Re: NY Times Ethicist Condones Ripping Off E-books

Beth,

The moment you exampled DVDs I realised you were trying to apply the situation in one industry to another. Books are not comparable in that way at all. Few people read a book twice. For that reason any distribution against the contract of purchase is a loss to the author; it is also straight breach of contract.

Any permission to make one's own copy is an invitation to pirates.

Laws are largely about regulating our dealings with one another. It makes me uneasy to have you say you might choose to break a contract you have with me.

Joseph


From: "Beth Young" 
>I completely agree with what Chris said.
> 
> I have to say, though, I don't need to see the whole thing for free before I
> buy.  A brief sample is enough for me.  What I will resent is if I buy in
> one format but am forbidden from transferring it to a new format.
> Especially because I believe that editors, proofreaders, etc. etc. will add
> enough value that buying the new format would be better.
> 
> e.g., if I were technologically able to easily scan a p-book into e-format,
> or if my computer could easily read it into an audiofile, I'm sure that
> professional quality would still be better.  I would probably pay to get
> that professional quality, but I would resent not being able to choose
> between homemade and professional.
> 
> My likelihood of buying in a second format increases if there are special
> features: updates for reference books, additional visuals for nonfiction,
> outtakes from a novel, or an extra forward, or a "making of" timeline that
> showed how much work went into creating the book, or the original book
> proposal, or alternate cover art sketches, a coupon allowing me to buy an
> advance "review" copy of the next book in the series, or something.
> 
> It's like dvds.  Right now, I can record a movie or tv show in HD when it is
> broadcast, save it to a hard drive, even burn it to a dvd if I want for
> later viewing.  But I have never made a homemade dvd, and I purchase lots of
> dvds.  Why?  Well, I like the stylish menus on a dvd, I like the bonus
> features, I like being able to switch languages (not that I understand the
> other languages but it is fun to hear them), etc.
> 
> I'm sure book publishers can come up with ways to tempt readers into buying
> multiple formats, even if we are allowed to make our own homemade versions .
> 
> Beth
> 
> On Fri, Apr 16, 2010 at 11:07 AM, Robotech_Master <[email protected]>wrote:
> 
>> On Wed, Apr 14, 2010 at 10:41 AM, Marion Gropen <[email protected]>
>> wrote:
>> When consumers see the rights they've come to take for granted being
>> taken away from them, they feel justified in breaking the law to
>> exercise the rights they feel they are supposed to have. And if *that*
>> copyright violation isn't wrong, then maybe this *other* copyright
>> violation isn't wrong either.
>>
>>
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
> 
> 
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