual may not matter.

You see - that is one point where we differ. The society is ultimately made of individuals.
If the individual is too important, a society cannot prosper. But - if the individual is too unimportant, the society will - ultimately - die.

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

But in the present internet, no practical way to enforce that law. So what good is it? There might as well be no law at all.

Following that logic nobody would be buying any cr-protected stuff anymore. People still do.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by tirsales

That is correct. We have differenct traditions from china - and that is one (but not the only) reason why I DONT want chinese internet politics.
Nothing against chinese or china in principal - I just dont know enough about chines politic or tradition and I dont like to judge people by the politics of their nation. I know something about their handling of the internet - and I dont like it.

Nor do I, but this goes deeper than tradition. We are talking about what is essentially culture reflex, handled on an unconscious level.

You see - that is one point where we differ. The society is ultimately made of individuals.

I concur, but that's because we come from similar cultures with similar values placed on the individual. Someone from china may not see it that way.

If the individual is too important, a society cannot prosper. But - if the individual is too unimportant, the society will - ultimately - die.

<shrug> China has been around longer than we have...
______
Dennis