A’ishah.

Very good article and points.

Personally, I try to adjust my consumption to my immediate needs. EG: I find “recycled” CD’s from consignment stores. I find “recycled” books from used book stores. I rent or borrow movies from others.

In all of these situations, I still consume the content (legally) yet the artist and initial creator of the content do not get compensated. This is not an excuse to support piracy, mind you, but to help illustrate that there is more of a “ripple effect” or downstream ecoonomy of media and content than the initial purchase and distribution of that content.

This methodology allows me to fill in my back catalog at $2-$3 / CD and if there’s something out there that I really have to have, I’ll buy it electronically with the mindset of being able to archive and retrieve later (applies both to books, CDs, DVDs, etc) — and doing such with a clean conscience.

Do I support the consumption of pirated content that is “first release”? — no. To your point, if we expect to get more media in the future, first releases need to be financially viable. It’s what happens in the echos of the years to come of what to do with “outdated” media / content which allows for other creative ways to get / consume content.

BTW — anyone interested in old movies on LaserDisc?

Michael

Another thing that sets the Nook apart is the Lend Me feature: you can lend an ebook to someone for up to two weeks. They can read it on their device or using software. But that’s a publisher opt-in kind of thing. When I bought Stephen King’s “Under the Dome” I still had to register my wife’s device with the account as it isn’t a books you can lend.

Very true about DRM. It’s another knock against purchasing digital content.

One thing about software is that in some ways it’s flipped and there’s less risk online. In the store you don’t get to take the product out of the package and once you do you can’t return it. Online many software makers will give you a free trial or lite version of the program so you can use it before buying it.

You’re right about the price and the perceived value. It seems counter intuitive, but when it’s free we don’t place value on it so it’s easy to dispose. If I pay $350 for software I’m going to use it more even if it’s only to justify the price to myself.

The lack of thorough preview is a good point to make. Barnes & Nobles is certainly addressing that *if* you’re in one of their bookstores. So that sort of matches the physical experience.

For me a big gripe with digital media, whether delivered via a physical medium or not, is that it’s often has copyright protection technology, preventing me from making (legit) backups or, once done with the item, passing it on to someone else.

Random thought: what’s interesting is that paying for an item enhances the perceived value of that item. Expensive wines are experienced as better tasting *even* when they were, in fact, cheap wines. What that says about collecting “free” digital content is that your collection is, in your own perception, of less value, less quality.

Take software…. I think that buying a $350 software means you’ll do your best to get value from it — whereas you would only interact fleetingly with a “free” copy before moving on to something else.

If I want to buy a book, I walk into my favorite bookstore, grab the book, sit down for a few minutes and read a little. The more expensive the book the more I’ll probably read in the store. Take a technical computer book that might run close to $50. I’ll read the introduction, skim a couple of chapters, maybe read a few pages about a specific issue I’m hoping the book will help with.

I also know that after taking home the book, if it wasn’t what I was looking for, I can bring it back and either get a refund or exchange it for another book. All in all most of my risk is mitigated because it’s a physical product I can use prior to purchase and return if I regret that decision.

Compare that to a digital book. I have to buy it prior to to being able to see any of the content. Perhpaps there’s an a free introduction, but most of the time there isn’t. I can’t skim a few chapters and odds are I can’t return it.

If we’re talking a few dollars no big deal, but say the book is approaching $50 I’m going to be hesitant to buy it sight unseen. There’s a lot more risk in purchasing the digital version of the book.

Now that doesn’t give me or anyone the right to steal a copy of that book. In my case I probably wouldn’t buy it unless I could read a chapter or at least some other writing by the same author (maybe their blog). The desire for the book hasn’t lessened though.

Again none of the above is an excuse for pirating. I thought I’d toss out a few things though as to why people may be more willing to pay for a physical product over a digital one.

On an unrelated note, Van Gogh might not have been the best example of someone who made a painting, sold it, made another, etc. I think Van Gogh only sold one painting in his lifetime. He was very excited as he was very poor and hungry at the time.

On his way home from the sale he came across a woman in worse shape than he was. He gave her the the few dollars he’d made from the sale, and went home hungry before getting back to painting.

His brother Theo pretty much supported him most of his painting life.

I couldn’t resist the Van Gogh story for obvious reasons.. I hope you don’t mind.