Author to give up Writing due to Illegal Downloads

[mosaix]

The thing is, LIlmiz, it's not about saying if the practice is right or wrong; because morality is ultimately an individual's choice.

Choice in morality is fine, Springs, providing that morality relates to your own possessions not somebody else's.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Absolutely; whatever change suits the problem best. If that's better secuity, great.

If that's not possible, then whatever solution is possible and meets the most parameters.

At the end of the day, I'd like to be a writer, that includes bringing in money from it so I'm on the side of the authors.

Said enough for now, so I'll go cook instead.

Just seen your other post, Mosaix; I agree, that's why we have laws, but I can't change someone else's morality, and the problem is some of the people doing this don't see it as wrong, and they have models which support their thinking. It's a difficult one, I think.

 

[Ursa major]

The thing is, LIlmiz, it's not about saying if the practice is right or wrong; because morality is ultimately an individual's choice. It's not something I'd do, and not something I agree with , but I do accept other's feel differently, otherwise why would they do it?

Morality may be a matter for individuals (although they may have to face the consequences of acting upon theirs). But morality doesn't enter into this. Theft - and that's what it is, the denying to another individual the fruits of their labour - is a matter for society**, not one's conscience. If someone is happy to, and feels no qualms about, taking something that isn't theirs, that may be taken into account. For instance, in a court of law, it generally increases any penalty handed down, because "the accused has shown no remorse for their crime."




** - If you read the article, the author concerned (whatever her merits, her awards, the accusations of plgiarism levelled against her) is complaining that in Spain, authors do not seem to get the same legal protection as they do in, say, the UK or US. (And as we know, US and UK law doesn't provide authors with that much practical protection against eBook theft.)

 

[jojajihisc]

And with a select few, this may indeed work out well... but not for the majority, even of very good writers. indications are that precisely the opposite happens in most cases, and few writers can afford such losses.

Assuming giving away books for free loses money for authors.

It has never been much of a paying profession, save for a tiny number, and most writers either barely make a living wage, or earn well below that, and generally for ridiculously long hours.

I agree.

As others have said, if we allow this sort of thing to continue, eventually all we will have are either a tiny handful of writers who can afford such a situation, or the talentless hacks who just want to be published.

Impossible to know but I doubt it. There might even be more writers. I think a more likely outcome is more and more writers find ways of using new technology to their advantage instead of trying to resist it with legislation and litigation.

The genuine craftsmen (and women) of good writing simply spend too much time and effort to put their stuff out there for others to take for free.

Not if it increases their sales.

Why Authors are Giving Away Books on the Internet

 

[mosaix]

Everything you say may very well be true, Jojajihisc. But the point is that it should be up to the author/publisher to decide what happens to their work, regardless of the commercial outcome.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

I see a lot of blaming the victim here, and I think it is more than a little self-serving. Those who use pirated media naturally want to come up with excuses to justify their behavior. It's all the writer's fault. They should give away their work. They should find another business model. Please. It's not a convincing argument. If you are going to take what isn't yours, at least don't add insult to injury by insulting our intelligence as well. What we do or don't do to protect ourselves does not excuse you from taking what isn't yours to take.

As for the argument: "It's here to stay. You can't stop it. It will happen whatever you say. Get over it." That's just absurd. Consider where this kind of thinking takes us.


People have been picking pockets forever. It's one of the oldest professions.
It's not going away. Still, if someone picked your pocket and stole your money or your credit cards, would you "Just get over it." Would smile and say, "That's all right. I know you'll pay me back someday with interest. In fact, I should have just handed you the money as you passed by." The heck you would.

 

[jojajihisc]

Everything you say may very well be true, Jojajihisc. But the point is that it should be up to the author/publisher to decide what happens to their work, regardless of the commercial outcome.

Ideally, yes it should be. And if we can't make it that way? What should we do?

I think copying books is not only not going anywhere but going to become easier and easier so I'm more interested in realistic solutions to adjusting to new technology than trying to resist it.

They should find another business model. Please. It's not a convincing argument.

Really? Aren't authors trying to make as much as they can from their work?

Would you stick to this line of reasoning even if it could be proven that giving away free books makes more money for the author than not?

I'm not even sure it does yet, and it may be damn hard to prove one way or the other, but many of the people assume that it costs them money when there's just no evidence to support that, on the other hand, there is, as the article I linked notes, at least anecdotal evidence to suggest it increases sales.

People have been picking pockets forever. It's one of the oldest professions.
It's not going away. Still, if someone picked your pocket and stole your money or your credit cards, would you "Just get over it." Would smile and say, "That's all right. I know you'll pay me back someday with interest. In fact, I should have just handed you the money as you passed by." The heck you would.

The difference being that when your pocket is picked you don't get anything in return and what I'm suggesting is that giving away books may make authors more money. Having your pocket picked of $20 to get back $30 is what we may be talking about.

Again, I'd just like to make it clear that I can't say for certain that giving away free ebooks makes money and I don't think people can say for certain that it costs authors money either. We just don't know yet.

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

Would you stick to this line of reasoning even if it could be proven that giving away free books makes more money for the author than not?

Maybe so, maybe not, but what people who read pirated books don't seem to understand is that it's up to us, the authors, to decide whether it's to our benefit or our loss. Realistic or not, it's our decision. Our choice. They have no right to make it for us, and then act like we are the ones being presumptuous.

It's one thing to say, "I do it, we all do it, so give me what I want for free or suffer the consequences," and quite another to say, "I've never done this myself because I think it's taking an unfair advantage, but it's obviously a problem, and have you considered these solutions?"

The one is, essentially, extortion, and the other is a good faith attempt to help out.

I imagine everyone here can figure out for themselves which line they are taking, so I'm not going to comment further.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

But market economics says it may not be the authors choice, or only in the sense that the author can decide not to do it anymore, as in this case. Otherwise, if the author wants to make money out of it it will come down to what model provides payment to them.

It's like we were talking on another thread about how publishers have models in mind which they follow; so more than one book planned, a brand to build on, one book a year etc. etc. and the author may not want to do this, but because it's a business it's a choice of doing it and making a living from writing, or choosing not to a la Swainton and finding a different way.

It's not nice, but it's the same in every industry. I work hard to write new training materials and hand outs etc etc and I put a lot of time into it. Some trainers I know copywrite everything, but I know once I deliver it if any student in the room wants to cobble that together and deliver it themselves there's nothing I can do about it. I would like to be able to stop them doing it, it would mean more business for me, but I know I realistically can't, so I take what I can and hope the fact I wrote something/said something good enough to be nicked comes back to me as a form of recommendation. It's not the same I know, but I have to work within the model I'm faced with and so does the author.

Does that make any sense? It's not about blaming this author, it's not about being complacent about it, it's about being pragmatic; what works, what pays the author, what's possible?

 

[Ursa major]

But market economics says it may not be the authors choice, or only in the sense that the author can decide not to do it anymore, as in this case. Otherwise, if the author wants to make money out of it it will come down to what model provides payment to them.

I think you're making the same error as too many economic commentators. A market is not a deity or something handed down by one. It's the combination of individuals' behaviour constrained, to a greater or lesser extent, by social and legal frameworks, and (if all else fails) by their own morality.

The market economics of which you speak only exist because: 1) technology now allows cheap/free and anonymous copying; 2) enough people want something for nothing and don't mind stealing from others. The market in pirated ebooks has been created by crooks (even if they may not see themselves this way) for their moral-lite "customers"; it has not been waiting to be discovered, a sunny upland of free literature provided by a generous universe. (If I had a lethal weapon and was prepared to use it - knowing that the police didn't care - I would soon find that cash and goods are similarly "freely" available to me.

It's like we were talking on another thread about how publishers have models in mind which they follow; so more than one book planned, a brand to build on, one book a year etc. etc. and the author may not want to do this, but because it's a business it's a choice of doing it and making a living from writing, or choosing not to a la Swainton and finding a different way.

But the author can walk away. They can choose not to be published by a publisher that could be destroying (or building) the economic value of their work. (Of course, they can't choose to be published by a given publisher; unless they're JKR, SK, GRRM or (*shudders*) Dan Brown.)

As Teresa has pointed out more than once, authors do not choose to have their books pirated.

It's not nice, but it's the same in every industry. I work hard to write new training materials and hand outs etc etc and I put a lot of time into it. Some trainers I know copywrite everything, but I know once I deliver it if any student in the room wants to cobble that together and deliver it themselves there's nothing I can do about it. I would like to be able to stop them doing it, it would mean more business for me, but I know I realistically can't, so I take what I can and hope the fact I wrote something/said something good enough to be nicked comes back to me as a form of recommendation. It's not the same I know, but I have to work within the model I'm faced with and so does the author.

At least this would require effort on the part of the thief (not that this excuses them); they may not be prepared to put that effort in. But how much effort does it need to read a pirated copy of an ebook? No more than reading a legal copy, I would assume.

Does that make any sense? It's not about blaming this author, it's not about being complacent about it, it's about being pragmatic; what works, what pays the author, what's possible?

Unlike the case of the music business, there is a limited market for live "performances" of literature. If an author cannot make money from the sales of their books, they will have to find it elsewhere. A tiny, tiny fraction may get enough income from film deals; the rest will have to concentrate on their day jobs (and so we'll all lose out, because books take time to write, and day jobs eat time).

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Ursa, there's nothing in this I don't agree with. (except perhaps the point at which a market swings, but that's an academic argument which tends to go round in circles a lot.)

But, it keeps coming back to the same thing. In this thread there has been limited belief that the industry can solve it/stop it happening and where this has been mooted it's been refuted by others. IF that's the case, that it can't be stopped, not that governments don't wnat to stop it, then that puts us in the realm of an industry facing a new challenge (and opportunity? that's one question isn't it?)

and it leaves me very, very worried, just the same as you about where that takes the author and what the answer is?

If it's a case it can be stopped/prosecuted/ economically then that's a different matter altogether, and I have to be honest I don't have the research in front of me to decide which it is. I just hope those making the decisions on how to lead on this do.

 

[psychotick]

Hi Jojajisc,

Actually I think it's quite possible to make an educated guess as to how piracy will affect the market for different authors. Let's just divide authors into three groups.

First, the stupendously talented / lucky (Feel free to choose your own adjective) best sellers. They are going to be hit, but let's be honest even if they lose half of their revenue stream to thieves, they should still be able to survive. And piracy was never going to benefit them since they already had a reputation and fan base etc.

Second the no hopers, those who don't have best sellers because of say poor writing or poor luck. (Again you choose your adjectives). If their sales are next to nothing, then piracy too won't affect them, and there is at least a possibility for them that piracy will act as a form of promotion, boosting their sales. They were never in a position to live the writing dream.

And then last, there's the vast bulk of us inbetweeners (isn't that a movie). Now for us, there is a dream and there is some income. Not enough to live on, but enough to have hopes. Now it becomes a balancing act. Is there enough promotional benefit from piracy to counter the financial losses? My thought is that for most writers, no.

Pirates don't really promote your work. They aren't stealing your books to show everyone else how wonderful you are. They're doing it because they don't want to pay. A few, a very few may go viral as the phrase seems to be. But mostly your books will just be one or two among maybe hundreds or thousands that they steal and share with their friends. You don't get the money (sure maybe you never were going to get it in the first place), and you don't get any great promotional advantage either.

So my thought would be that it's the guys in the middle who are going to get hit hardest where it hurts by piracy. This just pushes that dream further out of sight for most of us.

Sorry to be a gloomy guss about this. But theft really annoys me, and thieves who then go and attack their victim as in this case, well you can imagine what I would like to do to them.

Cheers, Greg.

 

[Lilmizflashythang]

I think I'm going to go with Teresa here. I'm tired and frustrated with people saying it's going to happen anyway, so why try to do what's right. Or legal, whatever fits your plausible deniability. I'm done talking.

 

[jojajihisc]

Maybe so, maybe not,

I don't understand, how could you morally make the case for someone not to give away free ebooks if it indeed makes them more money? Even if you didn't want the extra money could you not donate it to charity for instance? (I really think it needs to be studied further before we can say exactly what kind of effect giving away free ebooks has on an author's sales.)



Hello Greg,

Thank you for a very interesting response. Here are some points in regards.

First, the stupendously talented / lucky (Feel free to choose your own adjective) best sellers. They are going to be hit, but let's be honest even if they lose half of their revenue stream to thieves, they should still be able to survive. And piracy was never going to benefit them since they already had a reputation and fan base etc.

The only thing I'll mention here is that being "hit" as you say just isn't clear yet as to whether that is a bad thing. If you increase your book buying fan base because books are being copied illegally and distributed, talked about and generally endorsed it may very well benefit them.

Second the no hopers, those who don't have best sellers because of say poor writing or poor luck. (Again you choose your adjectives). If their sales are next to nothing, then piracy too won't affect them, and there is at least a possibility for them that piracy will act as a form of promotion, boosting their sales. They were never in a position to live the writing dream.

I agree, I think, but I'll defer to my statement about studying piracy's effects before I can say for sure.

Is there enough promotional benefit from piracy to counter the financial losses? My thought is that for most writers, no.

What losses? We don't know yet. And they may in fact be gains.

Pirates don't really promote your work.

I disagree. The act of copying the book itself is a sort of promotion because it means somebody wants to read the book, not to mention what a particular reader of that book has had to say about it.

They aren't stealing your books to show everyone else how wonderful you are. They're doing it because they don't want to pay.

I agree in part. I agree they don't want to pay but the fact remains that if they have your book copied for their own possession they intend to read it. And if they aren't planning on reading it then they sure as hell aren't going to go out and pay for it. So the book would never have been sold to that person in the first place - and therefore there is no loss to the author.

steal and share with their friends.

A very important point.

You don't get the money (sure maybe you never were going to get it in the first place), and you don't get any great promotional advantage either.

I agree with the first part as I explained above but disagree there's no promotional advantage. The promotion is it is being "shared with their friends."

More commentary from a publisher.

What's the current impact of piracy on the book publishing industry

And a some actual research! It's been found!

Media Piracy in Emerging Economies

After writing about copying and copying so much html I feel like I need to do something unique, but what?

I thought I would include a partial list of authors I've purchased books from after having first discovered their work for free at typically either their own websites', Tor, Clarkesworld, Starship Sofa, Escape Pod, SCI FICTION, Subterranean or other websites.

Paolo Bacigalupi
Ambrose Bierce
Ted Chiang
Greg Egan
Kelly Link
Ken MacLeod
Paul Park
Justina Robson
Robert Reed
Kristine Kathryn Rusch
Charles Stross
Jeff VanderMeer
Peter Watts

 

[Brian G Turner]

Tell me something Interface, and you too Brian. If someone broke into your day job's computer and stole your paychecks for the next year, would you be so patient? Or would you be pitching a fit? Me personally, I would be pitching a fit.

It's not a salient example because few writers earn enough to make a full time income out of their work - and those that can are obviously popular enough that a) they will be pirated, but b) that they will continue to make sales.

Am I aspiring to be a published author? Yes. Am I worried about the impact of piracy? No.

I'm not saying that ebook piracy is not an issue - I'm saying I think it's overblown, and the example we started with from the Guardian is a hypocrite who steals from other writers, then demands her own writing be protected. Pri. Ma. Donna.

And as I've said before, I don't simply have an opinion, I have direct experience of the issue from when I had a business earning good royalties from people listening to my music online, but that music was also subject to illegal downloading. But I did not regard the piracy as a threat, but instead an opportunity to expose my music to a wider market. In the end, it was a big music corp who killed that business, not the pirates.

The music and film industries have created a lot of propaganda, fear, and fluff about how bad piracy is - but in reality piracy is used as a distraction and excuse for their own failure to embrace the internet and digital media. There's a reason why big artists such as Radiohead and Madonna have gone independent. So long as publishers do not try and repeat the catealogue of mistakes the music and film industry have made, I can't see ebook piracy as a threat.

However, just to be clear as well, while I consider book sharing to be a normal and traditional part of the reading experience, I am going to make it official policy that chronicles will not accept or allow public distribution of books on the public forums. If people share in private, that's their business, but I will instruct moderators to remove any posts which try to offer reading catalogues to other members. I think that's only fair to everybody, and protects everybody's interests.

 

[Boneman]

The difference being that when your pocket is picked you don't get anything in return and what I'm suggesting is that giving away books may make authors more money. Having your pocket picked of $20 to get back $30 is what we may be talking about.

But the authors have absolutely no choice to GIVE AWAY the books in a controlled way, like at a book signing for instance, to drum up interest in their writing - they're being STOLEN, and it's completely uncontrollable. It's as though thieves can wander into an open warehouse, and take a book from a case and somehow they'll think "This is good. I know, I'll pay for the next one." Do you honestly think that's going to happen???

As demonstrated so (un)admirably by the thieves of Etxebarra, they raise a howl of protest that their thieving has been cut off at source. I find it pretty incredible that anyone can find stealing defensible, as though there's some greater good going to come out of it. Those who steal will continue to steal, and there is no justification for it.

 

[Stephen Palmer]

Radiohead and Madonna did their own thing because they could afford to. The problem with internet piracy is that the other 99.999% suffer the consequences. I don't suppose Stephen King and Iain Banks are quaking in their boots.

 

[Montero]

I don't understand, how could you morally make the case for someone not to give away free ebooks if it indeed makes them more money? Even if you didn't want the extra money could you not donate it to charity for instance? (I really think it needs to be studied further before we can say exactly what kind of effect giving away free ebooks has on an author's sales.)

Look, the point Teresa was making was NOT the one you are making. She is saying it should be the authors choice whether or not anyone has to pay for the book in return for a copy. If the author wants money in return for every copy that is their choice. If the book is not being given away free, then taking it without paying is theft.
If the reader thinks the author wants too much money for the book, then their moral choice is not to buy it. The immoral choice is to steal it.


Someone earlier in the thread said that we cannot impose morality on other people. The whole legal system is based on a common moral code. Some people always think some laws are unfair, or shouldn't apply to them. Depending on their personality they then a) grumble, b) campaign for a change c) break it and either get away with it or get caught.
Peer pressure can also come in to it. If there are enough people saying loudly that is bad behaviour we think less of you for breaking that law, then fewer people will break the law. If it as a law that everyone just shrugs about and is barely enforced then there is no peer pressure.
What we seem to have here is two groups of people - those who don't care that pirated books is stealing and those who don't know. Educating the latter group will reduce the problem.

 

[HareBrain]

Peer pressure can also come in to it. If there are enough people saying loudly that is bad behaviour we think less of you for breaking that law, then fewer people will break the law. If it as a law that everyone just shrugs about and is barely enforced then there is no peer pressure.

This is a good point. As far as I know, the penalties for drink driving in the UK have not been radically increased, nor are you much less likely to be caught than before, but it is now less pevalent (I believe) because it used to be "socially acceptable" to break that law, and now it is not. Quite how the change in attitudes has come about, I'm not sure, but if something similar could happen to internet piracy, it would be a good thing.

 

[mosaix]

This is a good point. As far as I know, the penalties for drink driving in the UK have not been radically increased, nor are you much less likely to be caught than before, but it is now less pevalent (I believe) because it used to be "socially acceptable" to break that law, and now it is not. Quite how the change in attitudes has come about, I'm not sure, but if something similar could happen to internet piracy, it would be a good thing.

I think the change in attitude to drink driving is a generational thing, with youngsters coming through their driving tests having a more responsible approach to it. Strangely this doesn't seem to apply to driving at speed and (I'm prepared to be proven wrong here) illegal downloads.

I'd be interested to know how the attitudes expressed in this thread were represented on an age-related graph.