Secondhand ebooks?

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by Harper Kingsley

Thank you for once again calling me stupid (my bad, you're not calling me stupid, you're just calling the things I believe in stupid. So I'm sure that's very different.). I'm just glad that your opinion has no bearing on my views whatsoever.

Oh, there is a vast difference between calling a person stupid and calling that person's ideas stupid. It's too bad you can't see that and instead willfully choose to pretend you're a victim of name calling. Plib engaged in legitimate argument about ideas; you're choosing to make it all about you.

[plib]

Originally Posted by Harper Kingsley

Thank you for once again calling me stupid (my bad, you're not calling me stupid, you're just calling the things I believe in stupid. So I'm sure that's very different.). I'm just glad that your opinion has no bearing on my views whatsoever.

I would just like to point out, that all I've said is a person-to-person transfer probably won't get anyone in trouble, but you can't resell an ebook as things currently stand. My reasoning? Because while a physical object can transfer from me to you, a license is ephemeral and cannot be transferred. So if I stripped the DRM off of a book so you could load it on your ereader, I would be the one that could get in trouble for whatever you do with that book.

You are free to do whatever you please with your life as I am free to do whatever I wish with mine. So if you feel no remorse whatsoever for taking someone's hard work and not even offering them a "Thank you, I really enjoyed your story" in recompense, then that is entirely up to you. But don't tell me I'm wrong if I don't want to be like you.

I'm sorry, I don't know how to make this any clearer, and you appear to be suffering from persistent misapprehension. The comment I made had nothing, nothing whatsoever to do with piracy, maintaining two copies of a book, or not compensating an author on original sale. It was addressed to the idea that if once read that book is given to someone else in it's entirety, no retained copies, no opportunity to download it again, that that transaction should still result in compensation for the author. That kind of transaction has been going on for centuries with physical books, ranging from donations to family members, donations to hospitals/charities or reselling it as a secondhand book. In none of those cases would another payment be generated to the author. Until recently the idea wouldn't even have occurred to anyone. I see no reason to treat ebooks differently in those circumstances than physical books, and I consider the growing body of thought that they should be to be, yes - stupid, pernicious and dangerous.

It has nothing to do with appreciating an author, if they weren't the book probably wouldn't be passed on, it has nothing to do with piracy. It does have to do with the concept that one no longer buys a book but only a restrictive license, very often for more than the cost of an actual physical book. If you think that's reasonable then you're entitled to your opinion. I don't, and I'm entitled to express mine. Fortunately it would appear that the EU Court of Justice, at least, appears to be leaning in the direction I favour.

One can, and I have tried to, attack an idea without attacking the proponent. I would point you back to the early days of the net and an institution called Fidonet whose motto was - "Do not offend, and do not be too easily offended".

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by Miss

It's disappointing to me that by simply following the normal, accepted method of getting books from computer to ereader I have, in some small way, broken the law. Downloading a purchased book automatically puts it in ADE, then I take it from ADE to Calibre, and from Calibre it goes to my ereader. That's 3 copies already. You say technically I "shouldn't have a book on such a PC"...is there some alternative way of doing things that I completely missed somewhere that wouldn't make any copies whatsoever, besides switching to a Kindle?

Actually my point was that the license agreement is not the law.

But going back to the original question: why don't you remove the extra copies? When a file is moved what really happens is that a copy is made to the other location and the original is removed. So technically if you remove the other copies you just move the file if you go by what the word "move" means when it comes to the digital world.

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by danskmacabre

because the cost of storing ebooks is irrelevant in this particular conversation. what is being discussed is the legality of giving away your ebooks.

There is no law that tells us that we cannot give away ebooks.

We are not supposed to copy art but that is a grey area, the statutes were really only meant for the business realm. Going to a museum and copying a painting, or sharing a book with a friend were definitely things that the framers considered fine and dandy.

[danskmacabre]

Originally Posted by Giggleton

There is no law that tells us that we cannot give away ebooks.

We are not supposed to copy art but that is a grey area, the statutes were really only meant for the business realm. Going to a museum and copying a painting, or sharing a book with a friend were definitely things that the framers considered fine and dandy.

That's correct, if you make an ebook, it's your right to give it away to whoever you like.

Alternatively if you mean you think there's no law against buying an ebook (not a public domain ebook or an ebook that has a specific clause that allows distribution) and then copying it and distributing it for free. Then I propose the following:
You buy one of Terry Goodkind's ebooks and then zip it up in a torrent with a text file with your full name and contact details saying you're "allowed" to do that. Then release it on a torrent site.
At that point let's see what happens, my bet is you'll be prosecuted.

If you don't get in trouble for that, I will happily re-imburse you for the cost of the ebook.

Go on, I dare you..

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Miss

It's disappointing to me that by simply following the normal, accepted method of getting books from computer to ereader I have, in some small way, broken the law. Downloading a purchased book automatically puts it in ADE, then I take it from ADE to Calibre, and from Calibre it goes to my ereader. That's 3 copies already. You say technically I "shouldn't have a book on such a PC"...is there some alternative way of doing things that I completely missed somewhere that wouldn't make any copies whatsoever, besides switching to a Kindle?

I would dispute that you've broken the law; you're entitled to make as many copies of the book for your personal use as you wish, and, indeed, such copying is inherent in the use of an eBook. Those are authorised copies.

[GreenMonkey]

Think of it this way.

If I download a book and read it, the content creator never got paid.

If I borrow the book from a friend, the content creator never got paid.

Then again, if you apply a piece of Kant's philosophy on morality (what if everyone did it)...

Let's say everyone shared one copy of a book (kind of impossible, but let's pretend). There would be a huge amount less in creative works. This is why we have copyright - it's a construct intended to encourage the creation of works, for the public good (see the Constitution for this in the U.S.).

But if you take it to other extremes:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/47558222.../#.UAb-PpHyx8E

Skipping commercials is stealing TV (and this is not the first spat like this...VCRs were ruled fair use due to a similiar attempt to stop technology years ago). So when you walk out of the room during commercials, or mute a commercial, you are stealing content without paying.

Think of it as "the content provider should get paid" leads to thoughts like you're stealing content by watching a movie at a friend's house. Better mail in that check for every time you watch something!! Or that you are stealing by not watching the commercials in TV. Or picking up a book and browsing it in the store - you're stealing content without paying!! Or the recent DMCA takedown of an anti-Obama youtube commercial because he was singing a copyrighted song (theft of content!! singing copyrighted music!!)

Some of us think copyright and DRM have simply swung things too far to the side of content providers. Copyright is a balance - rights of the public (Fair Use) vs right of the creator to make a profit from their work.

I will not give up the concept of "ownership" for the excuse that everything is just a limited license. Property ownership is slowly being chipped away in favor of "buy this product but you can only use it how we say". Witness Sony's attempts to say that they own the software on a product you bought (the PS3) - not you. You are not allowed to modify it because you only have a limited license to do certain things with it...sound familiar?

I've no problem with making sure creators are compensated. I actually feel for authors the most because they have the least ability to make revenue from other channels. Music and movies/TV have a lot more alternate sources of revenue. That doesn't mean I want to substitute a limited license with restrictions on loaning or selling it or even using it on my own devices for the concept of property ownership.

[QuantumIguana]

A watermark in an image file works so long as the person doesn't realize it is there. If a person simply copies it, the watermark will still be there. It will always be possible to get around a watermark of a picture file, but often people won't think about it. But an e-book is a glorified text file. You could embed a watermark in the e-book file, but if it is reduced to text, there's no more watermark.

[Giggleton]

Originally Posted by danskmacabre

That's correct, if you make an ebook, it's your right to give it away to whoever you like.

Alternatively if you mean you think there's no law against buying an ebook (not a public domain ebook or an ebook that has a specific clause that allows distribution) and then copying it and distributing it for free. Then I propose the following:
You buy one of Terry Goodkind's ebooks and then zip it up in a torrent with a text file with your full name and contact details saying you're "allowed" to do that. Then release it on a torrent site.
At that point let's see what happens, my bet is you'll be prosecuted.

What that sounds like is me simply moving my bookshelf from my room to my front yard and placing a sign that says read what you will. You might say that with physical books only one person can read a book at a time, but it is definitely possible for one to hold the book and another to read over that person's shoulder.

I am of course simply making a weird analogy, as you have just done.

Getting back to the reality, If I host my ebooks on a personal server and allow browser based cloud access to them, but for only one user at a time, would that be allright??

[Cpl Punishment]

Originally Posted by plib

Integrity...It's really as simple as that. Although it helps if you realize that integrity is a two way street.

No it isnt...You have it, or you make excuses for not having it....

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by Giggleton

Going to a museum and copying a painting, or sharing a book with a friend were definitely things that the framers considered fine and dandy.

Benjamin Franklin, who earned money pirating books, attended the constitutional convention. Does this count as framing?

To give the devil his due, Franklin did agree to a constitution than anticipated there being a copyright law enacted.

Most likely, some framers were generous with loaning books and some were not. One thing about loaning paper books is that the quality of the book declines a bit every time it is read. As a result, a lot of people prefer new to old. As an indirect result of this quality decline, a used market for lesser quality paper books helps support a higher-priced market for pristine new books. Unless someone invents a way to slightly damage the eBook each time it is copied, a used eBook market cannot fulfill this role and will hurt creators.

Getting back to your post, the first US art museum (Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts) held it's first exhibition in 1811. There were still some framers alive at this time. Where did you get the idea that any of them were OK with the free copying?

Perhaps tuition-paying academy students could copy.

[plib]

Originally Posted by Cpl Punishment

No it isnt...You have it, or you make excuses for not having it....

I'm awed by, and bow my head to, the depth, persuasiveness and rhetorical brilliance of your argument.

[The Terminator]

Originally Posted by plib

So far that makes it Amazon, Kobo, B&N and Smashwords where you can delete a book you've given away.

Yet another definitive statement in need of amendment.

Actually that's not true, you can not totally delete a book from Kobo. When you delete the book from your library it goes into your purchase history. And you can re add it to your library.

I think not being able to sell an eBook after you've read it is a small price to pay for all of their other features.

[Pismire]

Out of curiosity: say I am on a train, happily reading my book. Someone next to me glances over and reads part of it. Am I committing a crime here, by not successfully protecting the book, therefor making its content available to others? Is he committing a crime by trying to read my book without having payed for it?

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Pismire

Out of curiosity: say I am on a train, happily reading my book. Someone next to me glances over and reads part of it. Am I committing a crime here, by not successfully protecting the book, therefor making its content available to others? Is he committing a crime by trying to read my book without having payed for it?

No. You're not making a copy of the book, hence copyright law doesn't get involved.