Fantastic thread this. I've read lots of discussions on this topic over the last year but to have the authors (particularly star trek authors that I regularly read) commenting has been extremely interesting and thought provoking.
Anyway, I have personally downloaded 1 ebook from usenext (similar to torrents) and I'd like to get the authors that have commented in this thread's opinion as to whether this was wrong.
First let me say that I totally agree that downloading an ebook for free when you could pay for it is wrong. If you can't afford it (oh how i feel for the poor unfortunate rioting students mentioned by another poster that can't afford it, NOT. Get a job, most of them shouldn't be at university and the concept that everyone is entitled to is ridiculous, there are more jobs than not that don't require degrees. If everyones got degrees and expects jobs appropriate to those degrees who the hells going to do 80% of the work. Whoops. Sorry I totally digressed there
where was I
Anyway, if people can't afford something that is available to buy then I'm afraid tough titties.
On to the book that I downloaded for free and the reason for doing so.
I work away alot on new navy vessels as a civillian RADAR engineer, sometimes for 2 or 3 weeks at a time at sea. Sometimes due to proximity to land, or the prying ears of other countries vessels, my RADAR is off. This can mean that for hours or even days there is nothing for me to do but sit around reading (as the TVs don't work for S**T on these brand new shiny vessels, but I better not say too much on that or I'll get in trouble). You don't get much locker space in a 30 man mess so I could only fit a couple of dead tree books in my bag, and being a fast reader a book doesn't last me more than a day. Once the couple of books were read I would be BORED, BORED, BORED.
Along came the KINDLE and I was in heaven. 10 books loaded in before I went away and I was set. To begin with no star trek books were available on the kindle in the UK or in any other format, but I managed to get round it by purchasing from a couple of american sites that didn't check my IP address in the UK.
Theres my first question to the authors. What I did there was "illegal" but it was either that or not read them at all. I believe that depriving a UK citizen of something that a US citizen can get is bloody immoral. Should I have not read any star trek books at that time???
Anyway 6 months ago star trek books became avaiable in the UK on amazon and all was right with the world
However, and here I finally get on to the reason for my post as mentioned at the beginning (apologies
), I found out a few months back that there was a follow up book to the voyage home called Probe by
Margaret Wander Bonanno and published in 1992. I was ecstatic, it's probably my favourite film ever and I had to read it.
And here I found a problem. Many of the older star trek books including this one are not as far as I can tell, available anywhere in the world to buy as ebooks. I was mortified and went trawling the internet and bashing off emails to find out if they would be soon. No joy on that front and I suspect that in many cases it will be years before these books are available to buy from publishers if ever. Just not the market for them.
However all was not lost. My search of internet forums tipped me off to the availability of ebooks on file shares. And sure enough I found Probe avaiable to download on Usenext. Some kind soul had typed it all up judging by the spelling mistakes
So based on my long, elaborate and boring story above, my question to the authors is this? Should the growing number of people who only read ebooks, not paper books, through choice, or necessity as is my case, be deprived of reading the millions of books out there that are not available in ebook format, and may not be for many years. I'm sure eventually every book ever written will be available in digital format but this will take at least a decade or two I imagine.
Or was it okay for some kind soul to type up or scan in a book written 20 years ago and allow me to read it on my kindle whilst bobbing around in the english channel
I repeat what I said at the beginning. If this or any book is available to buy in ebook format it should be bought as I have done with every other star trek book I've read so far. But if it's not available to buy it is fair game for being downloaded as the "pirate" could not possibly have downloaded it themselves, stripped out the DRM and uploaded it to the darknet in this situation as it isn't available. They have spent time and effort to type up or scan a book to make it available to other ebook fans that want their literature in a digital format. Is this really wrong???
Yes we got along fine before ebooks came along you say. BUT, we don't have to any more. For example I know for a fact that ebooks are benefitting our armed forces immensely on submarines, or those on tours in Iraq or Afghanistan where getting hold of papar books is impossible but the availability of digital content means they've always got something to read.
My point is that although the evil pirate websites are bad for spreading content that should be paid for they also provide a platform for the sharing of content that isn't available via any other means. I'm certain from your posts that you would see these sites shut down completely. I believe that is not the answer to the copyright problem.
Sorry for the long post but I've wanted to voice my observations to authors and this thread has given me the opportunity to do so, but only in this long winded way
Kind Regards
James
I despise e-books for their potential effect on real books, but you just made me realize they have their uses. Thanks.
