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

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

[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

[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: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.

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: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...

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?

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: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: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.