Now, I don’t think that piracy is a blanket good thing. I understand perfectly well that, especially with music and movies, that piracy hurts everyone. However, it seems with literature is a beast of a different color.

Now, this might be because of the love for real books. I am one of those who is disgruntled by e-books and prefer to have the real thing in my hand. The weight, the smell, the crick in my neck from not moving for hours… Okay, maybe not the crick in my neck, but still, you know what I mean. I want the book in my hand. My boyfriend thinks I’m just being ridiculous, but every book I’ve liked that I’ve seen online, I’ve bought. I want to own it.

Perhaps, when everyone loves e-books and no one buys real books anymore, this will become a much more serious problem. But for now, I at least, want the book in my hand. And thus, pirating books has no real appeal to me beyond a preview of what I’m going to be putting on the shelf.

I design a chair and build a few. Some people buy it from me. Somebody decides to copy, they spend their money in wood (part of the cost, right?) and they make identical chairs. Maybe they’re “taking” sales from you. Is that stealing? Is it competition? Is it unfair? (maybe you think it is unfair. are all unfair things stealing?).

Now, someone takes a chair without paying. Would you say they’re stealing from you? But wait. I didn’t say they took it from your shop. Maybe they took it from someone’s house (a legitimate buyer). Yes, that’s stealing. But they didn’t steal from you, did they? They stole from whoever bought the chair.

But with content, you assume that every copy and copy of a copy is yours. If someone bought it from you, it’s still yours, right? Because part of your imagination or whatever went into it. Like the chair.

Do you own the chair that I bought from you? Can I loan it to someone else?

Can I loan a book? A music CD?

The same people that call copying/infringement “stealing” also call Public Libraries “stealing”, because they don’t get paid for each person that reads a book. You know what is also “stealing” now? Radio. It used to be that big record companies bribed radio stations to showcase their music. Now they want to get a fee for every time they play it. Yes, that’s right: radio are the new pirates now.

You’ll say it’s semantics. It’s also semantics that if I kill someone, I won’t be charged for “grand theft life” because I took a life illegally. Because to me, that’s theft. What about stealing a kiss? Is it theft?

You know what else causes “lost of sales”? Fair competition. If you have a sandwich shop, and I open a pizza place in front of you, you’re getting less sales. Would you call me one of “those darn customer stealers”? Will you call the police and accuse me of theft? After all, those were sales that I “took” from you.

This doesn’t mean that it’s lawful or not, correct or not. But you have to call something what it is. If you punch someone in the nose, and they say it’s “rape”, and you say assault is not rape, don’t complain when they claim that’s “just semantics”.

Now, for a nice musical interlude:
Copying Is Not Theft
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtsRbchutjY

You sound like someone who wants to forever consume, and never create.

Part-time art is more difficult than one thinks. Not that full-time art is easy, mind, but at least the creator has the time and — ideally, in a good world — the money to put towards it.

– c.