6 ms·

So how exactly pirating the books give money to the writers?

by ugjka 1y ago

trcf22 1y ago
How different is it from going to a public library?
- Mindwipe 1y ago
  Almost every country in the world apart from the US pays authors for library lending.
  - morsch 1y ago
    I wasn't sure how it works where I live, so I looked it up and apparently in Germany (according to Wikipedia) public libraries pay 3-4c per checkout to a central private body which redistributes it somehow. So unless the book is checked out a thousand times over and its lifetime, buying it still dominates overall.
    - layer8 1y ago
      The libraries also bought the book originally.
portaouflop 1y ago
Instead of lining bezos pockets get your ebooks from above sources and go to a real bookshop to buy hard copies of books you like especially - you can give them away and so support the actual author while not supporting bozo
keanb 1y ago
Where in the message did he claim that pirating the books compensated the writers?
blagie 1y ago
The cycle has been: Piracy -> Friendly ways to buy -> Unfriendly ways to buy -> Piracy -> ... Unfortunately, giving money back to writers involves hopping through piracy. At that point, a new, consumer-friendly service will sprout up. Everyone will use it. Over time, the service will want to profit-maximize, and will adopt anti-consumer techniques. Leading people to go to Pirate Bay. Leading to friendly services. Rinse, repeat.
- lotsofpulp 1y ago
  How many times has this happened, such that it can be called a cycle? There are other possibilities, such as people simply not writing as much anymore, or higher quality writers existing the market due to lack of sufficient return.
  - al_borland 1y ago
    It’s happened to some degree with music, movies, and TV shows.
  - blagie 1y ago
    Bad DRM led to Napster led to Netflix lead to a fragmentation of services led to a resurgence of piracy. Similar thing happened with music, only rather than piracy, it landed on legal / free (e.g. Youtube). Youtube is just starting to do the consumer-unfriendly thing (but it's got a long ways to go before piracy comes out competitive). Similar in books. I'll mention: A lot of these are consumer-unfriendly in some ways (e.g. Netflix DRM), but friendly in others. $20/month for all the movies you can watch beats piracy.
nashashmi 1y ago
Book authors should make money from concert ticket sales, not books. /s
throwbway37383 1y ago
You should check out Chokepoint Capitalism by Cory Doctorow and Rebecca Giblin. To put it briefly, you've been fooled. You're making an argument that empowers the likes of Amazon, not "writers", and it's by design that you've been fed that story.
shakna 1y ago
The more people who pirate my books, the greater my sales across all platforms. That's not hyperboly - its something I track. Individuals who pirate my books are also more likely to buy them in the future. Piracy is just about accessibility and trust. If the person can't afford to take a chance, they pirate. And if you win them there, they'll buy. (Nit: Zero of that applies to corps. Thanks Anthropic, Meta, and everyone else.)
- qmr 1y ago
  Are you looking forward to tens of ... dollars from that recent suit?
  - shakna 1y ago
    Some of my publishers are, as they're American. I'm unlikely to see any of that. Unfortunately, I'm Australian, and my government saw fit to narrow their interpretation of current laws, to make AI scraping of illegally obtained data, legal. You now have to prove direct harm - not the indirect harm happening to the entire industry.
    - pabs3 1y ago
      Is non-AI-related scraping now legal too?
      - shakna 1y ago
        Only if the original data scraper gets permission. [0] [0] https://www.oaic.gov.au/news/media-centre/global-expectations-of-social-media-platforms-and-other-sites-to-safeguard-against-unlawful-data-scraping https://www.oaic.gov.au/news/media-centre/global-expectation...
- SCdF 1y ago
  I am guessing this works for you because more people reading = more people talking = more readers discovering and potential sales? It would be interesting to see at what point of notoriety that is no longer true. Like is this still a factor for Stephen King, or at that point is it really just lost sales?
buyucu 1y ago
If they sell a PDF that I can download, then I'll give my money to them. But I'm not giving money for DRM.
wltr 1y ago
I pirate all the books, I treat that as a public library. I don’t read most of them. The ones I have read and found good, I talk about them, write about them, and I can buy them. For myself, plus as gifts to others. I just dislike buying highly marketed book that turned out to be useless. If I’ll ever to become an author myself, I don’t see any issue with that.
- rs186 1y ago
  I use the local public library from time to time (physical/via Libby) while reading on my kindle otherwise. Libby is something else, but for the physical books, I just see zero difference between going to the library in person, checking it out and returning it later vs just pirating it online. It's not like the publisher does not get any more money. OK there is a difference where there is a limit to the number of copies available, so some people have to wait, just typical of public resources. But I noticed that most books I borrow are always available, especially with interlibrary borrowing. So what difference does it make? In the end I pirated more often. I am not proud of that, but I also don't see how any of this makes any difference. It's not like I'll ever buy the book with my own money.

So how exactly pirating the books give money to the writers?

by ugjka 1y ago

So how exactly pirating the books give money to the writers?

trcf22 1y ago

How different is it from going to a public library?

Mindwipe 1y ago
Almost every country in the world apart from the US pays authors for library lending.
- morsch 1y ago
  I wasn't sure how it works where I live, so I looked it up and apparently in Germany (according to Wikipedia) public libraries pay 3-4c per checkout to a central private body which redistributes it somehow. So unless the book is checked out a thousand times over and its lifetime, buying it still dominates overall.
  - layer8 1y ago
    The libraries also bought the book originally.

portaouflop 1y ago

Instead of lining bezos pockets get your ebooks from above sources and go to a real bookshop to buy hard copies of books you like especially - you can give them away and so support the actual author while not supporting bozo

keanb 1y ago

Where in the message did he claim that pirating the books compensated the writers?

blagie 1y ago

The cycle has been: Piracy -> Friendly ways to buy -> Unfriendly ways to buy -> Piracy -> ... Unfortunately, giving money back to writers involves hopping through piracy. At that point, a new, consumer-friendly service will sprout up. Everyone will use it. Over time, the service will want to profit-maximize, and will adopt anti-consumer techniques. Leading people to go to Pirate Bay. Leading to friendly services. Rinse, repeat.

lotsofpulp 1y ago
How many times has this happened, such that it can be called a cycle? There are other possibilities, such as people simply not writing as much anymore, or higher quality writers existing the market due to lack of sufficient return.
- al_borland 1y ago
  It’s happened to some degree with music, movies, and TV shows.
- blagie 1y ago
  Bad DRM led to Napster led to Netflix lead to a fragmentation of services led to a resurgence of piracy. Similar thing happened with music, only rather than piracy, it landed on legal / free (e.g. Youtube). Youtube is just starting to do the consumer-unfriendly thing (but it's got a long ways to go before piracy comes out competitive). Similar in books. I'll mention: A lot of these are consumer-unfriendly in some ways (e.g. Netflix DRM), but friendly in others. $20/month for all the movies you can watch beats piracy.

nashashmi 1y ago

Book authors should make money from concert ticket sales, not books. /s

throwbway37383 1y ago

You should check out Chokepoint Capitalism by Cory Doctorow and Rebecca Giblin. To put it briefly, you've been fooled. You're making an argument that empowers the likes of Amazon, not "writers", and it's by design that you've been fed that story.

shakna 1y ago

The more people who pirate my books, the greater my sales across all platforms. That's not hyperboly - its something I track. Individuals who pirate my books are also more likely to buy them in the future. Piracy is just about accessibility and trust. If the person can't afford to take a chance, they pirate. And if you win them there, they'll buy. (Nit: Zero of that applies to corps. Thanks Anthropic, Meta, and everyone else.)

qmr 1y ago
Are you looking forward to tens of ... dollars from that recent suit?
- shakna 1y ago
  Some of my publishers are, as they're American. I'm unlikely to see any of that. Unfortunately, I'm Australian, and my government saw fit to narrow their interpretation of current laws, to make AI scraping of illegally obtained data, legal. You now have to prove direct harm - not the indirect harm happening to the entire industry.
  - pabs3 1y ago
    Is non-AI-related scraping now legal too?
    - shakna 1y ago
      Only if the original data scraper gets permission. [0] [0] https://www.oaic.gov.au/news/media-centre/global-expectations-of-social-media-platforms-and-other-sites-to-safeguard-against-unlawful-data-scraping https://www.oaic.gov.au/news/media-centre/global-expectation...
SCdF 1y ago
I am guessing this works for you because more people reading = more people talking = more readers discovering and potential sales? It would be interesting to see at what point of notoriety that is no longer true. Like is this still a factor for Stephen King, or at that point is it really just lost sales?

buyucu 1y ago

If they sell a PDF that I can download, then I'll give my money to them. But I'm not giving money for DRM.

wltr 1y ago

I pirate all the books, I treat that as a public library. I don’t read most of them. The ones I have read and found good, I talk about them, write about them, and I can buy them. For myself, plus as gifts to others. I just dislike buying highly marketed book that turned out to be useless. If I’ll ever to become an author myself, I don’t see any issue with that.

rs186 1y ago
I use the local public library from time to time (physical/via Libby) while reading on my kindle otherwise. Libby is something else, but for the physical books, I just see zero difference between going to the library in person, checking it out and returning it later vs just pirating it online. It's not like the publisher does not get any more money. OK there is a difference where there is a limit to the number of copies available, so some people have to wait, just typical of public resources. But I noticed that most books I borrow are always available, especially with interlibrary borrowing. So what difference does it make? In the end I pirated more often. I am not proud of that, but I also don't see how any of this makes any difference. It's not like I'll ever buy the book with my own money.