EU vice-president: Copyright legislation is “pushing people to steal”

[eschwartz]

Why do I get the impression that there are several people who have horribly misunderstood what I said?

A rights-holder can pull their product from the market. ingmar's proposed legislation takes away that right by legalizing unauthorized copies if the rights-holder exercises that right.

No one has ever implied that a rights-holder is or should be able to:

• forbid a sale retroactively
• sell only to a selective subset of the population. Except apparently if it is digital meda.
• forbid resale of an already-purchased item. Except apprently if it is digital media.

Whatever. I certainly don't understand how anyone could possibly say:

It's only for these "download things" that they think they have that right.

Could that statement have possibly been more backward?

[barryem]

Copyright these days means a lot more than what was originally intended, at least in the USA, which is all I really know anything about. The basis for US copyright law is the clause in the constitution that grants temporary short term exclusivity to a creator to give him a head start at making money from his creation. Nothing is said about it being "property". The whole idea of "intellectual property" seems somehow alien to me.

When an author (or publisher) publishes a book that book becomes part of our culture. From then on it belongs to all of us. The income from the book belongs to the author or publisher but the words are all of ours. The idea of the author or publisher having the right to withdraw it and take it away from us, from those of us who haven't bought or read it yet, just seems wrong to me. It's somehow anti-social.

Authors don't own the books they write and sell. They own the income the books generate. That's it. At least according to Barry's Law.

I'm all for paying for my books and I hope authors and publishers make a good living from them. As far as I'm concerned books are a good place to spend my money. But I don't accept anyone's right to tell me I can't obtain a book and read it.

A personal diary isn't part of this calculation, nor is any book that hasn't been published. But once a book is made available to us all bets are off.

One thing that might help with all this would be some kind of orphan work law that says if it's no longer available for some length of time it becomes public domain.

Barry

[gweeks]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Why do I get the impression that there are several people who have horribly misunderstood what I said?

A rights-holder can pull their product from the market. ingmar's proposed legislation takes away that right by legalizing unauthorized copies if the rights-holder exercises that right.

And you've totally missed the point of statutory licenses. If you have EVER published a song, anyone that wants to can do a cover of it and you have no control over it whatsoever. They simply have to pay you the statutory license rate and they can do anything they want to with it. Nothing you can do can remove it. There are other statutory licenses in the world besides music. Music however is a copyright one.

Greg

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by gweeks

And you've totally missed the point of statutory licenses. If you have EVER published a song, anyone that wants to can do a cover of it and you have no control over it whatsoever. They simply have to pay you the statutory license rate and they can do anything they want to with it. Nothing you can do can remove it. There are other statutory licenses in the world besides music. Music however is a copyright one.

Greg

OK, sure, with the exception of the one most messed up industry on the planet -- the music industry.

And I will note that you claimed that even without a statutory license (e.g. books) the rights-holder still cannot withdraw their product from the market???

[darryl]

Reading the posts since Ingmar's I think there has been a lot of misunderstandings. An almost throwaway line by Ingmar in the context of a thread discussing copyright law has suddenly been taken to an absurd extreme and ridiculed with talk of drugs, slavery and, of course, child pornography. Laws such as Ingmar suggested have precedent. Year ago, one Australian review of parallel import legislation for books failed to recommend abolition but tried to deal with availability by allowing book selling businesses to import books from anywhere in certain circumstances where the Australian rights-holders were not willing or able to supply. A ridiculous solution, of course. But I'm sure it is not beyond legislator's to come up with a form of words that allows access to books not sold in their region without extending the privilege to child porn etc.

I don't think any reasonable person would seek to deny an author the right not to publish. However, as I have made quite plain in other posts, the reality is that the internet has in effect created one world wide market, despite the continuing attempts to artificially divide that market geographically. Governments of course do hate this, since it poses significant problems for Governments seeking control over what is available to their citizens. An author should have the right not to publish a work at all. However, an author should not have the right to limit publication only to certain geographic areas. And yes, an author may have the right to withdraw a work from sale completely. But not only from a particular region or for that matter only from a particular person or group.

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by darryl

However, an author should not have the right to limit publication only to certain geographic areas. And yes, an author may have the right to withdraw a work from sale completely. But not only from a particular region or for that matter only from a particular person or group.

The biggest problem I have with the current geo-restrictions is that they only are for electronic books. As Harry pointed out, I can buy a book from anywhere in the world, as long as they ship it to my country. And if it's in paper. But I cannot buy that exact same book, from the exact same publisher in another format: bits. Even though there is not one publisher in my own country that publishes it (the only ones are in Britain and there I am not allowed to buy books either, never mind that one economic market thing of the EU). That's why I'm lying on my Amazon account.

I have (and will be) downloaded books from the dark side (mostly backlogged books though). But I've been replacing them too, once I found out where I could legally buy them.

[ingmar]

Originally Posted by ApK

To confidential police records! Child pornograhy! And since it's moral and sensible, how about apply it to drugs! And weapons! And slaves!

Now that's what I call a valuable contribution to the discussion ... not.

Believe it or not, we (read: some European countries, including mine) do pretty much just that for certain types of media already, the same way we acknowledge the right to make private copies under certain circumstances, or allow libraries to keep and make available to the public all published works. There are some financial transactions involved in return (blank media tax, mainly) but it all works out in the end.

Originally Posted by eschwartz

It remains a right of the rights-holder to deny anyone the right to buy a product.

Well, not necessarily. Copyright is by no means god-given, it is, on the contrary, a legally sanctioned monopoly granted by the state. It can be modified at any time. It is, in fact, every few years.

It makes far more sense to make georestrictions legally unenforceable.

Amazon.us still wouldn't sell (ebooks) to me: why should they, when they can levy a 40% (or so) "European" tax on amazon.{co.uk|de|it|*} ?

Originally Posted by HarryT

Actually, one extremely important right that copyright law gives an author is the right NOT to publish. If you write a private diary, copyright is what gives you the right to keep it private. A rights holder absolutely does have the right to say "this is not for sale".

Nobody questions this, but that's not the problem. Problems only arise when the author (or his agents, publishers, whoever) decide to publish in their home market only, and the rest of the world can take a running jump (or wait a few months at least to buy at twice the price.) This made sense (somewhat) when physical copies had to be printed and distributed, but these days the ebook is just a mouseclick away, regardless of my place of residence.

Originally Posted by eschwartz

A rights-holder can pull their product from the market. ingmar's proposed legislation takes away that right by legalizing unauthorized copies if the rights-holder exercises that right.

That's a valid point, but we have just such an exception for out-of-print books. You must not make copies of whole books (from a library, presumably) -- unless that book is out of print) [1]. I have no problems with just such an exceptions for ebooks as well. That said, it could be further clarified to only allow such copies if they are to be legally had in other markets.

[1] Or you copy it by hand. I kid you not.

[darryl]

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

The biggest problem I have with the current geo-restrictions is that they only are for electronic books. As Harry pointed out, I can buy a book from anywhere in the world, as long as they ship it to my country. And if it's in paper. But I cannot buy that exact same book, from the exact same publisher in another format: bits. Even though there is not one publisher in my own country that publishes it (the only ones are in Britain and there I am not allowed to buy books either, never mind that one economic market thing of the EU). That's why I'm lying on my Amazon account.

I have (and will be) downloaded books from the dark side (mostly backlogged books though). But I've been replacing them too, once I found out where I could legally buy them.

I suspect that you are far from alone. What I find so frustrating is the failure of Big Publishing to acknowledge, even implicitly, the reality of the current EBook world. They are completely at the mercy of readers, who, for whatever reason, continue to purchase their product, despite the fact that they can easily and trivially obtain a pirate copy. Amazon generally behaves as if it understands this reality. It strives for reasonable prices, has excellent customer service, and has a system which makes buying EBooks not only convenient and easy but also a pleasurable experience. On the other hand, the large publishers continue to war with the readers on whose goodwill they are so dependent. They act as a cartel, seek to retard the ebook market to preserve the print book market and existing business models, conspire to raise EBook prices (Harper Collins evidently liked the $US18 to $US20 for an EBook) and, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary (the fact that they are still in business) seem to cling to the paranoid belief that readers are dishonest and not to be trusted. And, of course, they attempt to artificially recreate geographic barriers which do not exist on the internet so as to cling to their outdated but profitable business models.

Personally I am no longer buying any ebook where the Publisher is setting the price, with rare exceptions for the occasional reasonable pricing. Instead, if there is one of these books that I really want to read, I borrow it from the library, usually as an ebook. If the ebook is not available, I will borrow the print book (which I have done once so far). Publishers have no business setting retail prices, particularly so when the purpose is to eliminate competition at the retail level. If the book is simply not available in my region due to geographic restrictions and I don't want to buy it? Well, in the longer term, I am looking to join a US library. In the shorter term, is piracy an option? I can only say that I would be sorely tempted if this situation arose. I have no moral qualms about depriving the Big 5 publishers of revenue, but the author is another matter.

I was and am a little concerned that borrowing from the library may penalise not only the publisher but also the author. However, a little digging reveals that publishers are also gouging libraries. What a surprise! One can only hope that authors see some of these ill-gotten gains, though I would certainly not be betting on it.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by darryl

I suspect that you are far from alone. What I find so frustrating is the failure of Big Publishing to acknowledge, even implicitly, the reality of the current EBook world. They are completely at the mercy of readers, who, for whatever reason, continue to purchase their product, despite the fact that they can easily and trivially obtain a pirate copy.

Which suggests, does it not, that people are generally happy with "the system" as it stands? I know that you consider that customers are being "gouged", but I certainly don't. I'm paying an awful lot less for books now than I was 10 years ago. 10 years ago I bought all my books from bookshops where they were sold at full price, which was generally £6.99 or £7.99 (US$11-13) for a paperback; today it's rare that I pay £5 for an ebook - most of the books I buy cost £3-4.

Are there $20 ebooks around? Yes, certainly there are. But, at least in the area of fiction, they are almost all newly-published books that are only out in hardback, and the ebook price falls dramatically once the paperback is released. There's nothing wrong with charging a high price for a new product: there are people who are willing to pay more to read a book NOW rather than in a year's time, and it's a legitimate business strategy to make money from such people. In exactly the same way, I know that if I wait a year, a DVD of a newly-released film which costs £15 today will probably be available for £5.

[Publishers...] despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary (the fact that they are still in business) seem to cling to the paranoid belief that readers are dishonest and not to be trusted.

Sorry, darryl, but you seem to be contradicting yourself here. In post #30 in this thread you said:

The mechanism that takes care of the differences in disposable income in poorer countries now is piracy, not publishing.

which suggests that you believe that large-scale piracy is happening. Publishers would seem, therefore, to be far from "paranoid" if they believe that "readers are dishonest and not to be trusted".

And, of course, they attempt to artificially recreate geographic barriers which do not exist on the internet so as to cling to their outdated but profitable business models.

As has already been stated several times in this thread, regional distribution contracts are primarily down to the choices made by authors, not publishers. If an author sells ebook rights to the UK only to a publisher, then that publisher would be breaking their contact if they offered the book to customers outside the UK. You're blaming the publisher for something that they have no control over.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

No one has ever implied that a rights-holder is or should be able to:

• sell only to a selective subset of the population. Except apparently if it is digital meda.

On the contrary, this happens all the time. The overwhelming majority of TV programmes, to name but one example, are only available in their country of broadcast. A rights-holder has the absolute right to control distribution in any way they wish, unless it would conflict with local laws (eg be discriminatory to certain groups).

[crich70]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

This is of course not unique to eBooks. Some video & music contracts are also Geo based with different movie studios and record labels holding distribution rights in different places. As for pushing people to steal (or infringe copyright anyway) maybe, but even if you could buy all the movies, books & music available on the market for really low prices there would still be tons who feel it's fine to download what they want for "free".

Probably true, but I wager ebooks are easier to pirate in that they are small files. I mean a movie is anywhere from several hundred MB to several GB in size for just one movie. I can't begin to guess how many ebooks are able to fit in a like space.

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by darryl

Personally I am no longer buying any ebook where the Publisher is setting the price, with rare exceptions for the occasional reasonable pricing.

If I would do that, I'd never been able to buy a Dutch book. We've a fixed bookprice. I don't know any better than that the publisher sets the price.

For me, it's not so much the price but rather the fact that I simply am not allowed to buy at all. If I want to read a book, I'm willing to pay the price asked. If I can buy it somewhere.

[crich70]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Which suggests, does it not, that people are generally happy with "the system" as it stands? I know that you consider that customers are being "gouged", but I certainly don't. I'm paying an awful lot less for books now than I was 10 years ago. 10 years ago I bought all my books from bookshops where they were sold at full price, which was generally £6.99 or £7.99 (US$11-13) for a paperback; today it's rare that I pay £5 for an ebook - most of the books I buy cost £3-4.

Are there $20 ebooks around? Yes, certainly there are. But, at least in the area of fiction, they are almost all newly-published books that are only out in hardback, and the ebook price falls dramatically once the paperback is released. There's nothing wrong with charging a high price for a new product: there are people who are willing to pay more to read a book NOW rather than in a year's time, and it's a legitimate business strategy to make money from such people. In exactly the same way, I know that if I wait a year, a DVD of a newly-released film which costs £15 today will probably be available for £5.

And those same publishers didn't offer their books for free for even one day either. I've gotten I don't know how many books during days they were offered for free at Amazon or other sites.

[darryl]

Thanks for your last post (#84) Harry. Even though we often disagree, I do usually enjoy your contributions and find them worthwhile.

In relation to your first response, I don't think it suggests so much that people are happy with the system as that they are living with it. I suppose you could say that they are happy with it in the sense that they are able to work around it or even resort to obtaining a pirate copy on the odd occasion where it does not adequately cater for their wants.

You are quite right that my statement in post #30 which you quote can be construed as seemingly contradictory, but only seemingly so. Your comment is that:

"which suggests that you believe that large-scale piracy is happening. Publishers would seem, therefore, to be far from "paranoid" if they believe that "readers are dishonest and not to be trusted".

However, the context is that of impoverished people in undeveloped and developing nations, who are relied upon by some to justify geographic restrictions. My point is that these people are not in fact catered for by Publishers with prices low enough for them to afford. Publishers in fact appear only to cater for the more affluent middle classes in these countries. If the truly impoverished in these nations wish to read they have little option but piracy. For you to class these people as dishonest and not to be trusted is certainly not indefensible, but in the context is probably neither appropriate nor relevant. Yes, large scale piracy may well be occurring amongst this class of people. But the publishers are losing nothing from it. It is a market that they are not interested in, for the practical and logical reason that they could not make a profit from it. Untouchables living in a rubbish tip and struggling to put food on the table have little or no money left to buy books (though, in true human fashion, some do apparently manage to obtain and operate cellphones). If a market segment that Publishers are not interested in catering to and don't do so for the perfectly practical reason that they would be unable to make a profit from that segment pirates their books, what does it matter to the publishers whether they are desperate or dishonest or both? This market segment is simply irrelevant to them.

So far as authors driving geographical restrictions, we simply disagree. But once again, it doesn't matter. The internet creates one market. You can enter into a contract based on the world being flat, but it does not make it so. I expect that the more ineffective geographic restrictions become the more difficult it will be for rights holders to sell geographically based rights. And, quite frankly, I see only one avenue that has any chance at all of bolstering geo-restrictions, and even that I do not expect to succeed. You will, I am sure, forgive me for not sharing that here

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

If I would do that, I'd never been able to buy a Dutch book. We've a fixed bookprice. I don't know any better than that the publisher sets the price.

For me, it's not so much the price but rather the fact that I simply am not allowed to buy at all. If I want to read a book, I'm willing to pay the price asked. If I can buy it somewhere.

Good point, the equivalents around the world of the Net Book Agreement (Government mandated terms where the list price either can't be discounted or discounted only by a small percent only).
Theoretically, at least, by popular demand of the people (technically the government works for the people, although it more and more appears the other way around) to keep small/local booksellers in business.

Ending geo-restrictions would actually be illegal in these countries as it would contravene these laws if anyone could sell cross-border at any price they chose.