Why Your e-Books Are No Longer Yours

Predictions Market sends us to Gizmodo for an interesting take on the question: when you "buy" "content" for Amazon's Kindle or the Sony Reader, are you buying a crippled license to intellectual property when you download, or are you buying a book? If the latter, then the first sale doctrine, which lets you hawk your old Harry Potter hardcovers on eBay, would apply. Some law students at Columbia took a swing at the question and Gizmodo reprints the "surprisingly readable" legal summary. Short answer: those restrictive licenses may very well be legal, and even if you had rights under the first sale doctrine, you might only be able to resell or give away your Kindle — not a copy of the work.

Comments

I got a better lawyer

[gnutoo]

I think I'll stick with Lessig's opinions and the surprisingly readable US Constitution.

How to sell your copy of Hary Potter only touches on the madness of paper based copyright applied to digital files. If these books are no longer mine, they are no longer the library's either. Do we really want a future where anyone and everyone can be cut off of knowledge at the flip of a switch? Where "owners" must be trusted with the raw material of history? No.

The answer to all this is very simple. The lower cost of publishing should bring lower protections and fewer created rights because fewer incentives are required. Advertising costs have not declined, so it is easier to recoup publishing investments now than ever. Worse for high cost, established publishers technology makes old laws contradictory and insane. Publishers want to make "unwet water" and outlaw the normal stuff by dominating the channels of distribution - the no real library future. We should allow people to make exact copies of almost all works and distribute them freely. It's really that easy and companies that can't live with that kind of freedom should look for a new line of honest work.

Re:I got a better lawyer

[Oligonicella]

"I think I'll stick with Lessig's opinions and the surprisingly readable US Constitution."

The surprisingly readable clause:
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.

"The lower cost of publishing should bring lower protections and fewer created rights because fewer incentives are required."
"We should allow people to make exact copies of almost all works and distribute them freely."

It doesn't at all sound like the copyright clause of the Constitution. You might reread that clause and notice the word exclusive.

Re:I got a better lawyer^Widea

[tomhudson]

Embed advertising in ebooks, the same as in magazines and newspapers, and give the ebooks away.

Advantages

1. "Content is king" - it'll be seen
2. Targeted market
3. Reflects the lower cost of production/distribution
4. Easier to disintermediate - greater portion of the revenue ends up in the authors' pocket/purse/wallet/bank account

Caveat Emptor

[justsomecomputerguy]

It bears repeating: The RIAA, The MPAA and all the other sue-the-customer organizations really really do want to make so that eventually you the consumer have NO RIGHTS, zip, zero, nadda to own anything.

Making everyone pay a fee each and every time they want to listen to or read or view something is their eventual goal.

You will own NOTHING.

You will have NO RIGHTS to view ANYTHING unless you pay their fees.

That IS the eventual goal.

Figure out how to tell this to non-librarians, non-techies

Re:Caveat Emptor

[The End Of Days]

What I find most interesting about the argument over copyright is how it boils down to two groups justifying why their greed is more meaningful and important.

Fine idea.

[gnutoo]

That sounds like a great way to do things and I'm sure there are many, many others.

What I'm interested in is preserving our rights. Publishers can think of ways to make money without robbing us of the ability to help our neighbor and without assuming draconian control of information. For them to violate our rights, we must agree to be threatened and prosecuted for doing things that are not crimes. It is better to keep them from making laws that threaten us than it is to try to do their job for them.

Publishers already know how things will work in a free society. They are not stupid and this is why they fight so hard. They understand that the broadcast era is over and with it their ability to control opinion and profit from every aspect of popular culture. There will be profits but they will be distributed and much closer to the artist than they are now. The big record companies, movie companies and paper publishers are out of luck and the damage done to public institutions will follow. With freedom comes truth and from truth we can expect justice. Without freedom, expect great injustice.

Re:Fine idea.

[peterarm]

I call bullshit: I have self-published a PDF-only book on Lulu, and I made $16 per copy. This book is currently for sale with a real publisher, and I would miss the PDF royalties *very* much if they evaporated. (My book is copied on BitTorrent, and there's nothing I can do about it.)

Authors are real people with families and mortgages; this isn't just some juvenile "you vs. the **AA" thing -- that may be true to a degree for records or movies where the **AA is evil, but it's not true for books. Many publishers are decent individuals, and authors aren't exactly millionaires...

Re:Fine idea.

[The Spoonman]

And they have no authority to determine how I execute mine. I want my books in a digital format so I can read them on my laptop, my PDA, my computer at work, my e-book reader...whatever. If you want to reduce my rights just to read your book, well, sorry I ain't going to buy it and you lose a sale. Only a fool would continue to release their art using "the old ways". I've purchased quite a bit of music and literature that I started out by downloading copies the author published for free on their site. I've then either donated or purchased a print copy, if it was good. If it wasn't, I didn't waste my money. These authors typically sell more copies of their books than those who go through traditional channels, indicating the marketplace is heading in that direction. It's the marketplace that decides how products are sold, not the content producers. We just want to pay them to share in their ideas, why is that a bad thing? Yes, some people are going to take advantage of the situation and never pay for everything. Boo-hooo. When I was a waiter I learned early: some people are never going to tip, but at the end of the night, my average per table was what was most important. With a little bit of work, you can download pretty much any book on the market today, yet books are still being sold everyday. Wonder why that is?

Re:Fine idea.

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, but you're completely wrong.

First of all, the only reason there is a market for the author to distribute his works is because of the artificial construct we have created in copyright. Without copyright, an author has basically two choices: sell it once or hide it. With copyright the author has two different choices: sell it lots of times according to the collective rules of society or hide it. That's basically it. Anything else (e.g. giving it away) is just a variation of those two choices.

Second, while the author is completely free within this system to do whatever the hell he or she wants, the reality is that if what he or she wants is to make money, then the market, not the artist, ultimately decides how the work is to be distributed. The only reason the market is not having its say right now is due to oligarchies such as the RIAA or because the market is relatively new (i.e. the ebooks market).

That desire is only driven by the cheapness of not wanting to pay for something you desire.

Your ad hominem argument is driven by your inability to think about and discuss the issue rationally.

Re:Fine idea.

[wall0159]

Yeah. Unfortunately, most people base their actions on selfishness, and try to justify them later by moralising...

While it makes sense to revise some of the ideas of copyright for internet distribution - I don't think it makes sense to advocate the wholesale destruction of 'Intellectual property' as a concept. I don't believe that cheapskates and freeloaders should define public policy.

While I have shared original music on Jamendo (for example), I also know that my day-job is dependent on the fact that I am creating value for my company by creating new ideas and writing software. These are not tangible, and in the absence of IP protection would be nearly valueless (in a monetary sense, to the company - I realise they would likely have some value to society as a whole. But then, isn't that the point of copyright - to reward those that contribute to society, and hence hopefully encourage more to contribute. If there were no IP laws, my company would likely not exist)

Re:Fine idea.

[toriver]

The point is that the anti-consumer industries - that is, the industries trying to restrict more and more what someone who bought their products can do with them - forget that copyright is a government-granted monopoly and not a "natural right". Copyright stems from back in the day when "work" was stuff like smithing and tilling fields. Sitting around on your ass writing books or painting did not put food or tools into the community. But the lawmakers saw that cultural products had intrinsic value, and thus created an incentive for creators to make a living from their art but also ensured that those works would eventually enter the public domain and become part of the shared culture.

Then we got the industry (where "art" is replaced by "product") and the lobbyists (who fight to keep works out of the public domain) and now "the artists" have been superseded by organizations that cry their crocodile tears over the plight of the artist, while in reality representing soulless commercial entities who provide crappy contracts unless you are very smart or very famous and can dictate your own terms.

You are right that we "do not get to determine how someone else distributes their work" - but Congress (in the case of USA) does.

Re:Fine idea.

[cpt kangarooski]

Yeah. Unfortunately, most people base their actions on selfishness, and try to justify them later by moralising...

While it makes sense to revise some of the ideas of copyright for internet distribution - I don't think it makes sense to advocate the wholesale destruction of 'Intellectual property' as a concept. I don't believe that cheapskates and freeloaders should define public policy. ... But then, isn't that the point of copyright - to reward those that contribute to society, and hence hopefully encourage more to contribute.

Sadly, you sound selfish to me. But don't get me wrong; that's perfectly fine.

Copyright is based on selfishness. The public is greedy; it doesn't care about authors for their own sake, it only cares about having more works created and published, and having those works for free, sans any kind of restriction or protection, so that it can do what it pleases with them. Copyright is simply a policy to try to satisfy that greed, by stimulating creation and publication, with as few restrictions as possible, for as little time as possible. If the benefit to the public of the stimulus is outweighed by the harm to the public of the restriction, it isn't in the public interest.

There's no intent to reward authors at all. The idea is to exploit their selfishness so that they'll do things -- create and publish works -- that are in the public interest. Copyright is no reward; it's a bribe. And it's not meant to be a generous bribe. If an author would create and publish a work in exchange for a 5 year copyright, it would be idiotic to offer him a 6 year copyright; it'd be idiotic, even if the author would prefer it.

So basically, we have a system that is geared around public selfishness, but with a recognition of the fact that immediate gratification might be quite weak, and that a delay can produce vastly greater results (like allowing cattle to mature, be milked, reproduce, and then be eaten, instead of having lots of veal but causing cows to go extinct). It functions by exploiting the selfishness of authors, who in some cases will not create and publish works without a bribe. (Those that would create and publish anyway don't deserve to be bribed, obviously)

Selfishness is the very heart of copyright. It's a system that works best -- for the public, I don't care about authors -- when cheapskates and freeloaders administrate it, since we want to maximize the net public benefit. Generosity would interfere with that.

Your position is understandable as an author; you are selfish, and want to increase what you get, regardless of the effect on the public. You wouldn't respond to copyrights at all if you weren't, so no one is upset with you. It's just important that we ignore you for the most part, and only give you the bare minimum that it will take in order to get you creating.

Re:I got a better lawyer^Widea

[Fael]

What a stup

(PLEASE WAIT FOR AD TO LOAD ...)
(ENLARGE YOUR PEN1S NOW ASK ME HOW)

endously great idea.

Truth in advertising

[LihTox]

What lets companies get away with this is that consumers don't know about it, and stores toss around words like "buy" and "sell" when the more appropriate term might be "(indefinite) lease". Let's pass a law forbidding e-book sellers from saying in their advertising "Buy this e-book!" or "We have e-books for sale!"; if they are forced to say "Buy a license for this e-book!" or "Lease this e-book!" and consumers will get the idea that something is up, and become informed.

Ditto for DVDs, music, software, or anything else where the manufacturer claims to be selling licenses.

Mod Parent Up and REJECT BOOK ADVERTIZING!!!

[RobBebop]

Actually, don't mod parent up because he was an Anonymous Coward, but as an aspiring author I would say that anybody seeking to use their writing to shill for advertisers does not deserve to be read.

I am in support of the business model where readers can experience an author's work from a free digital download... and then vote with their pocketbook by making a "donation" if they think what they "experienced" was worth it.

That is --- "read now, pay later". I think the days of "pay now, read later" are numbered.

Then again, I am continually refining my manuscript so that it will be readable for a mass audience. As is, the compliments I get are that the "story" is awesome but the actually story-telling is lacking (which I am, of course, working on).

Re:I got a better lawyer^Widea

[WNight]

You've got the right to hit mute, even if ads are how the publishers make their money in the long run.

Turn it back on and clear the block list. Then block only annoying ads.

They'll be able to see viewing statistics for the ads and they should realize that some users are blocking some of the ads. Blocking the real garbage keeps from rewarding the jerks, and gives the people who play nice a better chance. If they investigate they might find that giant pulsing banners aren't popular...