Just a random topic I wanted to get everyone's opinion on.

Let's say I buy an ebook. I don't like it and therefore want to sell it and get back some of my cost.

When I sell it, should I only sell a printed out copy of the book ? Or do I sell the electronic copy ?

Just curious what the Café members think. Is one ethical and one not ?

Dave

Most likely, doing either is illegal.

The purchase agreement in most e-books does not allow you to resell them at all. The copyright laws allow you to make a copy for your own personal use, but not for resale. This agreement exists because it’s not possible to verify that you have deleted the e-book when you sell it.

I know all of the e-books at http://www.lybrary.com/ have this agreement. All copies must be purchased from Chris Washburger.

There are some e-books that are free. These e-books contain text explaining the exact conditions under which the book can be distributed. For example, one free e-book I’ve seen states that the book cannot be sold for money and can only be given to other magicians. Free e-books about magic are very rare. I’ve only seen one.

As I’m sure you know, selling or trading any e-books is not allowed here in the Magic Café.

Unless your case is really unusual, I think you’re stuck with the e-book.

What is the title and where did you get it?

That means if I buy a DVD burner, and burn copies of my VHS tapes to be used on my DVD player, I can never sell that VHS tape without that copy burned from the DVD, that has other items also on it? (Uncopy protected VHS tapes: Up to six hours on one DVD Disk)

For instance I pay $200 for the "Secrets of a Millionaire Magician" and download it, I'm stuck with it? Not an appealing proposition!

There seems to be something wrong with this? To prosecute one person at a time for reproduction of a single ebook, would be impossible financially. It's a matter of ethics one must live with.

If I buy the book with a CD I can sell it if I don't like it, however, as we all know, people will make copies, then sell the original. Who's to know he has done this, outside of his own conscience?

It's boils down to a self-ethical question?

If I buy a hardbound book from a magic store....go home, take notes on various tricks that I like, I can then "ethically" sell the book to someone else. I still have written notes back at my place on the tricks that were contained in the book.

Why can't the same "rules" apply to an e-book. If I buy it, and don't like it, why can't I sell it ?

Just my thoughts

I must admit that I generally don't like the very idea of ebooks. Mostly because of the issues already mentioned. Also, it seems like a shameless effort on the part of the producer to cut costs. It's good that an ebook is easier and cheaper to have 'delivered' but I think the possibility of piracy outweighs these small benefits. Anyone who can access an ebook is capable of making as many copies as they like.

When it comes to magic, this is bad news. eBay always has a flow of nonesense 'magic' ebooks with full resae rights. The outcome being that 99% of people only buy it because they believe they can make money from selling it(?!) and the 'secrets' get spread around like cheap gossip.

The secrets are weak, I know, but that's not the point.

And here endeth the lesson.

This is an issue that http://www.magic-notes.com tries to address (as does http://www.underground-collective.com) by 'stamping' each page of a downloaded ebook with the purchaser's mail address and having the document password protected with their name. The likelihood of the purchaser passing the ebook on to friends is diminished.

There'll always be a degree of piracy with ebooks - but so there is with manuscripts and books anyway - I've seen full scans of 'Cards as Weapons' and many, many photocopied lecture notes, booklets etc before. Piracy's one of those things that always will happen. Best approach, I think, is to make it just awkward enough to discourage casual piracy; the more determined pirate will bypass whatever measures you take, in any case.

Jamie.

If you are really interested, go to the Copyright law section of your library and read the copyright act. It tells you what types of copies you are allowed to make and what you are not.

Then there are the contractual obligations you agreed to when buying a particular ebook. Basically you cannot make copies for others and if you sell one, you have to give the rest of the copies or you are violating the law. What that means to you is a personal thing, just like any ethics question. Are you a thief or a respectable person? Your call, unless you are in court, then someone else will decide.

Kirk G.

IANAL, but I am pretty sure that fair use lets you create 1 archival copy no matter the medium or product, and also you are allowed to sell anything you buy(as long as you are not "leasing"), provided you don't keep any copies yourself.




I would say while you "legally" can sell the book, you can't "ethically".

Ethically you are trading money for not only the secret, but for the thinking behind the secret and the performance rights.

Which means you should include the notes with the book, or else it you shouldn't sell the book.

It also means, once you sell a book you should stop performing any tricks in the book that aren't elsewhere in your collection, or any tricks that are inspired by the book, because you are selling your performance rights with the book too.

"It also means, once you sell a book you should stop performing any tricks in the book that aren't elsewhere in your collection" - Daegs

C'mon, that is ridiculous ! That is like saying that if you buy a book that teaches you how to play the guitar, and then sell the book, you are not allowed to play any of the chords taught in the book ever again.

You cannot UNLEARN something.

That's right, you cannot unlearn something, but you can stop performing something.

If I sell you a package that includes the props, the secret, my presentation and performance rights to show the effect, Then if you choose to sell the book to someone, I expect you to sell them the props, the secret, the presentation and the performance rights.

You don't get to "keep" the performance rights when you sell an effect.

Legally, you might not be able to sue someone for performing an effect you do, whether they bought a book or not. Being able to sue has nothing to do with the ethics behind such actions, and it is certainly un-ethical to perform someone's effect without buying it, or perform someone's effect after selling it.