Details here. Good job, Newsday. Alas, J.K. Rowling’s literary agency still won’t do legal e-versions of the Potter books. Excerpt from Newsday follows.
….the online theft occurred even though the series has never released an e-book. The piracy collaborators converted printed copies of the book into electronic format. “They’re going out on the Net by the thousands,” said David Rothman, a co-founder of The OpenReader Consortium Project, which promotes standards for electronic books. “It’s an illustration of the future.”
Publishing piracy hasn’t yet approached the crisis that the entertainment and software industries have faced from people sharing songs, movies and software online, Rothman said. “But you can be sure it will reach that level if publishers don’t wake up,” he said.
Traditionally, book piracy in the United States has been low compared with the rest of the world, mainly because most people can borrow books for free from the library, said Al Greco, a marketing professor at Fordham University’s business school and a senior researcher for the Book Industry Study Group. The International Intellectual Property Alliance estimated that U.S. publishers lost about $571 million to foreign piracy last year.
Legal Potter editions online, anyone? It’s the very best anti-piracy measure that Rowling and her agency can take, especially if the prices are reasonable. Easier use of e-books would also help, and a common format could go a long way, whether or not publishers keep insisting on DRM. Finally, note Al Greco’s perceptive comments on piracy and libraries. LibraryCity, anyone?
Related: What’s wrong with e-books–and how librarians can change them for the better (still undergoing tweaks), expanded from a talk I gave for PlanetLibrary’s Let’s Go Library Expo, held July 28.
