Open Source culture to blame for e-book piracy!

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Yes, agree completely.

Hi there, Kenny! I was wondering when you were going to jump on this thread!

[klikklak]

@WT Sharpe:Yeah, I guess we strayed a bit from the topic. Pity, I was enjoying this. I guess we'll have to wait for a few years for a general debate on this. I think artificial scarcity vs. abundance is the actual debate, but I'm willing to wait for some time for that discussion.

@M-Reader: Yeah, no person is infallible, even those fighting what you believe is the good fight.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by LDBoblo

I wonder how many ebook pirates actually read what they download...

It'd be interesting to see a survey of ebook pirates to see how much they read, and whether they would purchase a book if piracy were not an option (or, to be more thorough, what conditions would need to be met for purchase to become probable).

I see this argument brought up a lot and my take on it is that it really doesn't matter. Whether they read them or not, they have still committed an illegal act by possessing them. It's a moral thing and a criminal act and is disrespectful of society and the author's right to make a living from their work.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by klikklak

It would be equally logical to demand food coupons for writers. In fact more so. Socialized art works ok in Europe, so I think your argument is just ideology and refusal to look at alternatives.

There are numerous grants and awards and government support of arts, but it's far from across the board and certainly is not intended to address the issues of the digital age and in the U.S.A. of course there is a major aversion to government support of it's people (as can be seen in the raging health-care debate).

[Blue Tyson]

Speaking as an Australian, said people will find it hard to make a living when they refuse to sell anything to us.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by m-reader

I...
I am personally sick and tired of interesting stuff, give me boring any day!

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

.... Who would like to see library systems run by corporations?
...

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Hi there, Kenny! I was wondering when you were going to jump on this thread!

Sorry, late getting out of bed this morning.

[m-reader]

Originally Posted by Blue Tyson

Speaking as an Australian, said people will find it hard to make a living when they refuse to sell anything to us.

And we've got no-one but our government (and parliament) to thank for this!
Wasn't in only a few months ago that they all agreed to keep parallel import restrictions on e-books.

[nick101]

Originally Posted by HarryT

If you want to loan your son your reading device, with the book on it, that's absolutely fine.

And that, of course is the crux - when people talk about 'lending' an ebook, what they really mean is making a copy and handing that over. The author retains 'copyright', which is the right to control how copies are made and distributed, and that's what DRM is supposed to protect.

In my view, the issues are these:

1. Much copyright does not reside with authors/creators, but with corporations. It's much harder to make the case for protecting the originator's rights when he/she doesn't have any rights any more.

2. There is a moral issue (rewards for artists) and a commercial issue (protection of valuable assets) and both sides of the argument happily conflate the two to make their cases. Big Content loves to bleat about originators' rights, but has abused, and continues to abuse, artists routinely. The 'pirate' tendency use arguments about freedom and openness to justify the commercial activity of taking something for nothing. It's the combination of huge growth in sales of books, records, movies etc, and the concurrent growth in ease of copying that continue to fuel the fight. How many people who demand DRM-free copying rights now wanted the same when the only way to copy a book was to photocopy it page by page?

3. Ebooks are physical objects (files) and the seller is entitled to make his/her own terms for selling them, and if the terms include copy protection, so be it.

There are some interesting lessons to be learned from the case of the (excellent, award-winning) movie Sita Sings The Blues, created by Nina Paley. In essence, Nina gives the movie away free so as not to have to pay several hundred thousand dollars for some soundtrack songs whose rights are owned by corporations. In doing so, she's fuelled a fascinating (ongoing) debate about all of these issues. Google her or the movie to find out more.

Oh - and watch the movie it truly is wonderful

[Blue Tyson]

Originally Posted by m-reader

And we've got no-one but our government (and parliament) to thank for this!
Wasn't in only a few months ago that they all agreed to keep parallel import restrictions on e-books.

Yep. To which the government replied 'right then, die on your own, as no future help from us.'

[Blue Tyson]

Originally Posted by m-reader

And we've got no-one but our government (and parliament) to thank for this!
Wasn't in only a few months ago that they all agreed to keep parallel import restrictions on e-books.

Actually is is the publishers and authors that sign the contracts and threaten the retailers - ultimately their fault, as is your previously mentioned parallel importing.

[m-reader]

Originally Posted by Blue Tyson

Actually is is the publishers and authors that sign the contracts and threaten the retailers - ultimately their fault, as is your previously mentioned parallel importing.

I'm not sure if I follow. AFAIK, if parallel importing was allowed, then publishers from outside Australia would have been able to sell e-books to Australian market. Of course the local publishers lobbied everybody blue in the face (local jobs lost and all the usual fluff), pollies got scared and we (the consumers) are left up the proverbial creek with nothing to paddle with.

[LDBoblo]

Originally Posted by kennyc

I see this argument brought up a lot and my take on it is that it really doesn't matter. Whether they read them or not, they have still committed an illegal act by possessing them. It's a moral thing and a criminal act and is disrespectful of society and the author's right to make a living from their work.

I don't consider it an argument at all...I consider it a curiosity. People try to make it an argument from time to time, but without even numbers, there's no foundation for an argument to be made, and even with numbers, it's more just a consolation for authors who complain that the pirates are stealing their customers away and killing their profits.

I'm just curious what the numbers are, no need to read into it.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by LDBoblo

I don't consider it an argument at all...I consider it a curiosity. People try to make it an argument from time to time, but without even numbers, there's no foundation for an argument to be made, and even with numbers, it's more just a consolation for authors who complain that the pirates are stealing their customers away and killing their profits.

I'm just curious what the numbers are, no need to read into it.

Understand. And I agree that the numbers would be interesting, but I really don't see how they could be determined in a reasonably accurate manner.