If i am unable to get to the library and im also not able to afford a book, how does pirating it hurt the author? I was unable to afford the book in the first place so they would never have gotten the revenue from that sale. Also im not trying to like. Twist your words or anything but you seem to be implying that poor people without access to libraries shouldnt read books.
Right. This is the last post I’m making on the topic, because honestly, I have far too much going on in my life right now (to fill in new followers: one dying relative, three recently dead ones, grief coming out the wazoo, care duties for other relatives, a damn PhD) to dedicate any more mental or emotional space to this discussion. I appreciate that people have questions on this, and I honestly think I answered most of them in the post that’s being referenced here, but in the interests of having it all in one place, here we are.
Second disclosure: this ask was not initially sent on anonymous, but I’ve copied and pasted it and sent it to myself anonymously so that I can answer it publicly without people knowing who OP is, because I’ve noticed that some people have been sending incredulous messages to people who’ve defended book wankery on that previous post, and I don’t want to be the cause of that.
So, on a point-by-point basis:
If i am unable to get to the library and im also not able to afford a book, how does pirating it hurt the author?I was unable to afford the book in the first place so they would never have gotten the revenue from that sale.
Because it’s theft. Plain and simple. And without meaning to sound unkind, that argument is simply fatuous, because if you apply it to literally any other form of property - let’s say a car, because why not - then it’s not an argument anyone would make. “If I wanted a car but wasn’t able to afford it, and I stole it instead, then how does that hurt the car dealership? I wasn’t going to buy it anyway, so they haven’t lost revenue!” Yes, they have, and yes, an author loses revenue from a stolen copy of their book, because it’s a copy of their book in someone’s hands that that person did not pay for. If you just don’t buy it and then don’t steal it, then of course the author hasn’t lost revenue; Ford doesn’t lose income every time I look at one of their cars and don’t purchase it. They do, however, lose income every time I look at one of their cars and drive it off the car lot without paying (please don’t come for me, Ford, this is a hypothetical and I can’t drive).
In fact, for authors it tends to be even more the case, because most people will get a stolen copy of the book from a pirating site where the ebook or pdf has been shared. You aren’t the only person downloading that file, I promise you. It’s never just one lost sale. It’s dozens. Hundreds, even thousands, for more popular books. That’s the thing about creative work, such as books, art and music. It can be stolen over and over and over again. And it is.
And here is the other thing that most people can’t grasp. Authors’ income is directly, inexorably tied to the number of books they sell. This is not up for debate. Authors are not salaried. We don’t get, say, £4k a year regardless of how many books we shift. Let me explain very briefly. A traditionally published author, i.e. an author who has signed with an agent and / or sold their book to a publishing house, will usually get an advance. This is a one-off payment based on approximately how well the publisher thinks the book is likely to sell. These advances vary wildly in amount. They used to be much bigger. Celebrities can command huge ones, because it’s a broken system. A debut author will probably get in the four figures. That’s all they get until the book ‘earns out’ the advance, i.e. it sells enough copies that the advance has been recouped. After that, the author earns a percentage of sales (royalties).
A self-published / indie author, like me, is someone who doesn’t have a publishing house. We use a print-on-demand or ebook service, like Amazon KDP or Lulu, to make copies of our books. We then get a percentage of each sale, with no advance, and the ‘publisher’ (i.e. Amazon, Lulu) takes a cut, and the rest of the sale goes towards printing the physical book or delivering the ebook. Our only income comes from each copy of the book sold. This is why we lose income when you pirate a copy; because it’s a copy you get from which we get absolutely nothing. Diddly squit. Our hard work is in your hands for you to benefit from, enjoy and consume, and we see absolutely nothing for it.
But wait! I hear you cry. You get exposure, don’t you? Someone new has heard of your book! To which I pat you very firmly on the head, so firmly that your eyes start to water, and I whisper softly in your ear yes, child; an audience who steals from me, and then I walk away. In all seriousness, the ‘exposure’ argument doesn’t hold water. Asda don’t take exposure points when I try and buy milk there. I don’t need to build an audience of people who want my stuff for free. That’s no use to me whatsoever, unless those people want to do my food shop for me. On the same praxis, don’t repost art without credit, or against the artist’s wishes. It’s the exact same principle.
[…] but you seem to be implying that poor people without access to libraries shouldnt read books.
I am begging you on bended knee to see the equivalency here. You’re essentially accusing me of not understanding the needs of poor people, and of therefore being classist. How do you not see that this also applies to people - book wankers, in this case - who steal the meagre income from authors? You’re a huge part of the reason that hardly any of us get to write full time. You’re part of the reason that we can’t make a living off our work. Every time you steal a book, you reduce an author’s ability to pay their rent, to buy food, to pay for travel. You are contributing to our financial woes. You are depleting our income.
Most of us, unless you’re Stephen King or JK Rowling, really don’t make a lot of money from our work. I haven’t ever gone into the profit margins of my book before and I’m not super keen on doing so now, but I’ll tell you that I make a very small amount of money off each book sale. That was my personal choice, because as a first time author I was wary of pricing myself too high. I didn’t have the confidence to ask for more, and I’m not going to raise the price 3 years later. As for how I spend the money, I generally use my royalties to pay for travel to university and to writing research trips, because I don’t drive and rely on trains to get to university, which can be costly. I also use it to buy food. I still live at home so rent isn’t a big concern, luckily; I can put my salary towards that when I’m working at another job. Most authors have many more financial burdens than me. If you’re an author trying to pay your rent and bills and pay for your food, then book wankery is going to be much worse for you than it is for me. If you’re an author with dependents? Good luck to you.
And guess which authors suffer most from the effects of book wankery? I’ll give you a clue: it isn’t single working-middle class cis white able-bodied authors like me. It’s authors of colour, disabled authors, trans authors. Authors whose work about marginalised experiences is too niche for big publishers to risk advances on. Authors who can’t take a second job to supplement their writing income because they have health or access issues. Authors who can’t get a foot in the door of the publishing world because they come from working class backgrounds and don’t have the connections. Authors with children who need food, clothes, daycare and stable housing.
Now tell me again how being against book wankery is classist or proof that I don’t think poor people should be able to read. I am against book wankery because I believe that poor authors should be able to earn a living from their work and not have their shit stolen. I’m annoyed when it happens to me as an individual, because it peeves me off to have my hard work essentially waved away with a flick of the wrist and a wry well, I like it, but not enough to pay for it. That’s annoying, and hurtful, and frustrating, and yes, it diminishes my already small income, but at least I’m not going to be homeless due to it at this point.
I’m livid, however, when it happens to authors who have more to lose than me. Authors who have literally lost publishing deals because they couldn’t prove enough sales to publish the sequel in a planned trilogy, because so many copies were stolen that it looked like no-one read it. Authors who have fallen behind on rent payments. Authors who have to rely on an unreliable net of benefits / social security because their income is being eroded. This isn’t a case of book wankery having no real world effects, because it does. I’m fortunate to be able to avoid most of them simply by definition of my privilege in other fields.
I don’t think that poor people shouldn’t be able to read books (or to rephrase without the double negative, I think that poor people should be able to read books). I just think that within the capitalist society we live in, and with the current (outdated, horrible, unfit for purpose) income model of the publishing industry, we need to consider who we’re actually hurting when we pirate books, because I promise you that it’s not the Big Corporate Bosses. Borrow a book from a friend, because at least that copy was paid for initially. Ditto a secondhand bookstore, where you might be able to pick it up for like £2. Heck, wait until it comes on a huge sale and buy it then. There are alternatives. Consider them first.
This is the last post I’ll be making on the topic, because I really need to not keep talking about this for my own sanity. Please don’t defend book piracy on this post. I have had it up to my proverbial eyeballs. I am just one human. I can’t keep having the same conversation over and over again, like shouting into a void. It’s draining. Thanks for understanding.
