tl:dr

[lagilman]

To all the pirate and pseudo-pirate sites out there who post "not our fault if someone uploads files they don't have a legal right to upload?" While I appreciate the fact that you can't control your users and, by law, you don't have to, when 95% of your material is infringing on a copyright, you're coming across akin to the pimp who swore he didn't know his stable was under-16.... In other words, nobody believes that you don't know, and nobody thinks you're anything other than a pirate, no matter what your alleged justification or rationalization.

And to the people who upload and download those files and think it's all "a victimless crime?" No, it's not. It's you, stealing someone else's work, the same as it would be if you took the book or movie or CD out of the store physically without paying for it. If you're okay with that, fine. You're a thief. But don't try to claim you're not taking money out of my paycheck.

I'd rather a self-aware thief than someone who tries to blame me [or the system] because they're an asshole.


If you can't afford a book? Check out the library. Or hell, e-mail me, and we'll work something out.

If you want the 'fun' of stripping out a book and uploading it illegally? Dudes, it's not impressive when any ten year old can hack it. Go find something a little more challenging.

If you think you're doing fans a favor? Book sales fall because of pirated material, writers get dropped by their publishers and have to find other work -- which means no more books. How is that doing fans a favor?

Comments

[wedschilde.livejournal.com]

no book stripping. dear god.

i will burn CD mixes... and i do encourage people to listen but really mean they should grab the CDs. :::nods:::

because i'll "share" music to expose someone to an artist but oh no, the CDs still have to be purchased.

but hell, doing book stripping or movie torrents and uploading CDs to be used without compensation... no.

[lagilman]

oh yeah. Loan, tease, entice, enable. Go thou with good will! :-)

[wedschilde.livejournal.com]

oh hell yes. enabling is always good. here. have a little taste. temptation is good.

[ex-fashioni.livejournal.com]

My very favorite justification (and I use that term VERY loosely) was the dickhead who freely admitted to illegally downloading books, but it was "okay, because it's always of books I've already bought anyhow."

Um... are you saying that because I buy a trade paperback copy of a book, I'm then perfectly justified in stealing a mass-market copy of the same book because I already spent money? Um...NO.

The individual in question totally didn't get it.

[lagilman]

I actually don't have as much of a problem with that, if they're keeping it for their own use. In a perfect world a story would come in multiple formats from the git-go -- once you paid the use-fee, you could switch from paper to e-format depending on where you were, and pick up where you were reading easily. Ditto movies that could move from your tv to your laptop when you travel, or music that was portable from stereo to portable player to hard drive, without hassle. That's my dream, anyway.

It's the folk who think they shouldn't have to pay at all for their entertainment that annoy me. They don't want advertising, they don't want to pay cash in advance... but they want quality and consistency and they want it delivered in a format that's easy for them to use. Riiiiight.

[filamena.livejournal.com]

I can't understand stealing ebooks, they're so hard to read on the computer. I have to wonder how many of the books they're actually reading, or if they're just collecting them because they like to get away with something. (Still wrong, just makes it even more stupid.)

That said, I'm glad to see you agree that books should come in multiple formats from the get go. Searchable text of a book I love and want to quote or just jump to a section I find delicious is a great thing to have even if I generally can't read the whole thing on my computer.

[neadods.livejournal.com]

In a perfect world a story would come in multiple formats from the git-go

I don't mind buying a book and then the audiobook; I've been doing it for Pratchett's last three books.

What I *do* mind, and what's just happened to me, is buying the same media twice. I've got a legal download of an audiobook from B&N, but I can't burn it off - thus, no car copy. Other companies have tried to spike rips to ipod. Those annoy me. If I'm buying a copy to listen to, it's my choice where or how to listen! (Something similar has been going on with ipod; to get an .mp3 that I legally bought out of the ipod, I'm not allowed to burn it as an mp3.)

[lagilman]

Yep, that was my point. Once you own the story/music/movie, you should be able to access it via any reader. Personlly I'd be willing to pay a slightly higher price to get a combined e- and print book (audio, involving a reader, would be a slightly different story, but like music it should be transferable to any hardware registered to the buyer).

In a perfect world.

[neadods.livejournal.com]

Once you own the story/music/movie, you should be able to access it via any reader.

Heh. My very first job was in a copyright office, and one of the people we worked with was a complete hardass. If you bought vinyl and wanted to listen in the car, you were morally obligated to buy a cassette tape as well.

To go back to the OP, I think that some people see collecting this stuff as keeping score, or getting something over on someone... and utterly missing your last point, which is no cash = no product.

[jslinder.livejournal.com]

I have to admit I download the occasional book, but generally just to see if I like it (especially if its a new author). If I can't get past the first chapter, I delete it.. If I like it, I buy a copy. I used to do the same for music, pre-Itunes, and even Movies...

It's one of the reasons I LOVE Kindle. Sample chapter downloads, legally.

[lagilman]

And that's why most of us try to put sample material up on our websites, and why publishers ok'd the Amazon "look inside the book" offerings, once the 'browse a bookstore' option went virtual for many folk. I can't think of any writer who doesn't think pre-read sampling's fine and fair, and won't enable it as best they can.

[alpha-strike.livejournal.com]

"The lights are growing dim Otto. I know a life of crime has led me to this sorry fate, and yet, I blame society. Society made me what I am."
-- Duke Repo Man

[misofuhni.livejournal.com]

Color me ignorant.

What does tl:dr stand for? Or, tl;dr?

[lagilman]

too long; didn't read

Shorthand for the short-attention span generation, warning them that it's longer than a few sentences. :-)

[egret17.livejournal.com]

Oh oh - sounds like you were the victim of some book stripping? :( Sorry to hear that...

[lagilman]

I suspect there isn't a published author who hasn't been e-pirated, at this point. Dog knows all of my books have been, and the audiobooks as well.

The idea of 'copyright' being an actual established, defensible legal device is abused and overrun by Google; why should we assume that everyday citizens would respect it, and not steal?

*is bitter and cranky and tired of the whole damn thing, especially when she thinks of the estimated losses to an industry that's already hard-hit*

[celticboy.livejournal.com]

The only things I download are ebooks (which I already own and can't buy in ebook format) so I can read them on the way to/from and in work, and TV shows. With TV shows, I watch once then delete if I don't like them, or keep them if I do (until the DVD appears, then I buy that).

I never download movies ( i wait for the DVD or see it in the cinema), books I don't own (I'll get the book from the library, or buy it), music (not much of a fan of music TBH), comics (except for the REALLY out of print stuff where it's not possible to buy a TBP/back issue of it.

Illegal transfers of data would fall away if there was a legal way of providing & obtaining these things for a nominal fee. For example if Fox had a Peer to Peer network accessible after paying (say $50 per year) that you can download episodes of their shows legally) They could eletronically watermark the file so if it escapes into the illegal P2P it's easy to trace the source.

But no, they'd rather try to resist the change that's inevitable.