Pirated books thrive on Amazon(nypost.com)
nypost.com
Pirated books thrive on Amazon
https://nypost.com/2022/07/31/pirated-books-thrive-on-amazon-authors-say-web-giant-ignores-fraud/
79 comments
That sounds a lot like the current state of credit card fraud detection in the US. Merchants, the end company you're buying from, end up holding the bag for fraud. At the other end, the payment networks for Visa and Mastercard have all the visibility, history and context, but none of the liability.
Excellent example of workers knowing what’s best yet having less than zero control over it (at best setting precedence that it was a waste of time to combat unjust hierarchical decision making through hard work and advocacy without role based power). A bigger change is needed without waiting on those who achieve power to change their minds for a min
Well if nothing else, I'm glad that my intuition is not too far off-base. I had assumed that with a fairly minimal amount of analysis of the data that Amazon definitely has or can get, fraud would stand out plainly, therefore failure to address is organisational, not technical.
This alone should be an article on a major newspaper...
After several 80$ blatant photocopies, I stopped buying books from amazon. My local bookshop can order almost any book directly from the publisher, and I can refuse the purchase if it looks pirated.
Cory Doctorow has talked about this problem in what is possibly the cheekiest choice of medium I've ever seen: https://www.amazon.com/Why-None-Books-Available-Audible/dp/B...
This isn't limited to fake copies of books which are legitimately listed on Amazon, either. About a decade ago I found my doctoral thesis available for sale on Amazon -- with someone else listed as the author.
I have had this happen with a few O’Reilly books purchased from Amazon. The paper was ridiculously thin and I could see the page edges from photocopying all throughout the book. Amazon did accept the returns. I don’t like what Amazon has turned into, it used to be such a great place to shop online. Now it’s mostly garbage.
"Fight Club" is a grand example of pirating. The author got the book printed and movie made only because early version was so popular in Usenet.
-- Wikipedia does not tell the truth, but it never does.
-- Wikipedia does not tell the truth, but it never does.
Or maybe simple firefighter Palahniuk did not even know what internet was. Thus it was indeed a "surprise" when his book was suddenly accepted.
Anyways. The original short story was published in some shitty literary magazine, wherefrom the evil pirate copied it to Usenet.
Anyways. The original short story was published in some shitty literary magazine, wherefrom the evil pirate copied it to Usenet.
IMHO, Tron 2 was also only made because of heavy piracy of the original -- the gap between the two seems baffling otherwise.
I don't see that claim in the wiki but maybe I need to look closer.
Many of Amazon practices I find questionable, and I think unsustainable in a long term. Unfortunately legal frameworks does not put enough pressure on them to change. Vote with your money, I was able reduce my amazon purchases to 2-4 a quarter and use other online/offline retailers.
A long time ago, Karsten Self did a stock demand curve analysis of software piracy:
http://linuxmafia.com/~karsten/Rants/piracy.html
Turns out that software piracy keeps prices lower. As consumers, we are regularly told that price of goods or services is absolutely all that matters. Therefore, why should consumers care of some pirated books appear on Amazon?
Turns out that software piracy keeps prices lower. As consumers, we are regularly told that price of goods or services is absolutely all that matters. Therefore, why should consumers care of some pirated books appear on Amazon?
> why should consumers care of some pirated books appear on Amazon?
Speaking as an author: because I write for a living, and if I can't earn a living at this I'll have to find some other job, which will cause me to stop writing. Piracy is directly rivalrous for the author's revenue-earning product. (Libraries are less so insofar as Public Lending Right and royalties on library editions cause some money to go to the authors.)
Remember, authors are not film studios or rock groups. We don't have merchandising opportunities, we don't perform live for a ticket fee, and we're mostly very small-scale sole trader businesses. Our revenue comes 100% from sales of our books, unlike bands (who make peanuts from streaming but are paid to tour) or film studios (lots of spin-off merchandise).
(Median income for full time novelists working in the UK, per the ALCS in 2022, was around £7000 a year. A tiny handful make millions, a large number are hobbyists doing it in their spare time for pin money, a small number of us earn a middle class income -- not management level, not even programmer or web developer level. It doesn't take much to tip us from "just getting by" to "giving up, have to go stack shelves in a supermarket" territory.)
Speaking as an author: because I write for a living, and if I can't earn a living at this I'll have to find some other job, which will cause me to stop writing. Piracy is directly rivalrous for the author's revenue-earning product. (Libraries are less so insofar as Public Lending Right and royalties on library editions cause some money to go to the authors.)
Remember, authors are not film studios or rock groups. We don't have merchandising opportunities, we don't perform live for a ticket fee, and we're mostly very small-scale sole trader businesses. Our revenue comes 100% from sales of our books, unlike bands (who make peanuts from streaming but are paid to tour) or film studios (lots of spin-off merchandise).
(Median income for full time novelists working in the UK, per the ALCS in 2022, was around £7000 a year. A tiny handful make millions, a large number are hobbyists doing it in their spare time for pin money, a small number of us earn a middle class income -- not management level, not even programmer or web developer level. It doesn't take much to tip us from "just getting by" to "giving up, have to go stack shelves in a supermarket" territory.)
>Remember, authors are not film studios or rock groups. We don't have merchandising opportunities, we don't perform live for a ticket fee
They used to! Charles Dickens was very popular in the US in the 19th century. But because of the lack of international copyright laws, it was completely legal for American publishers to print copies of his books without giving him a dime (because they were only covered by British copyright). So what did he do? He did a couple of tours of the US where he sold tickets to shows where he would read from his books and answer questions from the audience.
They used to! Charles Dickens was very popular in the US in the 19th century. But because of the lack of international copyright laws, it was completely legal for American publishers to print copies of his books without giving him a dime (because they were only covered by British copyright). So what did he do? He did a couple of tours of the US where he sold tickets to shows where he would read from his books and answer questions from the audience.
Book tours are still a thing. minus the money. Although maybe the big authors like King, Martin, Gaiman, Rowling, Sanderson, get something out of it.
I'm not sure how common book tours are. I've done some book signings at events where I've nudged the event organizers into buying some books and giving me a table to sign them at some scheduled time. (Pro tip: It helps to have someone high up in the event hosting organization quoted in the book :-))
But my impression is that publishers are pretty selective at sending authors around the country on a book tour these days. Obviously big time (or even big time genre) authors can often book pretty nice speaking gigs if they like.
But my impression is that publishers are pretty selective at sending authors around the country on a book tour these days. Obviously big time (or even big time genre) authors can often book pretty nice speaking gigs if they like.
Publishers are very selective about sending authors on tours, because (except for the very biggest names) tours don't make money and cost quite a lot to organize -- they're loss-leaders designed to generate enthusiasm among booksellers (independent bookstores generate disproportionately more sales than you might expect given their usually-small size, and an enthusiastic local seller who feels a sense of amity towards an author can over a period of years produce thousands of additional sales).
I got sent on a couple of book tours when my career was spiking, over a decade ago. Grueling, and no very visible short term impact on sales ... and that's with free ticketing (the events were to generate publicity, not revenue). Many authors are middle-aged introverts and don't really thrive under such conditions -- myself included.
I got sent on a couple of book tours when my career was spiking, over a decade ago. Grueling, and no very visible short term impact on sales ... and that's with free ticketing (the events were to generate publicity, not revenue). Many authors are middle-aged introverts and don't really thrive under such conditions -- myself included.
I'd probably actually like it personally but my books are just trade press computer stuff and I doubt I'll do something through a publisher again. Not because of any particularly bad experience but it basically happened because of who I was sitting next to at some event dinner and I'd just as soon not make any material money on my own terms :-)
I think my favorite short/novella/novelette(?) of yours is A Colder War. But lots of great work!
I think my favorite short/novella/novelette(?) of yours is A Colder War. But lots of great work!
I'd rather a great writer write than be stuck on book tours.
I was just thinking about this today, I hope you don't mind me bouncing it off of you?
The computers & robots seem poised to make most human labor obsolete. (I'm only really good at programming computers and I feel like my career prospects just evaporated. Craigslist job section seems to agree with that assessment as well.)
To me it seems like the obvious response is to sort of declare ourselves the winners (Humanity: 1, Nature: 0) and get on with Star Trek. (In other words, institute something like UBI so people don't starve and/or riot, fix up our relationship with the ecology so civilization doesn't crash, ...and then I don't care what we do.)
What I'm getting at, is, as a professional author, if you were paid just to live and write, would you still want to be paid-per-copy of your work? I don't mean in a greed sense ("If it is money it is good.") but more in the philosophical or practical senses.
As an example of what I mean, the young fellow who writes/draws "Kill Six Billion Demons" ( https://killsixbilliondemons.com/ ) basically went from art school directly to a fan-supported, uh, career on one story, releasing pages as he drew them. (He then also publishes hardcopies, and I think he sells schwag too.)
The computers & robots seem poised to make most human labor obsolete. (I'm only really good at programming computers and I feel like my career prospects just evaporated. Craigslist job section seems to agree with that assessment as well.)
To me it seems like the obvious response is to sort of declare ourselves the winners (Humanity: 1, Nature: 0) and get on with Star Trek. (In other words, institute something like UBI so people don't starve and/or riot, fix up our relationship with the ecology so civilization doesn't crash, ...and then I don't care what we do.)
What I'm getting at, is, as a professional author, if you were paid just to live and write, would you still want to be paid-per-copy of your work? I don't mean in a greed sense ("If it is money it is good.") but more in the philosophical or practical senses.
As an example of what I mean, the young fellow who writes/draws "Kill Six Billion Demons" ( https://killsixbilliondemons.com/ ) basically went from art school directly to a fan-supported, uh, career on one story, releasing pages as he drew them. (He then also publishes hardcopies, and I think he sells schwag too.)
This exactly. I'm actually really surprised that so many people here who are head-deep in the open-source software community think that books are somehow different.
Is restricting the use of your software or the blog post you spent a long time researcher or whatever to paying customers really want you want?
When I write software I want the most people I can reach to use it. I get a kick out of people finding my software useful.
The world we live in now with a huge universe of free software is a bazzilion times better than the world of the 1980s when I started programming. I want the same for other industries. Pay people to live and let them do what they enjoy. Some of them will create stuff for others.
Is restricting the use of your software or the blog post you spent a long time researcher or whatever to paying customers really want you want?
When I write software I want the most people I can reach to use it. I get a kick out of people finding my software useful.
The world we live in now with a huge universe of free software is a bazzilion times better than the world of the 1980s when I started programming. I want the same for other industries. Pay people to live and let them do what they enjoy. Some of them will create stuff for others.
> What I'm getting at, is, as a professional author, if you were paid just to live and write, would you still want to be paid-per-copy of your work?
Ideally I'd like to know how many people were reading my work, and whether they liked it -- but I really just want the freedom to write (in reasonable comfort).
Unfortunately actually-existing-capitalism as it is today provides no mechanism for doing this, at least on any scale that can support more than a tiny handful of authors, plus the folks climbing the teaching-MFA LitFic academic career ladder (for whom writing is often simply an extramural career progression activity -- with notable exceptions).
Ideally I'd like to know how many people were reading my work, and whether they liked it -- but I really just want the freedom to write (in reasonable comfort).
Unfortunately actually-existing-capitalism as it is today provides no mechanism for doing this, at least on any scale that can support more than a tiny handful of authors, plus the folks climbing the teaching-MFA LitFic academic career ladder (for whom writing is often simply an extramural career progression activity -- with notable exceptions).
That's the failed promise of Amazon Unlimited though, isn't it? Authors get some sliver of the monthly $10 in exchange for having their books on the service,
according to how much they're read. If it cost readers $1,000/month and had enough customers then author's could collect real amounts of money and live off that. Unfortunately, the number of people who can even afford an extra $1,000/mo is small, never mind be willing to pay that.
The other problem is a bit harder to solve though. Authors don't get paid by how much they're read, but by how many books people buy. There's a subtle difference between the two, and as the story about a large number of record owners not owning record players suggests, I might read book one of a series, get really excited about the rest of the series and buy them all. And then not read them. Maybe it balances out with readers passing one copy of a book around, but I doubt that. That might just have to be something author would have to face if Expensive Kindle Unlimited ever became a thing.
The other problem is a bit harder to solve though. Authors don't get paid by how much they're read, but by how many books people buy. There's a subtle difference between the two, and as the story about a large number of record owners not owning record players suggests, I might read book one of a series, get really excited about the rest of the series and buy them all. And then not read them. Maybe it balances out with readers passing one copy of a book around, but I doubt that. That might just have to be something author would have to face if Expensive Kindle Unlimited ever became a thing.
> Ideally I'd like to know how many people were reading my work, and whether they liked it -- but I really just want the freedom to write (in reasonable comfort).
FWIW, I kinda figured. If you were really that into money you would have picked a different career, eh? (As a fan I'm glad you didn't.)
> Unfortunately actually-existing-capitalism as it is today provides no mechanism for doing this,
Ah, that's where it all falls down, eh?
I've got some ideas, and I just got some land on which to try them. At risk of sounding like an asshole, I'm looking forward to finding out if I'm a genius or just full of shit, you know?
FWIW, I kinda figured. If you were really that into money you would have picked a different career, eh? (As a fan I'm glad you didn't.)
> Unfortunately actually-existing-capitalism as it is today provides no mechanism for doing this,
Ah, that's where it all falls down, eh?
I've got some ideas, and I just got some land on which to try them. At risk of sounding like an asshole, I'm looking forward to finding out if I'm a genius or just full of shit, you know?
Question for you in particular since you are an author who I read and enjoy (and pay): Would you continue writing novels if you got UBI of equivalent size and weren't allowed to charge for your books?
Speaking for myself, that’s damn near the dream. Wild success is nice, but consistency is the true holy grail in art. If I had a consistent reliable source of income and could budget the rest of my life around it, I’d never have to do all the side work — marketing, deal making, querying, networking, etc — that is required currently BECAUSE one must maximize the profit of the good times to shore up against the lean.
How would you feel if the UBI were, say, $10K per year which is the likely number compared to any (unlikely) number would be?
Exactly the same, assuming this remains the UBI applied to all folks, not just artists. Again, I don’t think I can overstate how game changing regular payments of that amount would be. Being able to plan ahead is a rare luxury in the art game.
Not just for individuals either — imagine what would come out of the collectives of artists who would pool that money.
And in such a world, where basic needs for all citizens are handled already, I can see a version wherein art and entertainment would be even more greatly valued — especially since UBI means access doesn’t need to be gated nearly as harshly.
Not just for individuals either — imagine what would come out of the collectives of artists who would pool that money.
And in such a world, where basic needs for all citizens are handled already, I can see a version wherein art and entertainment would be even more greatly valued — especially since UBI means access doesn’t need to be gated nearly as harshly.
That's what I'd call living the dream!
Limited, but not zero, as the existence of a Laundry table top game states. I would totally buy a "Bob Howard" minifig or some sort of Laundry diorama from you!
One of those "book nook" things in the shape of a Laundry IT office would be pretty fun (until the SCORPION STARE cameras blow up the neighbouring shelf).
It quasi surprises how pro-piracy hacker news is, probably in large part due to need to minimize their own guilt from their own piracy. Maybe there is a socialist bent with the belief that if there was no money novelists and artisan software craftsmen could produce for the love of it. It seems that only SaaS products are acceptable but then hackernews also hates subscriptions...
A lot of things are indeed desirable enough to produce that many of us keep producing them even without much in the way of economic incentives. As someone firmly in the hobby segment when it comes to writing (my two self-published novels has sold more than average yet still won't cover my - admittedly ridiculous - takeaway spend) the money doesn't matter to me, and so I've probably given away as many copies as I've sold.
The problem I have with this support of piracy myself, is that while there'd be millions of books still being published without noteworthy economic incentives, economic incentives matters to get volume and quality from at least a proportion of those producing creative works full time who we'd really like to be able to dedicate their time fully to it.
In other words: Even if (and that's purely for the sake of argument) I had the talent to produce something of similar quality as cstross, talent is not enough. It also takes a huge amount of time and dedication to polish those skills to get to the that level, and very few people who are doing it as a hobby can ever hope to (and/or want to) put in the level of effort needed. I certainly could never do that.
If we could achieve the same with grants or something like UBI, great, but I feel we'd lose a great amount of of creative works if it wasn't possible for a proportion of people to work full time honing those skills. And many of those works would be among our best.
The problem I have with this support of piracy myself, is that while there'd be millions of books still being published without noteworthy economic incentives, economic incentives matters to get volume and quality from at least a proportion of those producing creative works full time who we'd really like to be able to dedicate their time fully to it.
In other words: Even if (and that's purely for the sake of argument) I had the talent to produce something of similar quality as cstross, talent is not enough. It also takes a huge amount of time and dedication to polish those skills to get to the that level, and very few people who are doing it as a hobby can ever hope to (and/or want to) put in the level of effort needed. I certainly could never do that.
If we could achieve the same with grants or something like UBI, great, but I feel we'd lose a great amount of of creative works if it wasn't possible for a proportion of people to work full time honing those skills. And many of those works would be among our best.
My dad wrote a book. It sold reasonably well as an academic book, but his hourly pay for it probably was in the single digits of pennies. He knew this in advance, and wrote the book as a prestige thing.
For non-fiction I think that is often the most viable way of getting a return on the time spent. I've not published any non-fiction in print, but even my (old... time to write some again) blog posts have more than once gotten people to put aside coding tests and/or fast-track me through interview processes, so the prestige is certainly a good point.
Some people will reflexively mod down anything that's pro-artist or pro-writer. They continue to embrace the idea that somehow piracy is somehow a good thing when it's pretty easy to see how it hurts.
Many of us probably actually discovered what we wanted to do for a living by being able to use all sorts of software that was way more expensive than we could afford as a teen, which eventually led to buying the software. I am thoroughly against pirating things you are making money off of, but more lenient on personal use/exploration/learning. If there was something akin to a public library full of the worlds commercial software for people to discover, explore and play with, I would have done that as that's where I was getting most of the books from that I was using to learn all of this complex software, like the $18,000 Alias|Wavefront 3D software, back then.
I totally get it, it’s a market segmentation problem where pirated software serves the bottom end of the market. If companies officially offered such discount prices then they’d be pressured by their regular customers for the same price. Segmenting based on willing to risk pirate software is a convenient workaround. Personally I’m still clinging on to old versions of perpetually licensed software. It makes little sense for me to pay a yearly subscription for something I use a few days a year. I’d much rather a day rate or hourly as I do a wide variety of things but only one thing at a time.
Some companies provide free non-commercial versions for learning e.g. Houdini and Nuke. I wish more companies would do it.
Hell, Davinci gives away their video editor application Resolve Free for commercial use. They're able to do that because they money off of hardware sales and getting editors into their ecosystem is worth more than a software license would be. (They do also sell a pro/Studio version of their software.)
A lot of high end software does have an education discount version if you're affiliated with a local college or university.
A lot of high end software does have an education discount version if you're affiliated with a local college or university.
> novelists and artisan software craftsmen could produce for the love of it
People probably won't build some dashboard for a large boring corporation but they absolutely will do it for something they love. This isn't even theoretical. See how much software and programming research exists completely outside of the market. And for writing, take a look at fan fiction or stuff on writing subreddits.
Certainly some people do it for money, but there still is a significant number of people who do it for the love of it.
People probably won't build some dashboard for a large boring corporation but they absolutely will do it for something they love. This isn't even theoretical. See how much software and programming research exists completely outside of the market. And for writing, take a look at fan fiction or stuff on writing subreddits.
Certainly some people do it for money, but there still is a significant number of people who do it for the love of it.
The D language, that I work on, is given away entirely for free. It has the most permissive license I can find (Boost). I don't get paid for contributing to D.
The same goes for most contributors to D. (A handful get paid via sponsors.)
If you're familiar with my posts, I'm about as far from a socialist as one can get.
The same goes for most contributors to D. (A handful get paid via sponsors.)
If you're familiar with my posts, I'm about as far from a socialist as one can get.
> why should consumers care of some pirated books appear on Amazon?
As the article demonstrates, when the quality is extremely low, the consumers suffer. Also, in this case, the price of the pirated books is the same as the price of the authentic books, so this is not a good demonstration of Karsten’s armchair economic theory of software piracy. In this case, the consumer loses and the real authors & publishers lose, while these fraudulent middle-men, the fake publishers and Amazon, pocket the difference in price. This is bad for the consumer and bad for the economy, in addition to being illegal.
Your question implicitly is asking why we even have Copyright Law and/or the Berne Convention, which is something that has a long a rich history. I don’t feel like we need to justify the existence of copy rights. There’s a rich debate on how long copyright should last and what the limits should be, but very few people suggesting we should just get rid of it completely and allow the pirates to flourish.
As the article demonstrates, when the quality is extremely low, the consumers suffer. Also, in this case, the price of the pirated books is the same as the price of the authentic books, so this is not a good demonstration of Karsten’s armchair economic theory of software piracy. In this case, the consumer loses and the real authors & publishers lose, while these fraudulent middle-men, the fake publishers and Amazon, pocket the difference in price. This is bad for the consumer and bad for the economy, in addition to being illegal.
Your question implicitly is asking why we even have Copyright Law and/or the Berne Convention, which is something that has a long a rich history. I don’t feel like we need to justify the existence of copy rights. There’s a rich debate on how long copyright should last and what the limits should be, but very few people suggesting we should just get rid of it completely and allow the pirates to flourish.
How does this work? There's plenty of books this is tested on: out of copyright works.
And there's indeed a great variety of quality available on those books. Great and very bad. Consumers don't suffer because of this, at least I don't, in fact I've recently discovered a bunch of out-of-print out-of-copyright mathematical works that are so much better.
Also I got pirated Anthony Horowitz books (I have the originals, but 30 year old book and all. Plus it's in the attic), that are much better than the originals at this point.
The thing is when it comes to actually making texts and culture available, libraries and librarians (and archive.org), and indeed piracy are generally the highest available quality. Why? Because there's no alternative. Once 2 or 3 years pass, copyright owners forget 99% of their stuff and just refuse to make it available. Expected profit is just too low (this goes 10x against publishers, who often take books out of print against the wishes of authors). So libraries are the only quality available, and I much prefer that over the black hole copyright owners present ...
And there's indeed a great variety of quality available on those books. Great and very bad. Consumers don't suffer because of this, at least I don't, in fact I've recently discovered a bunch of out-of-print out-of-copyright mathematical works that are so much better.
Also I got pirated Anthony Horowitz books (I have the originals, but 30 year old book and all. Plus it's in the attic), that are much better than the originals at this point.
The thing is when it comes to actually making texts and culture available, libraries and librarians (and archive.org), and indeed piracy are generally the highest available quality. Why? Because there's no alternative. Once 2 or 3 years pass, copyright owners forget 99% of their stuff and just refuse to make it available. Expected profit is just too low (this goes 10x against publishers, who often take books out of print against the wishes of authors). So libraries are the only quality available, and I much prefer that over the black hole copyright owners present ...
I’m not sure I understand your question, but works that are out of copyright aren’t relevant to the reasons that copyright exists, or to the fact that Amazon is allowing fake publishers to undercut legitimate publishers with extremely low-quality copies.
Copyright grants a time-limited monopoly to the reproduction of works by their authors. The idea is not that the economy benefits from protection forever, but that the authors have enough time to recoup their costs before the works become public. Many people (me included) think copyright terms are too long, but here we are discussing the idea that the term length should be zero, which I speculate most people would agree is too short. Having the economic incentive to produce good works is important to our economy, and if works can be stolen and faked immediately and the authors can’t profit from them, there is no incentive to make good things.
I guess to clarify… the quality of a reproduction hurts consumers when the quality is lower than the authentic original, like the case of the Amazon books in this article. But generally speaking, quality isn’t super high on the list of reasons for copyrights, or on the broader economic arguments. The primary reason, it is argued, that fakes and copying hurts consumers is because it’s a drain on the economic incentives for creative and productive people to author new works.
Copyright grants a time-limited monopoly to the reproduction of works by their authors. The idea is not that the economy benefits from protection forever, but that the authors have enough time to recoup their costs before the works become public. Many people (me included) think copyright terms are too long, but here we are discussing the idea that the term length should be zero, which I speculate most people would agree is too short. Having the economic incentive to produce good works is important to our economy, and if works can be stolen and faked immediately and the authors can’t profit from them, there is no incentive to make good things.
I guess to clarify… the quality of a reproduction hurts consumers when the quality is lower than the authentic original, like the case of the Amazon books in this article. But generally speaking, quality isn’t super high on the list of reasons for copyrights, or on the broader economic arguments. The primary reason, it is argued, that fakes and copying hurts consumers is because it’s a drain on the economic incentives for creative and productive people to author new works.
> Copyright grants a time-limited monopoly to the reproduction of works by their authors
The copyright length is so long and has been extended so many times that it for a long time could have been considered infinite. Maybe with some new works showing up in the public domain on January first now it's true again. But still, the length is looooong. There are books from the 1980s and 1990s that are out-of-print and almost impossible to find. Some authors are able to take back their copyright and release them to the public domain or some CC license after they are out-of-print but many works are just abandoned.
I'm all for people making a living, but man, it's absurd these days. Maybe we should move copyright down to 20 years or something.
The copyright length is so long and has been extended so many times that it for a long time could have been considered infinite. Maybe with some new works showing up in the public domain on January first now it's true again. But still, the length is looooong. There are books from the 1980s and 1990s that are out-of-print and almost impossible to find. Some authors are able to take back their copyright and release them to the public domain or some CC license after they are out-of-print but many works are just abandoned.
I'm all for people making a living, but man, it's absurd these days. Maybe we should move copyright down to 20 years or something.
Many authors write for most of their lives before they see success. Who is really suffering from copyright laws being longer than 20 years? Is there a giant void in culture because books go out-of-print? In cases of non-fiction and academics I can see there maybe being an issue with students not being able to learn, but with most fiction it's really ok to have to put some effort into obtaining a copy.
There are always new and amazing books being written. It's ok if some are difficult to obtain or abandoned. It's their creation and they can let it die.
There are always new and amazing books being written. It's ok if some are difficult to obtain or abandoned. It's their creation and they can let it die.
This difference in our perspectives is fascinating. I think of cultural works to be owned by society. The moment you make something public then society can do what it wants with it. We give exclusive rights to the author as a pragmatic step to allow them to afford to spend time creating. We won’t need this temporary band-aid when we are fully post-scarcity.
I think that society suffers when we artificially make cultural artifacts scarce. I don’t know how to quantify that suffering. I feel like there are parallels between the explosion in quality software and what we can do with it and the availability of open source software (including the languages, documentation, and discovery/distribution).
I think that society suffers when we artificially make cultural artifacts scarce. I don’t know how to quantify that suffering. I feel like there are parallels between the explosion in quality software and what we can do with it and the availability of open source software (including the languages, documentation, and discovery/distribution).
> The moment you make something public then society can do what it wants with it.
Very strongly disagree with this. If Stephen King decides no more printings of any of his books he's is well within his right to do so. He can share it with the world or not.
> I think that society suffers when we artificially make cultural artifacts scarce.
I agree with this only if it's the intent of the creator. For instance, putting a Picasso painting in a billionaire's office / yacht / warehouse and locking it away is probably wrong in the sense Picasso most likely didn't want his paintings under lock and key. And although I love Picasso I don't know if there's suffering in society when there's so much other art available. It's a loss for sure, but I don't know if society is any worse.
Very strongly disagree with this. If Stephen King decides no more printings of any of his books he's is well within his right to do so. He can share it with the world or not.
> I think that society suffers when we artificially make cultural artifacts scarce.
I agree with this only if it's the intent of the creator. For instance, putting a Picasso painting in a billionaire's office / yacht / warehouse and locking it away is probably wrong in the sense Picasso most likely didn't want his paintings under lock and key. And although I love Picasso I don't know if there's suffering in society when there's so much other art available. It's a loss for sure, but I don't know if society is any worse.
> The primary reason, it is argued, that fakes and copying hurts consumers is because it’s a drain on the economic incentives for creative and productive people to author new works.
And this is kind of stupid because authors that can live on their book earnings are very rare indeed. In fact, you can blame communism for a lot of things, but it certainly produced a lot of books, which would seem to indicate that should it become possible in the US survive on the promise to make a book, while making zero profit of the actual book, many more books would be produced.
Economic incentives incentivise publishers, not authors. That has never really been different. That business model can't really exist without copyright. Authors very much can.
And this is kind of stupid because authors that can live on their book earnings are very rare indeed. In fact, you can blame communism for a lot of things, but it certainly produced a lot of books, which would seem to indicate that should it become possible in the US survive on the promise to make a book, while making zero profit of the actual book, many more books would be produced.
Economic incentives incentivise publishers, not authors. That has never really been different. That business model can't really exist without copyright. Authors very much can.
I guess I still don’t understand your question/point. Yes if we had a hypothetically different economy in the US I suppose maybe more independent authors could get by on writing alone. They need to make a living somehow, someone needs to pay. UBI might produce more authors…
I’m not really sure why it matters how common it is for writers to make full time living on their work. What does that have to do with whether other people should be allowed to copy it without permission and get all the money for it? Copyright law does not depend on whether people can make a living creating something, it always applies, and gives authors enough time to make money, recoup costs, or sit on it, or do whatever they want (or more than enough time, as the case may be). Personally, I don’t buy into the idea that someone should be able to publish my work and make money off it just because its unavailable, for example, there should be other better reasons.
BTW, China and Russia are both party to the Berne Convention, so regardless of how authors make money, even communists believe writers and musicians and all creative people should be protected from copy theft, just like the capitalists and socialists do.
> Economic incentives incentivize publishers, not authors.
Naw, not true. Lots of people who create believe their work might make a lot of money, even if it never does. (Just like everyone who plays the lottery believes they have a chance to win.) Plus lots of people are okay with making small amounts of money, and never intended to make a full time living.
I’m not really sure why it matters how common it is for writers to make full time living on their work. What does that have to do with whether other people should be allowed to copy it without permission and get all the money for it? Copyright law does not depend on whether people can make a living creating something, it always applies, and gives authors enough time to make money, recoup costs, or sit on it, or do whatever they want (or more than enough time, as the case may be). Personally, I don’t buy into the idea that someone should be able to publish my work and make money off it just because its unavailable, for example, there should be other better reasons.
BTW, China and Russia are both party to the Berne Convention, so regardless of how authors make money, even communists believe writers and musicians and all creative people should be protected from copy theft, just like the capitalists and socialists do.
> Economic incentives incentivize publishers, not authors.
Naw, not true. Lots of people who create believe their work might make a lot of money, even if it never does. (Just like everyone who plays the lottery believes they have a chance to win.) Plus lots of people are okay with making small amounts of money, and never intended to make a full time living.
I used to make software for the masses but it was pirated to the point that the business wasn't viable. I had to switch to a very expensive small niche. While pirating is still rampant it's a niche where I can effectively sue so I can make sure at least my biggest customers keep paying which is enough to keep the business afloat. A lot of goods simply will not be produced at any price if piracy keeps producers out of the market.
How do you explain open source software then? Why is Linux still being developed?
Direct or indirect support from various corporations generally.
So it turns out that you can actually make money if you offer source code for free.
Epic Games earn billions with their Unreal Engine and Fortnite and they aren't afraid of pirates.
Epic Games earn billions with their Unreal Engine and Fortnite and they aren't afraid of pirates.
They earn a lot from Fortnite sure.
Unreal engine is not technically open source, I’m aware that their revenue from it is that significant compared to Fortnite and they make money by taking a share of revenue from it’s users.
Not sure how all of that is relevant for open source though . IBM/Red Hat, Google or even Oracle would be much better examples
Unreal engine is not technically open source, I’m aware that their revenue from it is that significant compared to Fortnite and they make money by taking a share of revenue from it’s users.
Not sure how all of that is relevant for open source though . IBM/Red Hat, Google or even Oracle would be much better examples
It might be tied to scenarios where the engineers producing said piece of software expected no compensation whatsoever (more or less).
I bought a technical book from Amazon recently, and it looks extremely legit. However, when I got to Chapter 4, only the sidebars and titles were printed—not the main text. The pirates had some kind of typesetting error, and a whole chapter was borked. So not only do I feel duped that I gave the scammers money, I had to rebuy the book (more carefully this time).
I'm not sure most people would care if not for the quality issues. Big surprise, someone willing to rip off someone else's work is also going to cut corners to make a product so inferior as to be practically useless.
Until, or unless it starts actually and materially affecting Amazon's bottom line, I doubt they'll do anything significant about anything. They're the 800lb gorilla and will survive for decades just on entropy at this point.
Until, or unless it starts actually and materially affecting Amazon's bottom line, I doubt they'll do anything significant about anything. They're the 800lb gorilla and will survive for decades just on entropy at this point.
you are describing the point of view of the market manager, whose wish is to make profit and keep the (relative) peace. Brand protection is a different concern, a concern of many participants, not the manager.
Brand integrity is a way for consumers to find quality or other attributes reliably. Brand building is a real way to build wealth for those seeking to do business in the market. These positions are fragile and rely on some amount of enforcement by the market managers.
This point of view is similar to many professions who deal with large volumes of the population, and when some of them become ill, suffer, have losses or disappointment, the response is "the market is healthy. To make an omelette you have to break a few eggs. What business is it of mine if people buy fake products?"
Brand integrity is a way for consumers to find quality or other attributes reliably. Brand building is a real way to build wealth for those seeking to do business in the market. These positions are fragile and rely on some amount of enforcement by the market managers.
This point of view is similar to many professions who deal with large volumes of the population, and when some of them become ill, suffer, have losses or disappointment, the response is "the market is healthy. To make an omelette you have to break a few eggs. What business is it of mine if people buy fake products?"
software piracy has two effects - it keeps prices lower and it helps spread the purchase of legal licenses of software.
It helps spread the legal license of software because by using illegal software you learn how to use it and when you get to a job you ask your employer for a version of the software you are familiar with, or because others need to buy software to interop with your illegal software.
There is not really any reason to suppose that pirated books help the sale of real books in a similar manner.
It helps spread the legal license of software because by using illegal software you learn how to use it and when you get to a job you ask your employer for a version of the software you are familiar with, or because others need to buy software to interop with your illegal software.
There is not really any reason to suppose that pirated books help the sale of real books in a similar manner.
> why should consumers care of some pirated books appear on Amazon?
Because pirated books are almost always of markedly lower quality, whereas pirated software is (almost always) functionally equivalent to (or better than) the non-pirated software.
Because pirated books are almost always of markedly lower quality, whereas pirated software is (almost always) functionally equivalent to (or better than) the non-pirated software.
Except when pirated software includes malware or excludes assets to save space.
True, but does that happen in any regularity even close to approaching the regularity of bad-quality pirated books?
People often say that pirated software has malware, but I liken it to people saying that you can’t trust Wikipedia; i.e. it’s most often false.
People often say that pirated software has malware, but I liken it to people saying that you can’t trust Wikipedia; i.e. it’s most often false.
It certainly happens with enough regularity to create and maintain a reputation for pirated software often-enough being compromised with malware that it is not worth the risk.
The fact that you have both a low-enough risk profile, and exceptional skills to minimize both the incoming risks and the consequences of a problem, does not mean that it is not or should not be a factor for others who have higher risk profiles and lower skills.
I am an actual case in point. Former CTO of several successful software/SAAS companies, now working in manufacturing, including on DOD projects. I could probably make use of some software that is $6-figures/seat, and it'd be fun to try out pirated copies since my small company can't justify that expense. But probably over a decade ago, I did encounter some malware from a download; handled it without a disaster, but it was a significant waste of time and resources. Since then, my observations of even the regular 'legit' software download services (freeware/shareware/trials, even used as official sites by some software authors), is that they look substantially less-well maintained and more 'scammy' than ever. Even if it isn't outright malware, but merely adware that comes along for the ride, I'm out.
Considering the risk of everything from malware to ransomware, to potential exfiltration of even encrypted-on-disk CUI (Confidential Unclassified Information, a new level of information control), I'm extremely wary about any software download, repeatedly check that it is coming directly from the vendor (certs, keys, checksums, etc.).
Again, I'm someone with a somewhat elevated risk profile, but also the (rusty) skills to deal with it, and I legitimately consider it a non-trivial risk. The vast majority of the user population has negative skills to deal with it despite their lower risk profile.
Stop trying to make pirated downloads look like a legitimate and safe option. They are not.
Although vendors are extremely foolish and shortsighted to not make available extended trials, you are still taking something from the owner without permission, and unless you know of some service that is actually 100% effective at scanning for malware, including 0-days and all the morphing/encrypted/etc. malware techniques, it is still a real risk (and if you do know of such a service, let us know about it, and how you have vetted their reliability).
The fact that you have both a low-enough risk profile, and exceptional skills to minimize both the incoming risks and the consequences of a problem, does not mean that it is not or should not be a factor for others who have higher risk profiles and lower skills.
I am an actual case in point. Former CTO of several successful software/SAAS companies, now working in manufacturing, including on DOD projects. I could probably make use of some software that is $6-figures/seat, and it'd be fun to try out pirated copies since my small company can't justify that expense. But probably over a decade ago, I did encounter some malware from a download; handled it without a disaster, but it was a significant waste of time and resources. Since then, my observations of even the regular 'legit' software download services (freeware/shareware/trials, even used as official sites by some software authors), is that they look substantially less-well maintained and more 'scammy' than ever. Even if it isn't outright malware, but merely adware that comes along for the ride, I'm out.
Considering the risk of everything from malware to ransomware, to potential exfiltration of even encrypted-on-disk CUI (Confidential Unclassified Information, a new level of information control), I'm extremely wary about any software download, repeatedly check that it is coming directly from the vendor (certs, keys, checksums, etc.).
Again, I'm someone with a somewhat elevated risk profile, but also the (rusty) skills to deal with it, and I legitimately consider it a non-trivial risk. The vast majority of the user population has negative skills to deal with it despite their lower risk profile.
Stop trying to make pirated downloads look like a legitimate and safe option. They are not.
Although vendors are extremely foolish and shortsighted to not make available extended trials, you are still taking something from the owner without permission, and unless you know of some service that is actually 100% effective at scanning for malware, including 0-days and all the morphing/encrypted/etc. malware techniques, it is still a real risk (and if you do know of such a service, let us know about it, and how you have vetted their reliability).
I have always suspected that the variety of pro-piracy posters on HN probably have no qualms about violating the GPL or other FOSS licenses either. It would be logically consistent at least.
It's funny you say that, but it was Linux that really got me to double down on actual piracy.
I tried to get a Netflix subscription. For a long while, nope. Wouldn't work.
Even now, Paramount streaming specifically excludes Linux. Theyll gladly take your money, though. Oh, and it works for chrome and android, of which the second is Linux.
The people who actually try to buy and pay distributors/creators get screwed time and again. I further refuse to take part in getting screwed again.
Or take the Microsoft Zune. Anyone who bought music there ended up buying void after they arbitrarily shut the auth servers down. Cause, uhh, Microsoft couldn't afford a few auth servers? And their sharing added in illegal DRM, especially if I was playing CC tracks that expressly forbid that. (And of course, the irony that MS is part of the business software alliance, with heavy draconian hands of licenses and copyright.... All the while pirating and breaking GPL with copilot. And you want US to respect you? QED: fuck off, MS)
There's the whole DVD debacle with deCSS.
Whereas with Linux and the FLOSS ecosystem, I do recognize that fellow creators are being ethical, and giving for the cost of "follow my license if you use code". And there's no spyware, DRM, or other harmful stuff. Sure, there's bad actors.... But those bad actors are usually companies like Microsoft who pilfer all our code for their benefit and profit (Copilot).
Tit for tat is the best game theory solution so far. And given how many times I've been screwed over by media companies arbitrarily revoking first-sale doctrine because it was really a rental... That means I'll "pierat" my media. I've paid enough. And I will help others free of charge do the same.
I guess to look at my views, it really is anti-commercial and pro-FLOSS. And having copyright rules different for the rest of us versus the big media also colors my judgement.
(And my last 3 projects were aGPL3, precisely to keep companies from _aaS my software without contributing back.)
I tried to get a Netflix subscription. For a long while, nope. Wouldn't work.
Even now, Paramount streaming specifically excludes Linux. Theyll gladly take your money, though. Oh, and it works for chrome and android, of which the second is Linux.
The people who actually try to buy and pay distributors/creators get screwed time and again. I further refuse to take part in getting screwed again.
Or take the Microsoft Zune. Anyone who bought music there ended up buying void after they arbitrarily shut the auth servers down. Cause, uhh, Microsoft couldn't afford a few auth servers? And their sharing added in illegal DRM, especially if I was playing CC tracks that expressly forbid that. (And of course, the irony that MS is part of the business software alliance, with heavy draconian hands of licenses and copyright.... All the while pirating and breaking GPL with copilot. And you want US to respect you? QED: fuck off, MS)
There's the whole DVD debacle with deCSS.
Whereas with Linux and the FLOSS ecosystem, I do recognize that fellow creators are being ethical, and giving for the cost of "follow my license if you use code". And there's no spyware, DRM, or other harmful stuff. Sure, there's bad actors.... But those bad actors are usually companies like Microsoft who pilfer all our code for their benefit and profit (Copilot).
Tit for tat is the best game theory solution so far. And given how many times I've been screwed over by media companies arbitrarily revoking first-sale doctrine because it was really a rental... That means I'll "pierat" my media. I've paid enough. And I will help others free of charge do the same.
I guess to look at my views, it really is anti-commercial and pro-FLOSS. And having copyright rules different for the rest of us versus the big media also colors my judgement.
(And my last 3 projects were aGPL3, precisely to keep companies from _aaS my software without contributing back.)
No, there's a lot of people here angry at GitHub for making a code-writing tool that occasionally launders GPL code.
To actually violate the GPL requires at least some effort towards locking the system down. If you just torrent some Linux ISOs, they either contain source, links to source, or that weird written offer thing that GPLv2 wanted. You'd have to actually remove those in order to violate GPL. Pirates would not be happy with you for doing this.
It's also important to note that there's a bit of a difference between different kinds of piracy, and they have different mentalities. You have the FTP topsite scene users, then P2P users, then people trying to resell copyrighted material for money. The first two are more aligned with either "we don't like copyright, period" or "we like downloading free shit", which makes them either aligned with or neutral to the FOSS community. The latter group does not care, they just want a quick way to make a buck. If they couldn't resell other people's books on Amazon, they'd probably be committing some other kind of cybercrime.
To actually violate the GPL requires at least some effort towards locking the system down. If you just torrent some Linux ISOs, they either contain source, links to source, or that weird written offer thing that GPLv2 wanted. You'd have to actually remove those in order to violate GPL. Pirates would not be happy with you for doing this.
It's also important to note that there's a bit of a difference between different kinds of piracy, and they have different mentalities. You have the FTP topsite scene users, then P2P users, then people trying to resell copyrighted material for money. The first two are more aligned with either "we don't like copyright, period" or "we like downloading free shit", which makes them either aligned with or neutral to the FOSS community. The latter group does not care, they just want a quick way to make a buck. If they couldn't resell other people's books on Amazon, they'd probably be committing some other kind of cybercrime.
I hope you do not include me in the pro-piracy category! I buy books and I like to hold them in my hands before buying. I've even bought books to reward, in some small way, authors that seem like good people.
Unfortunately, as in most things, the context of my question seems to have gotten ignored:
> As consumers, we are regularly told that price of goods or services is absolutely all that matters.
Modern anti-trust law pivots on this principle. Modern attitudes toward labor and hourly rates are based on this principle.
Why are we asked to abandon this only in select cases, cases where we as consumers, end up carrying the bulk of the burden?
Unfortunately, as in most things, the context of my question seems to have gotten ignored:
> As consumers, we are regularly told that price of goods or services is absolutely all that matters.
Modern anti-trust law pivots on this principle. Modern attitudes toward labor and hourly rates are based on this principle.
Why are we asked to abandon this only in select cases, cases where we as consumers, end up carrying the bulk of the burden?
Pirated you say? How about these blatantly fraudulent reprints of the original Programming in Lua book by Roberto Ierusalimschy (other books by these "authors" are highly likely also fraudulent):
- Claudia Alves, Alexander Aronowitz: Lua Programming: The Ultimate Beginner's Guide to Learn Lua Step by Step
- Kathleen Peterson: Lua Programming: Syntax, Concepts, and Examples
- Claudia Alves, Alexander Aronowitz: Lua Programming: The Ultimate Beginner's Guide to Learn Lua Step by Step
- Kathleen Peterson: Lua Programming: Syntax, Concepts, and Examples
I was told information wants to be free, though? These authors need to get with the program /s.
In all seriousness, Amazon needs to stop being so complacent and hurry up and remove them.
In all seriousness, Amazon needs to stop being so complacent and hurry up and remove them.
Snarky but people's opinions generally do tend towards a dichotomy of deserving and undeserving victims, if you will, of piracy.
This is a general tendency people believe. The categorical imperative is not something that people live by.
It's okay to pirate from some people but not others. Perhaps because software people are "overpaid" and artists are "underpaid".
Interesting stuff, definitely. For my part, the Kindle makes things too convenient for me to pirate intentionally (once I bought a book only to find that it was almost certainly pirated - massive typos in the metadata and it was removed soon after).
This is a general tendency people believe. The categorical imperative is not something that people live by.
It's okay to pirate from some people but not others. Perhaps because software people are "overpaid" and artists are "underpaid".
Interesting stuff, definitely. For my part, the Kindle makes things too convenient for me to pirate intentionally (once I bought a book only to find that it was almost certainly pirated - massive typos in the metadata and it was removed soon after).
"Amazon is getting flooded with counterfeit versions of books" - Hmm thats bad.
"the issue is especially widespread for textbooks" - Oh ok, carry on then.
"the issue is especially widespread for textbooks" - Oh ok, carry on then.
There was exteme organizational disinterest - partly for a bad but predictable reason (we made a lot of money off these fraudsters) and partly for a reason so bad it still makes me cringe (money recovered from identified fraudsters went into the balance sheet of a different SVP's org, so our org viewed it as a waste of time).
I made the case that the longer we let the problem fester, the less people would trust Amazon to buy anything. Leadership didn't really care but got sick of me constantly making noise about this and eventually signed off. That said, at my project's peak I had four engineers and one data scientist. Compare to consumer fraud and vendor fraud, both of which negatively impact Amazon directly, which were fought by entire VP-level orgs of hundreds of people.
In the end we put together a system that detected blatant fraud easily and in worrying volume, but as soon as I left - which meant there wasn't anyone in leadership sponsoring it - it was quietly mothballed.