Ebook Pirates Are Relatively Old and Wealthy, Study Finds (torrentfreak.com)

A new study has found that people who illegally download ebooks are older and wealthier than most people's perception of the average pirate. From a report on TorrentFreak: Commissioned by anti-piracy company Digimarc, the study suggests that people aged between 30 and 44 years old with a household income of between $60k and $99k are most likely to grab a book without paying for it. [...] In previous studies, it has been younger downloaders that have grabbed much of the attention, and this one is no different. Digimarc reveals that 41 percent of all adult pirates are aged between 18 and 29 but perhaps surprisingly, 47 percent fall into the 30 to 44-year-old bracket. At this point, things tail off very quickly, as the remaining 13 percent are aged 45 or up.

Comments

No mystery here

[Anonymous Coward]

Younger people pirate video games and DC Universe movies.

Re:No mystery here

[Altus]

DC Universe movies.

I certainly couldn't imagine paying to watch them.

Re:No mystery here

[jwhyche]

That is the new form of copy protection. Just make it so bad that nobody would want to copy it.

Re:No mystery here

[Anonymous Coward]

I could show you my >$10000 physical music collection.

No DRM, nice objects to own. But can you explain how do I steal bits?

captcha: replicas

Re:No mystery here

[Crashmarik]

More like you don't get wealthy by wasting money you don't have to.

Re: No mystery here

[Anonymous Coward]

The DRM part for me is the important point: I'll buy bluray, books, music but I'll never buy any adobe DRM eBook. It's privacy intrusive and they don't even have a Linux client.

age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[xxxJonBoyxxx]

Welcome to the third world.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[the_skywise]

I've somehow woken up in the universe of Logan's Run!

LastDay anyone? :)

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

There is no Renewal!

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, but seriously that must be a dual income household. Those are some big bucks.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Nidi62]

I'm just glad to see I'm considered wealthy by someone's metric. It is tempered, however, with the sadness that I am also now considered "old". (I'm 30 and make about 60k)

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[CrimsonAvenger]

"-er"

Do note that "er" on the end. It's important. "Older" is NOT the same as "old". My youngest is older than my dog, for instance. And wealthier too. Of course, that's not saying much, since the dog has no money, and is only two...

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, the subject did say "relatively", so yes, old and wealthy relative to the third world would be accurate. That's the problem with relative terms, though. Rarely do they say what it is relative to.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[fred6666]

The key word is "relatively". 30 to 44 is indeed older than we could have expected.

Also $60K puts you in the global 0.19% according to http://www.globalrichlist.com/
It's definitely rich on a world-wide scale, and no, you don't need to compare only the third world. Even in developed countries that must easily be in the top 20%.
But hey, it's easier to complain when you think you are poor.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

Welcome to the third world.

Or Detroit.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

The median household income in the USA in 2015 was $55,775. For the purposes of this kind of discussion, "wealthy" means "above average income", not "rich". While it would be interesting to know the pirating habits of the 1%, they are effectively irrelevant when it comes to assessing what the population in general is doing.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyone thinks they are poor. Trump thinks he's poor, no matter how much he likes to brag about how rich he is.

Which is why he so desperately needs all those upper-income tax cuts he's pushing for.

Well, OK. Bill Gates probably doesn't think he's poor. But he's retired. Larry Ellison, on the other hand...

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Mashiki]

The median range where I live is around $38k/year(poverty wage is $19k/year). The average wage across Canada around $49k/year and $52k/year in the US. So yes, $60k/year is wealthy. Now maybe if you live somewhere, where rent for 550sqft is $2000/mo and you're paying $15/lbs for kale, yeah $60k isn't going to reach very far. In my neck of the woods, you could not only live comfortably on $60k but live a lifestyle beyond the scope of your neighbors in the average middle class neighborhood. And to be realistic, at $38k/year most people in this area are barely making ends meet because wages aren't tied to inflation, but the basic costs for fuel, food, and so on have gone through the roof in the last 5 years.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[alexgieg]

Welcome to the third world.

Actual third world here. 40 years old and $18k income. I usually purchase ebooks when they're reasonably priced, meaning about $10 or less. When they cost $150 (or $39 for an article) because they're Harvard-library-priced, yeah, I pirate it. Also: when there's no ebook version (I love the underground movement that scans old out-of-print books); or when there is but it isn't sold to my region for some reason; or when it's priced higher for my region.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Enigma2175]

You don't become a billionaire if you can even consider the concept of "enough money". Of course billionaires always want more, or they wouldn't be billionaires.

Homer: "You know, Mr. Burns, you're the richest guy I know. Way richer than Lenny."
Mr. Burns: "Oh, yes. But I'd trade it all for a little more."

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

The key word is "relatively". 30 to 44 is indeed older than we could have expected.

What are those expectations based on? That age range corresponds to people who would have been in college between the start of the World Wide Web and the launch of Facebook (after being raised in an era of piracy via cassette tapes, VHS tapes, and floppy disks). That's the era that gave us Napster and practically brought piracy mainstream. If I had to guess what age range was pirating the most, that would be it. I'm actually surprised that the percentage is so low.

Also $60K puts you in the global 0.19% according to http://www.globalrichlist.com/
It's definitely rich on a world-wide scale, and no, you don't need to compare only the third world.

And having a penny would make me the richest person on Mars. A subsistence farmer with little or no income could have a better quality of life than someone making $60,000 per year in San Francisco. Having more money means squat if the cost of living is higher; location matters.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[liquid_schwartz]

Also $60K puts you in the global 0.19% according to http://www.globalrichlist.com/ It's definitely rich on a world-wide scale, and no, you don't need to compare only the third world. Even in developed countries that must easily be in the top 20%. But hey, it's easier to complain when you think you are poor.

I always think that anyone who resorts to saying that you're rich relative to Haiti and such is a tool of the 1%. Hey no worries that the middle class is dropping like a rock and the American dream of owning a house is slipping away, quit complaining because relative to Haiti you're actually quite rich.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[fred6666]

Except I am not talking about Haiti and such but the world average. And I even said you could compare to the average of developed countries.

With $60k+, we are part of the rich, like it or not. The 1% is not people with private jets and huge mansions. That's the 0.0001%, and I am probably forgetting some 0's. The 1% is us, people with good jobs in developed countries.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[fred6666]

What are those expectations based on?

We expect young people with less money to pirate more. Some slashdotters said young people no longer read books, that may be an explanation.

And having a penny would make me the richest person on Mars. A subsistence farmer with little or no income could have a better quality of life than someone making $60,000 per year in San Francisco. Having more money means squat if the cost of living is higher; location matters.

Put it the way you want, I don't think a lot of people earning $60k in San Francisco are looking to move to Congo to do subsistence farming. I'm sure a lot of subsistence farmers from Congo would be glad to be allowed to move to San Francisco, a $60k job would only be a bonus. You may not know Congo very well but I'll give you a hint: the subsistence farmer doesn't complain about his cell phone data cap or the taste of his starbuck.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[nedlohs]

30-44 is also the age of the people who were in school (and just out of school) when file sharing took off in the mainstream (napster was 17 years ago...).

They would be the group I would expect to be the biggest "pirates" - they're the group who got the internet as a free download anything you want wild west. Younger people got the app store style pay a few dollars experience instead.

Of course, 14 years is far too big an age range given the domain is internet related it includes some before and after that time frame.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[pnutjam]

I download alot of ebooks and read at least one or two books a week on average. I fall into this category, but despite my high household income I'm under 200% of poverty (large family).

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

We expect young people with less money to pirate more.

Why would you expect that? Young people have always been known to spend money on stupid things as status symbols, even poor kids. There's a reason why ads are targeted at kids whenever not prohibited by law. Piracy is rarely about money, as countless studies have shown.

Put it the way you want, I don't think a lot of people earning $60k in San Francisco are looking to move to Congo to do subsistence farming.

Of course not, they move to off-the-grid homesteads in the US, often with hilarious results. They even make reality television shows about it.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

I feel that the DRM, being told that you don't own that copy of an ebook even though you paid the same price as for the dead tree version, and overpricing of ebooks is why many pirate them. Whether it is right or not is moot. I and many others feel that ebooks should cost less than half of the mass market paperback price for that book in ebook form, and once purchased, the purchaser should have the same rights as they would have with a physical book, namely to read it anywhere (as in on any device) loan it out, sell it, or destroy it at will and without penalty. Also, if a device can read the ebook to you (text to speech), that should be no different than a person reading the physical book to you!

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[fred6666]

I doubt it changed that much. Torrents are still there and young people even started "streaming" (they often don't even understand they are pirating) TV shows and movies, this was clearly not possible 20 years ago (it was technically possible, but bandwidth was worth more so not a lot of people wanted to saturate their connection only for some random pirates to be able to watch a show).

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[sizzlinkitty]

This damn site tells me I'm in the top 2.54%.

I would hate myself if I made it into that 1% bracket.

Additionally, I am in that age range of 30 - 44, white male, and I pirate ebooks on occasion. It's mostly an activity of convenience combined with my hate for DRM mechanisms. Recently, I grabbed a book on golang, used it for 30 minute and then deleted it. Would of regretted buying the book in any form and it only took me 30 minutes to figure that out.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[LunaticTippy]

It varies widely depending on where you are, but the median income in the US for adult workers is 30k You will be pleased to realize that you make double what the average person makes! Mean is dragged up by the ultra rich, to 44k, but you make more than that too!

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. I was reading an article in the Wall Street Journal yesterday about the private showrooms that luxury companies (in this case, some wineries) were setting up. Want to taste Moët's finest? Be prepared to pony up EUR 15 000 for the privilege. One person interviewed for the article said that there were around 215 000 people in the world with a net worth over $30 million, and that was their target market. 215k people. In the whole world. (Probably meant households, but maybe not.)

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[DanielRavenNest]

> And having a penny would make me the richest person on Mars.

Then the Curiosity rover already took the top spot, because they included a Lincoln penny in the camera reference target. Why a penny? It doesn't weigh much, copper isn't expected to degrade in the Mars environment, and they know what it looks like. There are also color patches and grids of black and white lines. The point of the reference target is to calibrate the cameras with known objects, so they can tell the actual colors of the Mars environment, despite lighting changes as the Sun moves, and the occasional dust storm and cloud.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[dryeo]

Well Haiti is a good comparison as that is what our billionaire overlords have planned for us. Remember how much better off the average Haitian is compared to the average Cuban. None of that horrible free medical care, even lower wages then the average Cuban but if they can pay, they do get Internet and in theory, they can lift themselves up by their bootstraps and join the rich. They're allowed to bitch more as well, which proves they're free.

Never understood the average person voting for the aristocracy (billionaires in the US) and thinking they're actually going to help them.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

You realize that as of 2012 you needed an annual salary of over $700,000 to be part of the 1% right? (https://www.forbes.com/sites/moneywisewomen/2012/03/21/average-america-vs-the-one-percent/#701cb8a92395)

That's also just income, keep in mind that isn't net worth, which averages $8.4 million-- 70 times the amount of the lower classes.

The 1% isn't "us" with "good jobs in developed countries". Actually read the bare minimum of evidence before spouting this bullshit.

60K+ is certainly above average, but stop fooling yourself into thinking you are somehow part of the elite. You are just as poor as the rest of us, you just don't realize it because you eat the spoon fed garbage filtered down by the upper classes.

I'm certainly glad I live in a developed country, and have a decent job and don't have to struggle for food. But the people earning the ridiculous salaries of the 1% and the .1% are the REASON that undeveloped countries can't make headway. They are the reason our wages have stagnated, and they are the reason that the benefits of technological advancement, which once benefited all, are steadily shifting to benefit a smaller and smaller group of elite persons.

You can bet if they could get away with paying you less, they would, and they will as soon as they can.

Re: age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm 50 & i download books. Mainly because DRM pisses me off. I have purchased stuff that caused me such rageful spite that i truly regretted attempting to go straight. Audible i'm thinking of you.
Secondly, as i age my attention span has shortened & patience has thinned out & a book (or a film) has to be amazing for me to give it more than twenty minutes.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[Anonymous Coward]

Cheer up! On a global basis, your 60K makes you a 1-percenter.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[liquid_schwartz]

Except I am not talking about Haiti and such but the world average. And I even said you could compare to the average of developed countries.

With $60k+, we are part of the rich, like it or not. The 1% is not people with private jets and huge mansions. That's the 0.0001%, and I am probably forgetting some 0's. The 1% is us, people with good jobs in developed countries.

As someone noted below 1% means ~$700K earnings a year and a net worth >$8M. That is certainly a mansion if you want it and a shared private jet if you want it. I strongly suggest you look again at the facts before you assert that $60k is rich but 1% somehow isn't lavish.

Re:age 30 is old and $60K is "wealthy"

[fred6666]

1% of what? Certainly not of the world. $700k puts you in the top 0.01% of the world.

30-44 is old?

[the_skywise]

Also I question the income levels - Lower income peoples mainly have cell phones in place of pads/computers which, while they may have bigger screens, aren't great for ebook reading. (Of course those with lower incomes don't tend to read as much either)

I'd be interested to cross reference this data with video piracy...

Re:30-44 is old?

[93 Escort Wagon]

Yeah, the reality is - the internet and World Wide Web are old enough now that some people who grew up with them are now in their 30s.

Re:30-44 is old?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can people under 30 even read?

Re:30-44 is old?

[Anonymous Coward]

I now rite?!!

I'm in that age bracket and I can spell poorly for speed of typing - no I just want these fskrs to get off mah lawn!

Re:30-44 is old?

[Anonymous Coward]

I doubt it when the snowflakes are told they are special without having to try at anything. Who needs to read when you will have everything handed to you?

Re:30-44 is old?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, the reality is - the internet and World Wide Web are old enough now that some people who grew up with them are now in their 30s.

I think that is also the transitional group that still read traditional books for recreation more than the post-internet generations. Sure there's always a group of enthusiasts, but I casually notice a lot fewer people reading in public than I remember growing up, the local library is having a lot of trouble, and my son's friends and schoolmates don't seem to care about books, e or otherwise. The technology that makes reading more convenient also makes the piracy more convenient, but it feels like it's becoming a niche that a lot of people just don't care about.

It's weird to think that I'm already the old man who has stories about before we carried the entirety of human knowledge in our pockets, when the internet was the blue screened text only computer in the library that only the nerds used, we used the mail for more than bills and catalogues, and we actually read things on dead trees for recreation.

Re:30-44 is old?

[mean pun]

I have no idea how old you are, but it does not matter. When you were young there were people complaining about the feckless youth of that day. Heck, archeologists have found clay tablets

with such rants.

Re:30-44 is old?

[thinkwaitfast]

And we now see their rants were justified.

Re:30-44 is old?

[Tim the Gecko]

If every generation is really 10% worse than the one before then we are just pond scum compared to Plato. And Plato's grandfather probably thought Plato could do a lot of things better.

Re:30-44 is old?

[vel-ex-tech]

Why bother with getting defensive?

Just support measures to bring a quick end to social security.

I'm in that age group, and I know I'm not getting a single fucking penny of SSI.

Re:30-44 is old?

[tamd_77438]

For instance, Plato wasn't nearly as efficient at holding soup as his grandfather, Bollo.

Re: 30-44 is old?

[Anonymous Coward]

Blue screened? What kind of weird phosphor did you have in your tube?

There were amber, green, and paper white screens in my universe. I stuck with paper white for years into the vga world, until I saw Sim Earth at a friend's house.

Re: 30-44 is old?

[cpt kangarooski]

Phones with gigabytes of data on them are okay, but I won't really believe it's the future until talking rings become popular. (Preferably long play talking rings, though)

Re:30-44 is old?

[lars_stefan_axelsson]

I have no idea how old you are, but it does not matter. When you were young there were people complaining about the feckless youth of that day. Heck, archeologists have found clay tablets with such rants.

The problem with that argument is that it's always right.

By that token nothing could ever take a turn for the worse, as someone of age will point it out, and your argument will come into play.

OTOH my kids don't learn the rules of the language (not English, but we have a grammar also), they don't learn their multiplication tables, and they don't study long division any more.

As far as I can tell, this is not counter balanced by learning something else it its stead. This is also born out by our slumping ranking in e.g. the Pisa studies. (Or the diagnostic maths test all engineering students have taken at my Alma mater for the last close to forty years.)

So yes, I'm old, and kids today can't do X worth a damn, but in many areas my judgement is supported by international studies and comparisons. Kids today do a lot worse in many respects/subjects than we did. Demonstrably so.

Sharing Paper

[Anonymous Coward]

Older people - of which I am one, are accustomed to being able to share books. Book clubs, used book stores, sharing your favorite new read with a friend is part of the culture. The notion that you pay once and can never share with someone - yet pay close to the same price as paper - is both insulting and greedy.

Re:Sharing Paper

[the_Bionic_lemming]

Yep, I was going to post that as well. I have a library of over 5000 paperbacks, It's fun introducing people to Remo Williams, or Tarl Cabot, Casca and many others :)

Re:Sharing Paper

[Registered Coward v2]

Yep, I was going to post that as well. I have a library of over 5000 paperbacks, It's fun introducing people to Remo Williams, or Tarl Cabot, Casca and many others :)

Interesting that the same argument made by the "younger" generation - we're used to sharing, is now being used by "those of a certain age" to explain theirs. From a cultural standpoint, it's interesting to see how a norm, in this case passing around books, translates to a similar behavior in the eWorld. That has ramifications for a whole lot of industries. For example, if the really younger generation gets used to using Uber vs buying a car what happens when they start raising families. Will tehy automagically start buying minivans or will Uber morph int a Parent Taxi service?

Re:Sharing Paper

[JaredOfEuropa]

Older people like me are also accustomed to being able to buy books, and not be hit with arbitrary regional restrictions. Imagine the lady at the checkout of your favourite book store or library putting aside a couple of books from your selection: "I am sorry sir, but you can't have those". That has been my main reason to pirate ebooks: region locks and availability. Thankfully the situation is improving, and publishers are learning not to piss off their customer this way.

Re:Sharing Paper

[Anonymous Coward]

I think my generation (boomers) has a different interpretation of sharing. Want to borrow my chain saw. Here's a book I thought was cool. Use my pickup truck to help you move a sofa. Have a mix tape. It seems like the younger generation wants to share pictures of what they had for lunch, what movie they're watching, and how sad they are to hear X pop star is in rehab.

Re:Sharing Paper

[Anonymous Coward]

There is still the interoperability issue. Amazon, Kobo, and Apple all have different, encrypted formats, and if one has a Kindle, two of the formats will not work on it.

Re:Sharing Paper

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting that the same argument made by the "younger" generation - we're used to sharing, is now being used by "those of a certain age" to explain theirs.

Yes. Very interesting. Even more so when you realize that the "we're used to sharing" defense was first used in the '90s by all the "young people" back then. If you do the math you will see the correlation.

For example, if the really younger generation gets used to using Uber vs buying a car what happens when they start raising families. Will tehy automagically start buying minivans or will Uber morph int a Parent Taxi service?

Good question, but better questions would be "who buys minivans any more?" and for the more future-minded out there, "what is this thing 'sub $10 a gallon gas' you speak of?"

Re:Sharing Paper

[tlhIngan]

Older people like me are also accustomed to being able to buy books, and not be hit with arbitrary regional restrictions. Imagine the lady at the checkout of your favourite book store or library putting aside a couple of books from your selection: "I am sorry sir, but you can't have those". That has been my main reason to pirate ebooks: region locks and availability. Thankfully the situation is improving, and publishers are learning not to piss off their customer this way.

Incorrect analogy.

Because for starters, if the store couldn't sell it to you, they wouldn't have it. If there is a geographical restriction on the sale of a book (e.g., perhaps people of Town X can't buy it), then all the book stores of Town X won't carry it. Town Y, just a town over can read the book, and its bookstores carry it. There is nothing stopping a person from Town X shopping in Town Y and bringing it back. (This happens a lot, actually - people did travel just to get stuff they couldn't get locally.

Re:Sharing Paper

[taustin]

I guess you've never heard of Calibre and Apprentice Alf.

Re:Sharing Paper

[SoCalChris]

Older people - of which I am one, are accustomed to being able to share books. Book clubs, used book stores, sharing your favorite new read with a friend is part of the culture. The notion that you pay once and can never share with someone - yet pay close to the same price as paper - is both insulting and greedy.

You haven't priced ebooks lately. Most of them are considerably more expensive than having a physical copy shipped to you. Take for instance the classic 1984. A paperback copy can be bought brand new including shipping for $6.51. On Kindle, it is 50% more, at $9.99. I love my Kindle, but I refuse to pay the premium price that publishers are charging for the books. On books that are priced this way, I'll either borrow a copy from the library or pirate it.

Re:Sharing Paper

[John Bokma]

If only Amazon made available a command line converter for free, right? They could call it, say KindleGen.

Re:Sharing Paper

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh so you don't have a single photo album? No photos in picture frames? Nothing on your desk at work? Never chitchat with friends on the phone? No tabloids existed before the internet?

Human nature has not changed. What we use to express the same desires has.

Re:Sharing Paper

[Anonymous Coward]

I fully agree. A 10 or 20 dollar e-book is also a signal that literacy is only for the wealthy. 99 cents is reasonable for an electronic copy of a text-only book.

Re: Sharing Paper

[Anonymous Coward]

I paid $1.88 per gallon for gas yesterday.

Re: Sharing Paper

[Anonymous Coward]

You can go to abe.com and order a physical copy of 1984 for under $4 including shipping.

abe.com is an online consortium of independent used booksellers.

Re:Sharing Paper

[the_Bionic_lemming]

Sharing a book is legal.

Sharing a file isn't because you agreed to the EULA.

I don't support that model, but then again I don't have e-books.

Re:Sharing Paper

[tbuskey]

You haven't priced ebooks lately. Most of them are considerably more expensive than having a physical copy shipped to you. Take for instance the classic 1984. A paperback copy can be bought brand new including shipping for $6.51. On Kindle, it is 50% more, at $9.99. I love my Kindle, but I refuse to pay the premium price that publishers are charging for the books. On books that are priced this way, I'll either borrow a copy from the library or pirate it.

And 1984 is out of copyright in many non-US countries. It's on Project Gutenberg.

Given that, and its subject matter, I was amused by Amazon's remote removal of it. That's the strongest case for DRM removal I can think of.

Re:Sharing Paper

[Anonymous Coward]

I agree with both (sharing and price), but I think the major reason is price. Paying almost the same price as paper is just going to result in a certain level of "no f@cking way" piracy from some folks. It's a rip off at that price and they need to adjust their pricing model.

hell yeah

[Anonymous Coward]

You heard it here first copyright trolls!! Fire up those big data engines and get prosecuting!! Daddy Trump is in town, it's time to FUCK.

Digimarc

[Anonymous Coward]

The CEO and chairman of Digimarc is Bruce Davis, infamous for his destruction of Infocom and Activision.

how surprising

[Anonymous Coward]

People who like books have slightly higher incomes on average, who'd have thunk it.

This is not lost revenue, but lost library loans

[Anonymous Coward]

See subject

ownership vs content license

[Anonymous Coward]

These "old" people were born in a time when a book or pretty much any other thing sold had transferrable value intrinsic to the object.
The brave new eWorld of digital content, the best you can acquire is a license to use the content in specified ways, often restricting the ability to transfer the license.
It's not surprising that people with the expectation that any thing bought would be transferrable might rebel against the notion of a limited rights use license.

Napster Generation

[Anonymous Coward]

I dunno about your generation but who ever was around when Napster started in its incubator days, this is a direct result in why people of that age bracket are pirates. Simple Ideology if i can get away with it fuck the rest right? deeper problem is that this article doesn't say who are the posters of these illegal books, are they in the same age bracket that the down-loaders are in ... my best guess not even close. dissociation between up-loaders and down-loaders is remarkable.
Just cuz generation X is tech savvy to find these torrents doesn't make them worse than the people who upload them it just makes them ignorant to think they have the privilege to do so with out any repercussions or to say the least being labeled like this article has .

When Ebooks are more expensive then pysical copies

[Anonymous Coward]

Its kind of OK if they are priced the same, but I will never ever buy a EBook that costs more than the physical copy.

The publisher needs to learn and set proper prices on EBooks.

TRIGGERED!

[Thud457]

kids these days don't read.

Also - reading correlates with "relatively wealthy"

Re:TRIGGERED!

[thinkwaitfast]

And he was right. The civilization that he was trying to protect no longer exists.

My neighbor's kid was telling me last night that they "don't do things like study apostrophes any more" in school, relating to a science presentation that he'd finished. He's in the 7th grade gifted program and didn't know many grammar rules of any kind.

Re:TRIGGERED!

[liquid_schwartz]

... He's in the 7th grade gifted program and didn't know many grammar rules of any kind.

But I bet he got an honorary participation award in English ;-)

Re:TRIGGERED!

[pnutjam]

My daughter is a crazy about grammer rules, her school is obviously teaching them.

Re: TRIGGERED!

[Anonymous Coward]

My experience has been that with eBooks prompting a lot of people to dump their bookcases, I can build a fabulous library just by regularly browsing the 'clearance' shelves at Half-Price books. There are a lot of fabulous classics for $2 these days. I got the Oxford edition of Shakespeare for $2 recently.

Re: TRIGGERED!

[johanw]

I can build an even bigger library with a lot of fabulous classics for $0 these days. I can sometims even download the pirated copy before Amazon starts selling it, like with the last part of the great schools of Dune trilogy.

backlash for bs ebook terms/prices IMO

[Anonymous Coward]

if i were paying double for an ebook vs a physical book, that i wouldn't actually even really "own" or be able to share -- i'd probably consider the whole thing a joke and pirate too... just saying...

Younger crowd reads less books

[misnohmer]

Since younger generation consumes less books, it would make sense they don't pirate them, leaving mostly the older pirates to account for majority of book pirating.

Re:Younger crowd reads less books

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it's more you move from time wasting movies and TVs to more educational books as you get older. It would have been interesting if they broke it down into genres.

Mod Parent Up

[Scholasticus]

They tell me I'm buying the book, but I do not actually own even the copy on my "device" in any meaningful sense. But ... if somebody obtains a copy without permission of the copyright holder, somehow that becomes theft of "intellectual property."

I resent that!

[nospam007]

I'm barely over 60 and 'wealthy' is a stretch.

Blame the walled gardens, instead

[Anonymous Coward]

Once B&N stopped allowing downloads (or even sideload access on the nook to books downloaded by the nook), many stopped buying books from B&N and turned to the web instead. Older folks are used to tangible media that can be transferred from place to place or person to person and don't like the idea that B&N or Amazon can take away something they've already purchased without recourse. One may even rationalize the action by drawing a parallel to checking out a book from the library then returning it.

What about...

[Anonymous Coward]

The pirates that read books at libraries without paying for them?

Re:What about...

[Anonymous Coward]

Only a LIEberal would steal knowledge from a LIEberry, you retard.

I am 53

[Anonymous Coward]

I have $600K in my eTrade account, plus a nice 401K, and a house, and I still download 'pirate' pdfs, whatever that means. I prefer paper, but it is harder to come by.

Re:I am 53

[johanw]

Yeah, if for nothing else downloading the pirated copy saves you the trouble of removing the DRM yourself.

Paid once already

[bensafrickingenius]

I know this doesn't make it right to anyone but me, but I've been torrenting audiobooks and ebooks left and right OF TITLES I'VE ALREADY PAID FOR AT LEAST ONCE BEFORE. I have a long commute now, hence the desire for audio rereads of old favorites. I also do ALL of my reading on my Kindle app now -- I feel no guilt about obtaining the content I paid for on paper in different formats. I know, I'm a monster, right?

Re: Paid once already

[Anonymous Coward]

You download audio books of books you once bought? How delusional are you that you think that's just another format? Do you think movies are just another format of your book? Is the soundtrack part of the book you paid for? I kinda want your morals. Its sounds very frugle. I bought a coppy of harry potter in highschool so that means I deserve free admission to the broadway play.

Re:Paid once already

[Anonymous Coward]

I know this doesn't make it right to anyone but me, but I've been torrenting audiobooks and ebooks left and right OF TITLES I'VE ALREADY PAID FOR AT LEAST ONCE BEFORE. I have a long commute now, hence the desire for audio rereads of old favorites. I also do ALL of my reading on my Kindle app now -- I feel no guilt about obtaining the content I paid for on paper in different formats. I know, I'm a monster, right?

I get tons and tons of audiobooks for free too. My local public library is amazing and I don't even need to worry about storage space on my phone, because they just disappear when I am done with them!

Re: Paid once already

[Anonymous Coward]

except that they didn't mention anything about movies or plays...

Re:Paid once already

[fred6666]

So in short, you don't want the voice actors and sound technicians to be paid, only the author?

Re:Paid once already

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly this. Publishers should long since have come up with some option for people who already own the printed version of the books. We own thousands of books. Probably half of those have been purchased through Amazon. It would be trivial for them to offer an option: Re-purchase all of your paper books as eBooks, for (say) 10% of the price.

That said, and as much as I like the Kindle, the ability to organize hundreds or thousands of books sucks . It's almost unbelievably bad. It should be trivial to tag books, to attach brief annotations to remind yourself what you thought of a book, to define categories, to move books, tags and categories around as needed. Sure, you probably don't want to do all that on an actual Kindle, but you could manage your library in the PC Kindle application.

Re: Paid once already

[Evtim]

I do just like the parent, only I commute with public transport so no audio books, just the regular ones. Is that fairer in your [ha-ha] book?

My family has about 1000 volumes. I live in another country now...what am I supposed to do - transport all of it? I'd do it if there was no other alternative...but there is.

My most beloved author is Terry Pratchett. I have bought everything he ever wrote in two languages; I regularly purchased and still do merchandise and not just small trinkets [posters, bags, key holders, jewelry] but clothing too - lots of T-shirts and hoodies. Did I download all his books in both languages after e-books came around - yes. Have I inflicted any financial damage to Terry or Paul Kidby - no.

I did "hurt", however, the greedy assholes who say I do not own anything except the right to enjoy a book or song or a movie for life, yet never provided me [for a price recovering the manufacture and transport costs] with the digital copy of the CD [bought] of the tape [bought] of the vinyl [bought] of say "Made in Japan" by Deep Purple.....no, I purchased the full rights 3 times already and still can't get the file. Well, screw them!

Re:Paid once already

[taustin]

So you feel that the people who record the audio book, the voice actors, the sound engineers, etc., provide no added value and deserve nothing for their efforts?

Re:Paid once already

[argStyopa]

It makes it perfectly right to me, if that makes you feel any better?

Same thing I do for movies and recordings. MafiAA insists that I don't actually own what I buy, I only own the 'right' to listen/watch it. So I do...whether I have the physical media any longer or not. I bought it once, the author & artists involved have been paid for my use, so which vector I use to get it is none of their fucking business.

No remorse here

[Anonymous Coward]

If the Google hivemind, a corporation that is fantastically wealthy, is allowed to legally scan and read every book ever published without regard to the authors or publishers wishes and without paying a dime, why the fuck should I feel guilty that I occasionally download a few books and do the same?

I have precognition look at this

[Anonymous Coward]

I can predict this will change in about 5 to 10 years, in 5 to 10 years these will have evened out.
I predict it should be around 18-29 should be 33-35% 30-44 should be 30-32% and 45 and up should be about 25-30%.
Im such a visionary...

Older and wiser?

[Anonymous Coward]

When you can download an e-book, read a bit, realize it wasn't worth reading you've made a good choice.

When you buy a book, read a bit, realize it wasn't worth buying you've made a poor choice.

Maybe people who are older and richer make better choices?

Re:Older and wiser?

[Anonymous Coward]

But people do get to sample books before they buy them. In Barnes & Nobles, or Borders, they can open a book, scan/read a few pages - nobody stops them - and then decide whether to buy it. If they are doing it on Amazon, they get to read a sample chapter or so and decide if it suits their taste. Then and only then do they buy it.

eBook Costs Ripe for Disruption

[Malggi]

For $9.99 I can listen to almost all the music in the world... or I can read a single eBook

Not any eBook either. Most current bestsellers are $12.99.

There are some all-you-can-eat services like Oyster or Scribd, but a lot of major publisher's don't participate. Once the major publishers throw their hats into the ring, they'd probably start to see revenue from people who are currently pirating.

Re:eBook Costs Ripe for Disruption

[ctilsie242]

Amazon Prime has a service where you can read books for free, but only a few at a time, and you have to "return" them when done.

Re:eBook Costs Ripe for Disruption

[Kevin108]

And the selection is shit.

I blame "whole word reading".

[tlambert]

I blame "whole word reading".

Pople who learned to read that way simply do not read for pleasure. They read when they are required to do so, but not otherwise.

If you are a "whole word reader", and you encounter a word you've never seen before, it's off to the dictionary to look up the new ideogram (since that how the words are taught using that method), even if you actually use the word daily when speaking.

I've occasionally wondered if we are going to have to make books available in "text speak", in the same way that we make them available in braille, in order to comply with the Americans With Disabilities act.

Re:I blame "whole word reading".

[Anonymous Coward]

Text speak? Buddy, that's like the last century! Now it's emoji.

Re:I blame "whole word reading".

[Anonymous Coward]

WRONG! Whole word readers don't require a dictionary to recognize new words any more than phonetic readers do. The oddity with whole word readers is that can easily learn new words while reading without having a clue how to pronounce them.

distribution

[fluffernutter]

It is difficult to spend money on an industry that saves printing charges and shipping charges on physical books yet in some cases charges more for the ebook than the physical version. Demonstration of the fact that 'the people' aren't getting most of the benefits of technology.

Re:distribution

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, it's more the value to the customer rather than the cost to the producer that's worth looking at here.

Yeah, physical books do cost more to produce - starting from slaughtered trees to printing and packaging and shipping and the rest. Yet, once a person has the book, s/he has to track it. If a person has some 100 books, s/he needs a bookshelf or some other organizer to keep it. Want to read 'War and Peace'? Go to the place where you store it. If a person has to relocate, then getting all those books transported costs a bundle. Flying internationally? Those books quickly add to your luggage weight, which is ever lighter on every airline.

Now say you bought all your books in ebook or electronic/pdf format. It's all there on your iPad. You don't need all that extra space or bookshelves - maybe use it for sports memorabilia. Moving to Cleveland? Movers may have to worry about your 40" TV, but you won't risk losing your books. Flying to Manilla or Rome? Just carry your iPad on the carry on luggage, and don't bother carrying any books - it's all in there.

All these advantages are what make the ebook a lot more valuable than the slaughtered tree version. One of the books I have was the National Geographic World Atlas - a book I love. But going to any online map and being able to zoom into any city at street level is a lot more fascinating

Re:distribution

[david_thornley]

Paper and digital each have their advantages, and we're better off having a choice. I don't mind paying more for the one I want more.

Re: distribution

[fluffernutter]

Then you are not performing your job as a consumer to find the best value for your money that you can.

Re: distribution

[fluffernutter]

I don't see what any of this has to do with the inability to lower the price. I'm a little surprised that a person could be so lazy that they would be troubled by finding a place for a book, but none of this contributes to the cost of a book seller.

No wonder

[jbmartin6]

No wonder searching for a book download is such a hazardous endeavor. I see a ton of garbage, adware, BSOD web page scams, and worse all coming in off searches for " download". Interesting that I almost never see this with music.

Well, it's got me pegged...

[hackwrench]

I'm 40 and I do quite a bit of eBook pirating. http://gen.lib.rus.ec/ makes it so easy. The books are largely in Russian, though there are many English books, but now I have a reason to put learning Russian higher in my priorities.

Being old in the tech world..

[Anonymous Coward]

You know, these "older" pirates are the same ones who started in Junior High using a "locksmith" program to pirate games like Aztec, hack their C64s, clock chip their 286 and use resource editors to screw with Mac System 6. We're all much older now but the early skills are still with us. Yes, we'll pay for music, the occasional movie and software as we've got disposable incomes. Not entirely barbarians anymore, but I know I'll occasionally crank up usenet and take a tour...

Author doesn't really get paid

[Anonymous Coward]

You're assuming that the publishers don't steal the royalties from the author. Unless the voice actor and audio producer are paid royalties (they generally aren't) then you're not stealing from them.

Escalation

[hackwrench]

Well that escalated quickly. You might be interested in drawing your victims out a little more slowly next time for more interesting responses, or not... but then I am just egging you on, myself, in order to get a more interesting response from you, though it might be more effective to pick you up and shake it out of you. Pity I don't know where you live, though it might be interesting to have you try to get me to post my location so you can give me the drubbing you might think I so richly deserve. Have I covered all the bases yet?

Take a look at the illustration.

[Gravis Zero]

Take a look at the chart the illustration, Maybe it's just me but it kinda looks like charts that reflect who has a computer and who is proficient with it.

Re:Take a look at the illustration.

[WallyL]

I agree. Reminds me of the xkcd heatmap.

Re:When Ebooks are more expensive then pysical cop

[Anonymous Coward]

It would seem obvious to price an ebook more. With a hardcopy, you risk the book pages getting eroded over time - just like older books in the last millennium used to when we were growing up. Not just that, a lot of books were thick and heavy and consumed real estate within home. Books like encyclopedias that one might use for reference.

With ebooks, consider the advantages

1. That book always looks new on whichever reader or tablet you might be using;

2. You do not need a bookshelf/s for all the books that you want: it's all in your Amazon/Barnes/whatever account

3. All your books are easy to find, and search. That physical copy of 'The Three Musketeers' that you once had may have been lost when I was shifting from Santa Clara to Charlotte. Whereas if I have my iPad, I can find and read my books anywhere.

In fact, I've stopped buying books ever since I got my tablets: any books I have must be available either online, or in ebook form.

I pirate ebooks because...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't want some outdated edition of a tech book in my itunes or playstore library forever. if published let you pay a small "upgrade" fee to get the latest edition, i'd be more likely to buy an ebook.

Made up stats?

[Anonymous Coward]

How accurate are these stats really? From the PDF it shows the questions being asked, Why would anyone tell these people how much they make or their actual age and education? The scope is narrow and does not show if they purchased the book at a later time, and or if they have already purchased it on their nook but want a copy on their PC. Taking this data with a grain of salt.

Re:When Ebooks are more expensive then pysical cop

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, and the publisher needs to learn that I own the book I paid for. I do not lease it, rent it, option it, or anything else. I own the digital file. If they a uncomfortable with my owning a digital file then they can stop selling the digital file.
The only things I rent are cars, apartments, movies and beer.

And I don't consider the source?

[Anonymous Coward]

I didn't RTFA. And I won't examine their methodology, sorry.

But a study commissioned by an anti-piracy group on piracy has about as much validity to me as studies on smoking commissioned by the tobacco industry. Sorry.

I'm guessing it likely that it was arranged something like, "Have you EVER illegally downloaded an eBook?" If it wasn't outright like, "Have you ever gotten an eBook you haven't paid for?" which could cover things like Baen Free Library or Project Gutenberg.

Probably because...

[101percent]

DRM-free PDF books are great and most of the alternatives are shit. Who wants to carry around a 1000pp math book when you can read it on your laptop?

Re:Probably because...

[david_thornley]

PDFs are awkward to read except at the original size. I have a large-screen low-end Android tablet for them. ePub and similar formats allow easy reading on an arbitrary screen with arbitrary type size.

Easy..

[CptLoRes]

Give me ebooks that are reasonably priced, and deliver them as media where I have the freedom to select how I digest them. Give me this and I will buy the books. Anything involving special apps, with limited device support or DRM restricted software is an instant fail, match the convenience of unrestricted PDF or at least the plain old paper book or I will see myself out the door.

You can't "illegally download ebooks"

[hackel]

Downloading eBooks (or anything else) isn't illegal. *Distributing* them is, without the proper permission/license. It's the person who is sharing who is at fault, not the receiver. Don't let the corporate IP police fool or scare you. I support every author who sells directly to consumers. I will not support giant publishing corporations who screw over authors as a routine order of business.

Support self-published authors, people!!

Re:You can't "illegally download ebooks"

[ljw1004]

Downloading eBooks (or anything else) isn't illegal. *Distributing* them is, without the proper permission/license.

Correction: *copying* them without the proper permission/license is what's illegal.

In the case of printed books, if you obtained an illegally-distributed book and read it, then you wouldn't be doing any copying.

But in the case of ebooks, if you obtained an illegally-distributed book and read it on your computer, the act of reading it on computer inevitably makes a copy in the computer's memory or cache or disk. The copyright act specifically says that copies this made this way are exempt from copyright restrictions, SO LONG AS these copies are (1) temporary, and transient/incidental, (2) an integral and essential part of a technological process, (3) the sole purpose of the copies is to enable a lawful use of the work.

Is it a "lawful use of the ebook" if you're reading a copy that had been illegally distributed? I think this is up for debate, and I'm not aware that it's been tested in court.

Is it a "temporary copy" if you download an illegally-distributed ebook and store it on your phone or hard disk? -- no.

http://www.legislation.gov.uk/...

Note: I'm not a lawyer.

Re:You can't "illegally download ebooks"

[MercTech]

One bit of hilarity is getting a copyright take down notice for a document you wrote yourself because a large publication quoted you and now claims copyright on the quote.

Re:When Ebooks are more expensive then pysical cop

[taustin]

1. That book always looks new on whichever reader or tablet you might be using;

Assuming you're allowed to transfer it to a new device. That can be problematic already, and history shows us that even if you're allowed to now, policies can change tomorrow.

2. You do not need a bookshelf/s for all the books that you want: it's all in your Amazon/Barnes/whatever account

But you do need power to charge your book reader, and if you drop your book in the bathtub, you drop all your books in the bathtub.

3. All your books are easy to find, and search. That physical copy of 'The Three Musketeers' that you once had may have been lost when I was shifting from Santa Clara to Charlotte. Whereas if I have my iPad, I can find and read my books anywhere.

But you can't loan them to a friend, or five friends, or donate them to the library when you're done with them.

There certainly are advantage to ebooks, but there are disadvantages, too. Overall, I don't think either is superior to the other. That said, I haven't bought a paper book in years either, but then, I know how to make actual backups of my purchases, encrypted or not. And if I lose that ability, I'll stop buying ebooks.

Why is the age surprising?

[SuperKendall]

I don't find the age range surprising at all. That's pretty much the last generation that read much, so it makes sense that they would also be downloading more books.

There are lots of reports saying younger people do not read as much as they used to.

Re:When Ebooks are more expensive then pysical cop

[Anonymous Coward]

No, ebooks should always be less, and by 50% or more. Current pricing is absurd.

They may already own the books they are pirating.

[NoSalt]

Older people tend to have more books than younger people. I know I would feel completely within my rights to download a digital version of a book that I already own a hard copy of. For that matter, I would feel within my rights to download a digital version of a movie or music I already own, rather than go through the trouble of finding, then ripping the media.

Dude, I have pirated a copy of a book I wrote.

[netsavior]

I have pirated a book that I wrote (Amazon won't let you buy it twice, and I couldn't get it to download without buying... I could have made a new account, but a quick google search turned up a pirated copy.

I have bought an ebook on my phone because I accidentally left the physical book at home and I wanted to read it, for many of my favorite books I have bought a physical copy to loan out and an ebook copy to read on my kindle.

Basically I love books and don't consider my causal nonchalant piracy to be immoral or a threat to the industry, it isn't like if I suddenly stopped pirating I would be spending any more or less on books. that line item in my budget will probably always be "the rest."

- a "wealthy" (by this article's standards) guy in his late 30s.

101%

[Anonymous Coward]

Of those the 1% percent above 100% is already dead

Re:When Ebooks are more expensive then pysical cop

[Anonymous Coward]

I would never buy an ebook that costs more than 5% of the dead-tree version if it comes with DRM -- I consider "buying" DRM'd crap "renting". Even if it happens to be DRM that I can rip out, it is just plain wrong to pay for DRM'd ebooks that will render information unavailable when the physical device breaks (and it won't last for 100+ years like a book does), or Adobe/Amazon/whomever decides I don't have the right to read the ebook I paid for anymore, etc.

OTOH, if it costs up to 60% of the dead-tree version *and* comes without DRM, I will buy it *even if I already own the dead-tree version*. Been there, done that. My kobo has a 32GiB SDHC card for a reason, there's in excess of US$ 5k worth of ebooks there (all of them bought by myself, all of them without DRM), and about 80% of them I also own in paper.

If someone asks me for an ebook, either it is someone I can trust to not copy it, or he gets a lesson on DRM, the value of really respecting authors that publish DRM-free ebooks, and gets a printout he must return to me, instead of the binary.

My dead-tree library is quite impressive, too. But it is so much nicer to just carry the Kobo around and have most of my technical literature and Sci-fi magazines in there... thus why I actually pay for ebook titles I already own on paper if it is something I'd lug around in a trip.

The publishers haven't gotten the memo...

[Anonymous Coward]

The only times I pirate eBooks is if the publisher is asking an exorbitant amount for an intangible digital document that costs the publisher almost nothing to create or distribute.

If I see your eBook for $20 or more on Amazon, I'm going to pirate all of your eBooks to make a point. In other words, if you are selling your eBook for more than an actual physical paperback version? 1.) Fuck you. 2.) I'm going to pirate all of your shit.

And then there is the stupid licensing bullshit. I own the hardcopy of all of the Culture novels by Iain M. Banks. And I tried to collect all of them in eBook form but was completely fucking barred from purchasing two of the books because they weren't currently 'licensed' in the states and my only option to purchase them from European eBook vendors for stupid amounts of more money.

Sorry, not fucking happening. Inconvenience me like this and I'm going straight to pirating your shit. I'm willing to pay a fair price for intangible property, but I'm not going to be ripped the fuck off and pay MORE for a digital copy than a real copy.

The only publisher who I refuse to pirate ebooks from is Baen Books. Because of their licensing policy with eBooks and the prices they sell the eBooks at.

youre a fucking retard

[Anonymous Coward]

who doesn't understand economics, and should not be modded up at all

but hey im off to the huffington post now to get some more social justice! they will tell me exactly what is wealthy and what is not wealthy

Re:When Ebooks are more expensive then pysical cop

[trawg]

The publisher needs to learn and set proper prices on EBooks.

I think as important is publishers need to learn that the world is one place and they should sell books everywhere.

I've been trying to buy "Dream Park" by Larry Niven for the last few weeks. It seems to be restricted by territory for sale in the UK. I can find ebookstores in France (Amazon) and Netherlands (can't remember) that sell the English version but I cannot find anywhere in the UK that sells it at all.

I'm sure I can pirate it but haven't been bothered yet as I have other stuff to read. LET US FUCKING BUY THESE THINGS.

Trumplethinskin is late to Carousel!

[Anonymous Coward]

LastDay anyone? :)

Just want to point out to my local Sandmen that there's a bunch of people on Pennsylvania Avenue who are late to Carousel! Runners!

Surprising

[Immolo]

Interesting as I'm in this age group and I actually find most ebooks at an acceptable price that I'm willing to pay for them rather than look elsewhere. I think this is more to do with the fact Amazon have a pretty good system of letting me use any suitable device I own.

It may not be about money

[ukoda]

I think the older generation have seen enough companies and technologies come and go over the years to know that paying for DRM's content is a really bad idea. Try buying a book you recently heard about in an open format that you can read on all of your devices and with no reading dependencies on some companies whim or longevity. The odds are above even that pirated content is going to be easier to find in a format that can be trusted. Money may be a factor but don't under estimate the mistrust old people have for the 'system', they have seen how the commercial scams pan out over time and are no in a hurry to buy into that.

Re: When Ebooks are more expensive then pysical co

[Anonymous Coward]

And what happens when your ebook vendor closes up shop?
like microsoft, sony, kalahari, etc, have done.

eBook piracy is only because of eBook prices

[Kevin108]

The demographic described in this story must be the most likely to comprehend that eBook prices don't make any damn sense. The publishers want $10-$15 for a text file. How is this justifiable? For many titles, that's the price for a hardback copy! A paper book is almost always cheaper than an eBook, but requires actual physical resources for creation and delivery, and has resale value.

Various providers have figured out how to eliminate piracy for music and movies. Is reading books just such a dead pastime that the market doesn't care to offer potential customers the convenience and price point that makes piracy stop making sense?

Path of least resistance....

[MercTech]

The experience....

Hear about a new book.....

Put title or author into Google
Get returns for 8 pirate download sites and 4 sales sites.
Click on sales site.
Get inundated with adverts to the point you can't read the listing of books.
Click on another sales site
Get to the fourth web page trying to register to use the side and get disgusted
Click on another sales site.
See that they want over $20 for a digital version of the book you are interested in.
Click on the last sales site.
Have the shopping cart bomb three times while trying to purchase.
Go to the first pirate site, download, be reading within a minute.

At least this experience is becoming less frequent with Amazon carrying so many authors in eBook only format. And, the publishing houses getting off the idiot paradigm that an eBook should cost the same as a library grade hard cover.