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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.
Welcome to the third world.
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.
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.
#DeleteChrome
DC Universe movies.
I certainly couldn't imagine paying to watch them.
"In America, first you get the sugar, then you get the power, then you get the women..." -H. Simpson
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.
kids these days don't read.
Also - reading correlates with "relatively wealthy"
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
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 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 am not left-handed, either!
with such rants.
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.
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.
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.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
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.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
And we now see their rants were justified.
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.
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!!
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.
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.
That is the new form of copy protection. Just make it so bad that nobody would want to copy it.
I read at +2. If your post doesn't reach that level I will not see or respond to it.