So chances are you’ve probably heard something recent about all the piracy issues with electronic books. Authors are losing money and people are angry and the other side seems not to see the big deal. This all happened several years ago with the music industry. I think it goes hand-in-hand with some other trends we’ve seen about. So what is the big deal? Is it wrong to download a free copy of an electronic book if the author didn’t give permission to do so? Is it stealing? Is it cheating?
I don’t know if any of you are aware of another significant problem in our society, but as you all know I am married to a college professor, and this is certainly something that affects our lives. College kids cheat, at an alarming rate. I’m sure it starts earlier because frankly they’re quite good at it, taking plagiarism to a whole new level. This semester alone The Professor had 2 students from two separate classes cheat on a final paper, one of these students was a graduate student so we’re not talking about an 18 year old kid here. And the level of deception is sophisticated. I’m not talking the purchase of papers though that clearly is still happening despite universities efforts to prevent such behavior.
I heard a news story a while back where an ethics professor who caught a rather large number of students cheating on a test and he gave them all the opportunity to come forward and turn themselves in even though he already knew exactly who they all were. During the news segment they interviewed some random college student and he was quoted as saying, “everyone cheats, it’s just the way it is.” I’m saddened by this though I don’t completely believe it either. Right now I have 2 nieces and a nephew in college and I’m fairly certain that none of them have cheated.
But the mentality seems to be that this is harmless behavior, but let’s consider for a moment that if you cheat on a paper and you don’t get caught, chances are you’ll do it again. But where does that end? Then do you cheat on your resume, add some “white lies” to get the job? Do you then borrow a co-worker’s idea and pass it off as your own? It’s harmless, right? What about in your family? Do you cheat on your spouse? It’s just an emotional affair so that doesn’t count, right? Or maybe it’s just harmless online flirting, nothing real. Where does it end? How harmless can it be when the behavior stems directly from your own personal ethics?
So what do you think? Is it okay to download a book for free? Is it the same thing as borrowing from a library? What about cheating in school? Is it okay to cheat just this once?
**Also I must tell y’all that I have a new book out, I hope you’ll all check out The Temptations of Anna Jacobs, it’s the second book in my Dangerous Liaisons series, an historical romantic suspense about the hunt for Jack the Ripper.
I’m Robyn DeHart, AKA Basket-Case Mama, but not because I’m crazy (though really, what mom isn’t?) but because I have a slight obsession with baskets, well containers really. I’m a bit of an organization nut and I love to containerize stuff. And yes, I’m authorized to use words like that because I am also a writer. But back to the kids, so I’m mom to two ridiculously beautiful little girls and I can say that without bragging because I didn’t actually make them. The Professor and I adopted said little lovelies from the foster-care system here in Texas and now we’re a big happy forever family. Busybee is five and so full of joy it just oozes from her. Babybee is a three and is too smart for her own good. www.robyndehart.com
peanut butter on the keyboard 
I do go onto some of the e-book sites that have pirated e-books and have seen quite a lot of current romance novels. But I don’t generally download the works of living authors. I’m usually looking for vintage and out of print books of authors that are dead. I don’t feel guilty about that but would feel guilty about depriving living authors, many of whom I now have contact with on the internet.
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I deal with the book piracy thing daily, sending takedowns. A lot of those sites are scams and virus-ridden, so it makes me nervous even dealing with them. I think cheating is human nature. Not the good part of human nature, but the part we have to work against. People have always wanted something for nothing. When I was a Freshman in college my psych 101 professor, Dr. Lewis (who I had a crush on, but that has nothing to do with this), said, “If you cheat, I may not catch you. But when you cheat, the person you really cheat is yourself.” I really believe that.
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I went to one of those nasty sites looking for a Mary Burchell book that has been out of print since the fifties. I’ve been searching for print copies for over three years with no success. It looked like a scanned file might be on the site but it wasn’t. I did get six programs that downloaded to my computer and had to be cleaned off. So I was suitably punished for going to the site. I feel sorry for authors having the time suck of sending take downs though. Personally I wouldn’t worry too much about one of those virus sites. If someone wants your book enough to put up with that sort of garbage it has to be a compliment. If they would rather waste hours of their time cleaning up the computer when they could be reading rather than pay the equivalent of half an hours wages for the legitimate book they aren’t terribly bright either.
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We’re talking about integrity here. Do folks today not seem to care about it in the grand scheme of things? If so, that’s kind of sad.
Or, do folks think it’s okay to set integrity aside from time to time– like it’s no big deal. Again, that saddens me.
I try hard to do the right thing, even when it’s not easy. I’m not going to sit here and say I always do the right thing. That’s just not possible. But, I give it a good shot.
With my girls, we’ve talked about things like: Easy doesn’t mean it’s the right choice. When you’re considering doing something, how would you feel if it was on the front page of the Wall Street Journal?
And, even if no one’s watching you, it’s important to still do the right thing, because when it comes down to it, two people/beings are actually watching– you and God. That’s enough to keep me toeing the line between right and wrong.
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I work for a library, we have 18 branches. We were discussing piracy this morning, and how so many are working to stop it. By the time one site is shut down, there are 3 more to replace it, and how IP’s are changed so frequently that they are difficult to track. We also discussed copyrights and that original content is immediately copyrighted whether you legally copyright it or not. It is a done deal.
Libraries are dealing with the high costs for ebooks at $80 a copy or they have check out limits of 20 or 26 per ebook, requiring frequent replacements. It is difficult to do ebooks fairly with a library system that is on an ever shrinking budget. We need to be fair to writers, while still providing popular content to patrons. Piracy is never the answer, but controlling electronic content is difficult. The laws are in flux, hopefully a solution will be found. Personally, I only buy ebooks from 2 trusted sites and borrow from my home library. I can only imagine the frustration of writers.
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I’d never illegally download a book or share it. I agree with Shana and Priscilla though, it’s something in human nature that we all have to struggle against it.
I read a really interesting article the other day where the author (I think a professor, but don’t quote me) suggested we need to return to oral exams, especially for those required liberal arts courses where people are just trying to breeze through to get to the next thing. It would mean a lot of rote memorization which maybe isn’t good, but I think it would stop at least the laziest of the cheaters. And being able to make an cogent oral argument/presentation isn’t just useful for future lawyers ;-), it’s something that could be useful for most adults.
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It pains me to know artists are robbed and cheated. What a labor of love it is to put yourself into a book, a piece of music or other work of art. I’ve spent 17 years cleaning up ethical messes. Actually I’ve made a career out of helping people, leaders and companies through big change. And in all of that time, sadly I’ve come to realize we’ve always had cheaters and people who steal. I don’t think it’s as easy today. We see it more readily because of the transparent nature of our world.
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How do you know if the site is a legitimate one. I only download from Amazon and Barnes and noble. Other sites I have tried but the formatting is wrong and I have lost money. But free books all my free books are from Amazon and Barnes and noble. I’m in college now and I see students cheating. My English 102 professor scared me so bad about plagiarism I didn’t even think about. He said every paper we did her would run through a computer to check if its plagiarism. Also if we didn’t quote something in our papers correctly he said he would mark it as plagiarism.
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My son’s in the engineering academy at his high school, and recently voiced his frustration about a kid cheating on a test, and gloating when he made an A. My son made a C on the test, and was pretty upset about it. I asked him if he wanted to have an office in a skyscraper designed by the guy who cheated on his engineering exams, or one in a building designed by someone who actually put in the work and effort and knew his stuff, and that seemed to make a lot of sense to him. 🙂
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I’m suddenly thinking Towering Inferno. Which probably just gave away my age.
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