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Are We About To Enter The Age of Book Piracy?
theodp writes "The speed with which the 4MB e-mail hoax purporting to be the new cookbook from the Naked Chef streaked across the Internet suggests to Slate that a new, disquieting era for the publishing world may be in sight. Indeed, the latest Harry Potter tale made the rounds on the Web just hours after the book went on sale, its 870 pages apparently scanned in and distributed by rabid fans. The old argument that no one likes reading on a computer has pretty much eroded. Just because publishing people can't conceive of book piracy doesn't mean it can't happen."
reading converted fiction ebooks on handhelds is better than reading them on paper.
Lots of advantages like being able to read on the go or in bed with the lights out and than being awoken by the Handheld in the morning...
Not only books, but comics too. Already I've seen complete archives of all X-Men, Spiderman, etc. I think that might actually become a bigger problem, because comics are easy to scan and distribute, and their readers probably fit very well the profile of your typical "downloader".
Belief is the currency of delusion.
Book piracy is too much of a pain in the ass. Plus, people want to own the book and feel it in their hands.
Like someone wants to have a stapled stack of recycled copier paper in a fuzzy inkjet font. Even worse is the suggestion of reading it off the screen. The whole concept is just silly.
In the case of music, I seriously doubt most people get the mp3 and then buy the CD. I would suggest in this case that anyone interested in reading an 870 page book would go out and buy it, or at least borrow it from the library.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
It's copyright infringement, not a bunch of people sailing around with their swords in the air looting the natives and stashing thier booty (ARRGH!)
It's been my observation that sites that distribute pirated books have far, far too many to read -- and many of the books there are obviously scanned through OCR, with no attempt made at legibility. And yet they're still offered.
For most book pirates (and pirates in general, really), it's not about getting books to read for free -- it's all about having the book. To these pirates, if you don't have a bigger collection than everyone else, you're nothin'.
I get all my books from #bw (hi guys!). sure, it's sort of illegal, but you could similarly get it for free from the library, and if I really like the book I buy it anyway.
IMO, more interesting than the fact that book "piracy" happens is the fact that with todays "electronic entertainment systems" people are actually willing to read a book instead of playing repetative action games.
I was under the impression that some of the pdfs were made from the printer's source postscript file or something to that effect. I know a guy who pull D&D manuals off KaZaa that are perfect copies. I think he's the reason that the campus computer labs instituted printer quotas.
It was also remarkably similar in plot, probably due to both authors reading fan discussions on what will happen for the last couple of years.
In the 16th and 17th century actors and stenographers would conspire to rush off unlicenced copies of popular plays. The most famous example of this is the 'Bad Quarto' of Hamlet. This appeared in print several years before the authorised edition, and was based on the memory of two or three of the principal actors, with much filling from other popular works.
In the 19th century the USA was the piracy centre of the English speaking world -- bootleg editions of every popular British work would be printed, with no money getting back to the original British writers. You can read many complaints from English authors of the time about this situation.
Even if we restrict ourselves to illegal distribution through the internet, this is not a new phenomenon. The alt.binaries.ebook newsgroup has been around for many years -- the only thing which has changed is the mass availabilty of scanners which would have cost thousands only ten years ago. So, instead of having to manually type a book to copy it, we can now scan and OCR.
Just as with music distribution, we need to emphasise that there is an incredible amount of *legal* book distribution on the internet. The standard bearer is Project Gutenberg -- creating free electronic copies of out of copyright texts since 1971.
-- Help Digitise the Public Domain at DP.
So instead of Kazaa, Gnutella and Napster, book piracy will be by email? God help us! Just when I'm trying to convince my higher-ups that emailing that graphics-laden instruction manual (10 MB) to everyone in the company is NOT a good idea.
Hey! Maybe then they'll outlaw email and it will give us a chance to revamp SMTP!
But why is the rum gone?
That's the common term for it. You're annoyed at that? Tough. I'm annoyed at people that use cold, clinical words like "infringment" so that it won't sound as bad; the implication being that since they don't agree with the notion of copyright in the first place, they'll try to make piracy sound as harmless as possible.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
Is a very old thing. It has been going on for a very long time.
An illegal translation of Harry Potter was being sold here (Chile). They regularly decommision tens of thousands of books at a time here.
Books suffer the same type of overcharged price fixing as CD's, so most people here can't afford them. Does that mean that the poor are denied the right to read? Libraries are basically non existent here too. Book piracy is not bad in the developed world because of fairly good libraries and greater affluence. One cannot expect a person making 200 bucks a month (or less) to buy a 10 dollar (minimum) book. Pirate copies sell for around 2 bucks. An affordable price. Your 10 dollar paperback could still make decent profit if sold for 3 bucks.
Piracy against the RIAA is still ilegal, but considering the way that the RIAA screws everyone (the artists included), it's understandable.
Piract against the Movie Industry is again ilegal but it can be rationalized when you consider some of the dodgy things they want to try and pull against the consumers.
Piracy against the book publishing firms makes no damn sense. They don't screw the customers, price increases for books have been very slight and can be explained by the normal rate of inflation (my personal average is $1.50 over the past 10 years) and if you really want to read the book for free there is a *legal* way to do it. Just go to the local library and check it out
There is no "robin hood" rationalization for this, there is no way to justify it, this is just a bunch of cheap fuckers who can't be bothered to fork over $18 on Amazon.com for a pre-order.
In my opinion it's *now* a case of the consumers (the ones sharing the books on the web) screwing the authors. Remember, JK Rowling was a starving single mother when she wrote HP:ATSS...Think about *that* when HP #6 comes out
-- Wiccan Army, 13th Airborne Division "We will not fly silently into the night"
Hopefully, "book piracy" won't suddenly catch on. I suspect it will slowly rise, but a sharp increase will only prompt publishers to have a knee-jerk reaction and jump towards some kind of lock-down attempt. A slow increase will give publishers time to think about the most sensible way of altering their business model in the face of copyright infringement. Some have found that giving away electronic copies is profitable.
Print all the books in X11 fonts. Those font suck so bad that my OCR program segfaulted when trying to read in a chapter.
Although my method involves going to the local public library and signing them out.
is the official reason the Harry Potter phenomenon is labelled A Good Thing.
The other reason is that it also encourages adults to read. I've got few objections to literature being pirated on the internet, and although they wouldn't admit it in public, I'd imagine the books authors don't object much either. If you really love a book, you'll want a hard copy.
It makes a change from all the "How To Drive a Woman Wild in 30 Seconds.pdf" crap circulating on Kazaa anyway.
Would you object to your kids downloading Shakespeare's sonnets from th'Internet?
Then what's wrong with downloading modern literature from a personal development point of view?
"It's not your information. It's information about you" - John Ford, Vice President, Equifax
I love books. Always have. I can hang out in a bookstore all day long. I love the smell of them (even the musty smell of older books), the feel of good books in my hand. When you find a book with really nice paper and binding, you've found a treasure. This even goes for paperbacks.
There is no substitute for holding that book in your hands, and having the pleasure of turning the pages. It's slow, perhaps (unless you're one of those heathen speedreaders; reading was meant to be enjoyed), but it's a satisfying expirience.
As much as I love computers and all things gadget-like, no electronic contraption with a small sreen will ever replace my books. And having a personal library is just plain damn cool.
Life is hard, and the world is cruel
the main reason books on computer suck is because of the way computers are set up by default. when most people think of books on computer, they dont immediately think of putting a book on a PDA. also, it kinda strains the eyes after looking at the screen so much, because of the default colors. change the colors to white text on black background, and youll feel much better after a night of reading when you should be sleeping. which would be an advantage for computers, as you dont need an external light source for that. of course, there was an older slashdot sotry about electronic paper. looks just like regular paper, but when you send an electrical signal to it, it prints a new image on the paper. the image stays for something like 10 years when the power is taken away, but a new signal will re-write on the paper. i imagine ebook piracy will become a bigger problem once they start making ebooks out of those.
Books don't ALL cost 20 bucks (in fact much much less normally) and there isn't just one page that is good.
Baen has make a point of releasing its books free online. Their reasoning includes such as this "Losses any author suffers from piracy are almost certainly offset by the additional publicity which, in practice, any kind of free copies of a book usually engender. Whatever the moral difference, which certainly exists, the practical effect of online piracy is no different from that of any existing method by which readers may obtain books for free or at reduced cost: public libraries, friends borrowing and loaning each other books, used book stores, promotional copies, etc." and they note that "After all, Dave Weber's On Basilisk Station has been available for free as a "loss leader" for Baen's for-pay experiment "Webscriptions" for months now. And -- hey, whaddaya know? -- over that time it's become Baen's most popular backlist title in paper!"
Bad Panda! No Bamboo for you! In matters of importance ACs will not be responded to. Want to say something critical,OK
Freely adapted from the parent post.
I own the Harry Potter book but I read the whole thing on my laptop.
I like to read in bed and I found the 766 behemoth unwieldy (or I would if I tried it, I've found shorter books unwieldy).
With my laptop I just stuck it on my bedside table, turned down the brightness, chose acceptable font and background colours in Acrobat, flipped the page 90 degrees and went full screen.
A pleasant reading experience in a comfortable position with no book to support and reposition with every page turn.
My only fear was that some joker might edit the book and interject with a spoiler part way through. With a song if a track is spoiled you can chuck it and still enjoy the track from other sources. If you get a book from an untrusted source and it spoils it then it could ruin your enjoyment of the book completely.
Boffoonery - downloadable Comedy Benefit for Bletchley Park
And if you agree with copyright, that's exactly how you should call it.
Unless you want to be a dope promoting the big publisher's propaganda.
Once again, the FSF tells it as it is...
Why did man make libraries?
To store all his information.
Why will man not share his information?
To hold power over other men.
God spoke to me
In less regulated markets, such as those that seem to exist in the east, and in places where large sums of money are not readily available, it is often easier to violate the copyright than purchase the book under 'proper' license. In some cases, it would be nearly impossible for an average person to purchase the book under proper license because the publisher chooses not to create an affordable edition. Of course, it is no more the responsibility of the publisher to create an affordable edition that it is for the consumer to pay the publisher.
So, why are publishers now worried about copyright infringement of books. The same reason music publishers are worried. The publishers are becoming less efficient at publishing books, and therefore are charging more. At the same time is it cost much less to print out your own copy, and nearly nothing to read it on the screen. Add to this that the days of the dirt cheap paperback are long gone, and you have a situation where people will choose not to buy.
The sad thing is that instead of using free market tactics like coming up with innovative ideas to add value to hardback editions, or releasing quickly cheap paperbacks, they use state controlled market tactics like heavy regulation and government enforcement. Even the idea of creating a subsciber service in which electronic editions can be downloaded for a fixed monthly fee seem to inexistant, even though such a scheme would generate cashflow with the expense of paper publishing.
I was just reading a article in Fortune on how name brand manufacturers have become so massively inefficient that they can no longer compete with the store private label quality or price. The major brands also have lost the power to force the retail stores to carry their over priced low quality products, so these brands are losing market share. I think it is the same in publishing, and the majors probably need to be more worried about Barnes and Noble than individual book sharers(and, of course, unless they steal the books off a boat on the high seas, it is not piracy).
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
It's just not popular, coz...as a society we don't read nearly as much as we watch movies or play games.
But believe me, any book you'd want is available in text format and pdf.
I mean, seriously, a insane number of classics are already available legally from Project Gutenberg - how many people use that regularly?
There's just not as much prestige in releasing a pirated book, when the most highly anticipated movies can make a group famous.
That's just my 2 cents.
First off, I agree that it is Piracy and is wrong. But the effects may not be what you would first expect. Baen books has an experiment with their Free Library, www.baen.com/library where they are giving away some of their books and watching the results on sales.
They are finding that sales actually go up on the author's other books! Having freely available books gives readers an introduction to authors they may have never picked up before, they tend to buy other books written by the same author. According to Baen the life-cycle of your typical book really isn't that long.
This isn't to justify book piracy, but just as we have seen in the Music industry we may be dealing with a bit of exaggeration on the part of the publishers (and on the part of some authors who seem to have gone a bit rabid on the subject).
Brian
Remember Lexington Green!
"Piracy" has been fed into common usage via the media by the FUD-slinging industries that want to disguise their real motives for inhibiting legal media distribution. You're not annoyed at that?
I'm annoyed at people that use overblown, emotional words like "piracy" so that it will sound of life-or-death importance; the implication being that most people can be mind controlled to agree with their notion of copyright infringement - they'll try to make it sound as harmful as possible.
- Brian
Sure - if it's as simple as finding info about Euclid's algorithm.
:/
If I want to find all texts about LTP in the amygdala, however, flipping through a dozen books and a few hundred papers just isn't the same as a quick "grep". If I want to find the source of a half-remembered quotation, I'd have to spend days to find where I read it - or spend half my reading time filling in index cards and keeping them sorted, which is what people had to do before their texts were searchable. If you want to do that, you are welcome to.
Laptop: I do have the books in paper format as well. And the size of the laptop compared to books is a non-issue; it's not laptops OR books, it's laptop, or laptop AND books.
Oh, and for all the convenience of generating vaiorus formats, you _still_ occasionally bump into PDF:s that are simply scanned pages, or where you can't extract the text for some other reason.
BTW, the title turned out wrong - Phoenix autocompleted it without me noticing it...
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
I get books from the library. I do own a few books that I routinely reference, but for most of my reading, I go the route that means I dont have to pay.
Why would book piracy put publishers in a great deal more trouble than libraries? Someone still has to buy the books. Likely there are several groups of book piraters, I am sure they all buy their own copies.
Oh, and I dont like reading on a computer. Maybe my CRT just sucks.
I am a viral sig. Please copy me and help me spread. Thank you.
The problem here is that many authors are in similar situations to recording artists, in that they are only seeing a slim percentage of the profits from their labors. The amount of books pushed out is very slim in comparison to the number of CDs sold, and unless you become the next great genre fiction writer (like TOm Clancy, or John Grisham or whatever your fancy is) then you're pretty much out of luck as far as the big millions come.
Put it on top that in the publishing industry books can be returned to the publisher, so the publisher can withold royalties to the author for the longest time stating that they are making sure that the books are not returned en masse causing a massive hit to the house. All the while, the publishing house is building up interest on the royalty payment that was supposed to go to the author.
I seee e-books as a positive solution for the industry; the middlemen are for the most part cut out, and the prospect of returning books is non-existent (after all there are no actual books, only large text files). Now the publisher has no excuse but to pay the author the money owed. Of course, I hate the way e-books work. Recently I read David Copperfield online (as it is easily availible having puhed far beyond copyright date, and even the Penguin Classics are up around ten bucks). I found myself printing out the pages most of the time, so I could carry them around and read them while lying in bed, lying on a couch, and lying in the tub. I suppose I should get an e-book reader, but it still precludes reading in the bath. [This segment brought to you by the commitern for Too Much Information]
I don't really know how long it took Jim Dale to get 23+ hours of Harry Potter laid down on tape, but it must have been months of work. I have no objection to seeing him get paid for that (and since the CDs are available for under $50, only a few bucks per CD, it seems quite reasonable compared to music.)
Other recorded books are, of course, much more expensive. Overall I've found that Order of the Phoenix could have been priced much higher than they did based on demand, in any format. I assume this is an economic decision rather than a friendly one, but I know that it enabled married friends of mine to purchase two copies rather than one so neither had to wait.
Now, that's just to point out that this is more than just a "golden voice"; it's a major effort by an actor with rare talent. If you want to put together an Internet project to read books aloud, I think that would be noble and interesting. For out-of-print books, you might check out AudioBooksForFree. Just don't be too disappointed when your efforts don't sound nearly as good as the professional ones, and take more work than you expect.
For copyrighted works, well, the publishers wouldn't be happy if you're competing with their efforts, especially if they have their own recordings. But I'd press you to think about the value of new books versus old; if you'd rather record a new, copyrighted book than an old one, maybe you'll see why that book has value to the one who paid to publish it.
Disclaimer (too late): I am an actor and do recorded readings (and am unbelievably jealous of a voice like Jim Dale's).
Well, I can see two sides of this argument.
If I'm going on holiday, then a book bought at the airport bookshop is far more convenient than a PDA. I'll still be able to read it on the flight and take it with me to the hotel swimming pool/beach. With a PDA or laptop, I probably won't be able to use it on the plane, while at the beach I'd be too concerned about it being stolen, buried in the sand, soaked by rain/drinks/the large guy jumping into the swimming pool/the little kids splashing about learning to swim, to really feel relaxed. Having any of these things happen to a $10 book is an acceptable risk. Similarly, when attending a conference I'd prefer to have a hardcopy of the paper than the author is presenting. If a cheap CD-ROM reader/LCD display with long-lasting life came along, then I would change my mind and say E-books would be a good idea.
If I'm learning technical stuff at home or in the office, then saving as much space as possible is definitely a good thing. I'd prefer not to have to lumber a large book back and forth between office and home. If I need the information from a book, then I can either buy it brand new, second-hand, or borrow it from the library, copy the relevant pages and then sell or return it. Photocopying has the disadvantage of creating as much paper as was copied. Scanning the book electronically allows me to create my own virtual bookshelf, and make backups onto CD-ROM whenever required. Having the all the relevant chapters on a single CD-ROM is no bad thing. I would consider buying a technical book electronically, if it were possible.
My preferences are based entirely on how much space is available, and how safe the surroundings are.
There are some differences btw book trading on Usenet and music file on kazaa: usenet newsgroups have already been accorded common carrier status (like the telephone companies). Just as you cannot sue the telco's if thieves rob you while using the phone to plan the robbery, likewise ISPs are not liable for books stored on their news servers. This case law came down years ago before Massa realized his intellectual property was in such danger from the Net, otherwise the proper case law would have been duly purchased, as it has been against the web file traders.
Also, books can be placed in quite small files, making usenet trading easier than web file trading.
Also, has anyone noticed that this particular thread of slashdot is much slower than the other threads today?
eat shiat and bark at the moon
you could similarly get it for free from the library
I have read this argument as a justification, and I don't like it. Quite apart from the technical difference (the library only has one copy of each book, and you can only use it for a limited time), if you download rather than going to the library, you will push the library's use rates down. Politicians will take that as evidence that nobody uses the library, and cut the library's funding.
Now, the ideal solution would be an all-digital library, but publishers will not agree to that anytime soon. Besides, with libraries, everybody wins -- people who don't own computers can read the book, and authors get paid (I remember an interview in which an author said that if every library in the US bought his book, it would be a best-seller).
So, for pragmatic reasons (not to mention the idea of actually going outside!! and meeting real humans!!), support your local library -- don't use it as an excuse to download books.
Toronto-area transit rider? Rate your ride.
About a year ago I started downloading books to my Handspring and carrying them around with me. It took a few days to get used to the constant scrolling, but once you get past that you've got a small device which you always have with you that you can read from at a moment's notice. No more sitting around on the train doing nothing... I just pop out the Handspring and I'm reading Harry Potter V, or Michael Chricton's Prey, or Ender's Game or older books like Fahrenheit 451 or Brave New World or 1984. They're all available online and the list is growing. Publishing is in for the same thing the music world is already fighting... as soon as people become accustomed to reading digital books the industry is in trouble.
--
RumorsDaily
I myself downloaded a copy of 'arry's latest adventure. It was good. I actually finished the entire thing before the hard copy that I ordered online showed up on my doorstep. I've reread the entire "Myth" series in the past month or two. (Nevermind the fact that I actually OWN the damned things but can't find three of the books.)
I've said it before and I'll say it again. Book piracy is no big deal.
Anybody who has the patience to read a book on their computer REALLY REALLY wants the book that they're reading. So much so, that they tend to either already own the book, but have lost it, left it at home and they're somewhere else, or something of that nature.
Piracy of textbooks and, say, RPG manuals is another story, however. I think most people who acquire that stuff might actually have purchased the real deal, but because they don't want to shell out for a reference manual, as they already have it, they won't go out and buy the real thing.
Book piracy may have a negative impact on sales, however. I think that would-be book pirates should be aware of that and restrict themselves to downloading books they already own or would immediately purchase if they saw it on a shelf, and then order it immediately online before making a real dent in the sucker, BEFORE deciding if it's worth finishing.
Why?
I had the pleasure of meeting Joe Haldeman a couple years ago, and he explained the financial facts about writing.
It's important to remember that most authors are in pretty bad financial shape - they don't make a whole lot on a book, or for that matter for shorts and articles. "Bridget Jone's Diary" and it's like are the exception, not the rule. Science fiction and fantasy - minus JK Rowling and a very small set of other lucky ducks - are probably the worst paying genres.
So if you're planning on purchasing a book but find yourself downloading the book instead, whether or not it turns out the book is your style, buy it anyhow, unless you're that guy who sits for 3 hours in the bookstore trying to determine if the book is worth buying.
Counter as you will, people.
Its more than that. You move the book around your head. With a computer, you move your head around the book. That requires considerably more energy. Reading is a relaxing activity, in which typically one shifts his body into various confortable positions about every 5-10 minutes.
With a computer, you can not move at all. That makes it not relaxing, but stressful.
If this is going to be a serious problem, then it would already be one. The technology to "pirate" books via the internet has been around 10 or more years now, and reading extensive texts on a terminal hasn't really improved to the point that people would be willing to read "Anna Kerennina" or "Gavity's Rainbow" on a screen. Web pads and tablet PCs are unlikely to change that as long as bound paper is still available.
My guess is that someone in the industry (think big, DRM friendly software vendor) has come up with a solution to sell, and is now looking to create a problem. The "Harry Potter" leak has all of the earmarks of a media stunt engineered to prevent the inevitable downswing of popularity that the trendy serial will (and already has) expirienced.
Alarmist Crap.
Keep your DRM, thank you.
And no, SMTP works just fine for me, thank you. If you think you have something better, then release it and see if anyone switches.
Read, L
Closer to our own time, Taiwan did not sign the international copyright convention until late in the 1970s. Up to then, Taiwanese publishers routinely ripped off popular books and sold their editions for a fraction of the what the legal editions cost.
My point is that book piracy is nothing new.
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I think that somebody has a problem, if it takes them 30 minutes to read a comic.
I finish the Sunday Non Sequitor in just under 18 minutes. If it takes someone thirty minutes, they need to switch to an easier one. Maybe Ziggy would be a better start. That one only takes me 5.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
The problem of book scanning and illegal distribution has been stated and debated by thousands of people, but so far nobody's come up with any _workable_ solutions. That's because there aren't any workable solutions other than the same one that applies to just about anything else; make piracy more effort than it's worth. NOT 'trouble'. 'Effort', as in 'Work'. Who's going to scan 870 pages if you can buy a professionally produced ebook version for $10 or less? Only some pathetic geek without a discernable life or income. Who's going to actively search for pirated copies of such an ebook? The same kinds of people who'd scan 870 pages instead of spending ten bucks. People to whom ten bucks is worth more than a few hours of their lives. The results of busting pirates and taking them to court won't cover the costs of tracking them down, and you'll never get 'em all that way. BUT... the point is moot, because a reasonably-priced solution can't happen for such things as first-run movies, new music, and Harry Potter books. Current high-end publishing and marketing industries aren't designed for flexibility or innovation; they're designed to milk the public for maximum-possible bucks for a product and to control all possible methods of acquiring a product. They won't die off; they'll just adapt into other industries. It's unlikely that the net will disappear, so publishing and distribution methods (and policies) WILL have to change. We should be discussing how to make those changes happen as quickly and painlessly as possible WITHOUT altogether removing the incentives for publishing. No profit = No New Stuff. The HP and other books, music, and movies now being pirated were first _published_ by some company. That leads us back to "more effort than it's worth", because when publishing no longer turns a profit, publishers will seek other - uncopyable - products. Ed Howdershelt - Abintra Press Science Fiction and Semi-Fiction http://abintrapress.tripod.com
It's amazing to flip through the project Gutenburg list of books. Pretty much any English (and increasingly other languages) classic is available. Completely free because copyrights have long since expired, and legal. Who really wants to pirate "pop fiction" anyway?
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
Gilad.