South Korean students engaging digital shoplifting:
The whole thing smacks of a bored journalist blowing a story way out of proportion during a slow news month, but a South Korean newspaper is reporting about a new problem affecting bookstores there: students taking illegal pics of the pages they need from expensive textbooks (to write reports or study or whatever) rather than actually buying the whole book. Not that it’s not happening or anything, just that you’d think students would just hit up a library where they actually have photocopiers right there waiting for you.
I’ll do one better, simply perusing a book (i.e. previewing) should also fall under the same erroneous rubric of “theft” if snapping digital photos is.
You know how Apple’s iTunes Music Store lets you “preview” songs for 30-seconds? I’m just waiting for the day when bookstores have the same policy (no I don’t think it will happen anytime soon, if at all, but it is a worthwhile mental exercise to practice).
Take for example someone who has a “photographic memory” (an ability many readers have: if you can read a passage and recall an idea or sentence from it then you have a PM, albeit to a smaller degree). Should these individuals be required to register or for that matter, should every individual be required to register with some reading comprehension authority and carry around Reading Licenses which state the abilities of the card holder? After all, information is being disseminated, stored, copied and reproduced by a sophisticated electronic machine — a machine which has been known to recite passages and recount knowledge verbatim - adapting for the positive benefit of the host (and detriment as well).
I should also note that I have no problem with private firms constructing a store policy over who they will refuse service to, after all, it is their store and they own the books.
What I do have a concern over is the word-games that Copyright-protected industries play in defense of their business model. Those individuals taking pictures with their cameraphone are not stealing anything. No physical theft takes place nor is any physical damage done. The store owner is not deprived of his property. Rather their activity may fall under Copyright infringement, a different topic altogether and one that is continuously conflated with property theft (with the RIAA trailblazing that endevour — as is SOCAN).
On a related note, a number of book publishers and authors are upset over what has become an increasingly popular feature with virtual stores like Amazon, the sale of good ole-fashioned “Used” books. These transactions break no laws as both publishers and authors are left out of the royalty loop. For more on this, the E-Commerce Times has an in-depth overview and discussion over this poignant issue.
To end on a light note, RIAA Demands End to Unauthorized Humming, Whistling.
