fishingboatproceeds:

Yesterday on twitter, I expressed annoyance with the hundreds of people who send me emails or tumblr messages or whatever to let me know that they illegally downloaded one of my books, as if they expect me to reply with my hearty congratulations that they are technologically sophisticated enough to use google or whatever. (I dislike it when people pirate my books. I know that not all authors feel this way, but I do. As I’ve discussed before, I think copyright law is disastrously stupid in the US, but I don’t think piracy is an appropriate response to that stupidity.*)

I then pointed out that my books are already available for free at thousands of public libraries not just in the US, but also in Europe, South America, Australia, Canada, Mexico, South Africa, the UK, etc., to which many people replied, What’s the difference between pirating a book and checking it out from the library?

1. Libraries are broadly collecting institutions curated by experts. The curation facet of a library is hugely important: We train these librarians to organize information based not solely on what is popular (which is what piracy does), but also on what is good. The truth is you can’t get “anything” via piracy; there are hundreds of thousands of books you can’t get, because they aren’t yet popular. American public and school libraries play a huge role in preserving the breadth of American literature by collecting and sharing books that are excellent but may not be written by YouTubers with large bulit-in audiences.

Libraries improve the quality of discourse in their communities in ways that piracy simply does not. And if it weren’t for the broad but carefully curated collection practices of libraries, the world of American literature would look a lot like the world of American film: Instead of hundreds of books being published every week, there would be four or five.

2. Libraries buy books. Lots of them. And there are tens of thousands of libraries around the country. That is good for me and good for my book. (Like, the average library copy of The Fault in Our Stars might get checked out 100 times, or even a thousand, butsingle files of Looking for Alaska have been illegally downloaded more than 50,000 times.)

3. For the more than 100 million Americans without Internet access at home, libraries are the only free places to use the web to search for jobs or connect with family or buy t-shirts at dftba.com. I am very happy if my books can help add value to institutions that facilitate such important services. I do not feel the same way about BitTorrent.

4. And this is the most important: I believe that creators of books should have control over how their work is distributed. If, for instance, a musician doesn’t want her songs played during Rick Santorum rallies, then Rick Santorum should not be allowed to use them. I don’t want my books to be available for free download (unless you borrow an e-copy from a library, that is). I just don’t. It’s not because I’m a greedy bastard or want to keep my books from people who might otherwise read them. It’s because I believe books are valuable. Right now, on Amazon, my brand new hardcover book costs about $10, which represents 1.2 hours of work at the federal minimum wage. I believe books are worth 1.2 hours of work. 

One last thing: A lot of people compare the world of books with the world of music. I think this comparison is unfair. For one thing, CDs were overpriced before Napster. I really don’t believe that books—at least my books—are currently overpriced**. More importantly, most musicians have a secondary source of income: They can charge for live performances. Writers—or at least the vast majority of writers—can’t do this. The book is The Thing. The book is all we have to offer.

And in my opinion, libraries preserve the integrity and the value of the book in ways that piracy simply does not.

Based on how many of you have already seen Season 2 of Sherlock, I realize that most of you disagree with me. And I’m happy to acknowledge that I might be wrong. I welcome your thoughts and responses on these complicated questions.

* The whole argument that piracy is some kind of civil disobedience in response to unfair copyright laws is ridiculous and indicates to me that not enough people are reading Civil Disobedience, or even the wikipedia article about it.

** As pointed out by no less an authority than John Darnielle, CDs weren’t overpriced by many independent record labels. Also, I should add that many books—particularly literary fiction hardcovers published for adults—are overpriced, sometimes dramatically. I think this is a bad and discouraging trend, which is one of the (many) reasons why I like publishing my books the way I do: It’s still possible for a hardcover to cost less than $20, and if you adjust for inflation, it always should be.

I’m not personally anti-piracy (I don’t like to claim it’s always bad or always harmless) but the main point of this post is a much better-articulated version of something I’ve been trying to make people understand for years.

Also, why would you admit to a creator that you pirated something they made? Just. How does that even make sense. (Unless they’ve stated that they don’t mind pirating of course.)

korybing:

postcardsfromspace:

To the people proposing this:

You dumb bastards. You know who this’ll hurt? Not big media. Not on any significant scale.

No, the people this will really fuck over are the EXACT same people SOPA and PIPA would fuck: Creative professionals; small publishers; independent businesses.

If you want to do something that makes a statement, consider shifting your money not only away from corporate media but to independent media. Buy comics published by someone other than DC and Marvel. Buy books from small and independent presses. Support independent production companies who fight to stay independent and fan-focused. Better yet, buy things directly from creators and artisans. Support independent retailers. Don’t just blanket punish media producers and distributors—refocus those resources into supporting the ones who espouse and depend on free exchange of information and ideas.

Because those are the people preserving intellectual freedom.

Those are the people creating work of substance.

And those are the people struggling to make a living, because they aren’t bankrolled by the doucheweasels lobbying for SOPA and PIPA.

So, yeah, boycott whomever you please. But for fuck’s sake, also think.

Thank you Rachel, this is basically what my problem was the moment I saw that image but I couldn’t put into words exactly what was making me so angry. SOPA and PIPA are going to hurt small businesses and independent artists that make a living off of the internet, and refusing to buy ANY media during the month of March will do the exact same thing: hurt small businesses and independent artists.

Not all “big media” is bad. There are plenty of “big names” that have been openly against SOPA and PIPA since the beginning, like Valve, for example. I know research is hard and “Don’t Support Companies That Support Things You Don’t Agree With March” isn’t as snappy as “Black March” but don’t be so hasty that you actively hurt the people that you want to help.

This so much. You don’t protest the actions of some companies by not buying from ANYBODY, that is just silly.

(via fubukinookaasan)

iphysianthe:

my mom’s argument against piracy is “well what if you wrote a book and one person bought it and then hundreds of people got to read it for free and you didn’t make any money!”

MOTHER YOU HAVE JUST DESCRIBED

LIBRARIES

I hate this argument, libraries are incredibly different from piracy.

• One pirated file can spread to everyone in the world with internet access. One library book can only be accessed by the people who can get to that library. You would have to buy hundreds, if not thousands, of copies of a book in order to make it legally available to the same number of people who could pirate it.
• Books wear out, meaning that libraries have to either buy new copies or not have them any longer. The internet is forever. (Okay, occasionally files that you know existed at one point are impossible to find, but that’s much rarer.)
• Checking a book out of the library helps to encourage them to buy more copies of that book, similar books, stuff by the same author, etc. Pirating a file does not. (It may encourage YOU to make a purchase, but that also applies to libraries.)
• You have to return a library item after a period of time, and if you want a permanent copy, you still have to pay for it. If you pirate a file, nothing is stopping you from keeping it forever without paying.
• Libraries are obtaining and distributing items in a manner that is approved by the original publisher. Pirates are not.

tl;dr it’s easy to see why libraries would be considered more acceptable than piracy.

(via strobelast)