Interesting, the comment/question “Kelly” left on the recent eBook Success Stories Crushing Ivory Tower Publishers post. Basically, she wants to know if there’s a way to minimize the risk of theft/piracy of her husband’s ebook, which they’re selling directly through his websites.

The good thing is that she understands that there really is no way to prevent this kind of theft. At best we can make it technically more difficult — maybe — but that’s really pretty much it. We can most definitely try. And keep trying. The latest techniques do work… temporarily. The whole thing is a moving target that you’ll just need to constantly keep on top of, if you’re so inclined.

Through the years I’ve simply learned not to worry about this much, at least not above “normal” levels of care and concern. I guess the rest of this post will show you why I consider this Alfred E. Neuman “What Me Worry?” stuff.

In essence, I figure there are three major identifiable groups of pirates who’re trying to “steal” our ebooks:

1. Readers who don’t want to pay
2. Free distributors and file collectors
3. Illegal resellers, counterfeiters, plagiarizers, etc.

Although they’re all technically pirates by definition, the first two are just, well, odious and arguably “gray area” criminals. It’s the third group that’s pure evil. And that’s beyond contestation.

Anyway, I don’t worry about the first group since I strongly suspect the lot wouldn’t be your readers at all anyway if required to pay. So, they are economic non-entities as far as your book’s concerned — they won’t be paying you either way. So why sweat and stress over non-entities? The only reason I can come up with to hassle with them, really, is that it really gets your goat that someone is technically getting something from you for nothing. Hey, if that’s you, knock yourself out going to war with this group of leeches… me, I have little time and other things to do. That’s not to say either way is better than the other; we’re just different in that regard.

The second group’s more of a weird primordial ooze-type subset of subhumanity that’s been enabled, stimulated and encouraged by technology — in this case by free peer-to-peer networks (e.g., Napster, BitTorrent) — which makes it easy to anonymously “share” really huge files (music, movies, software, ebooks, etc.) with little risk of being picked out and caught as a distribution source unless you do something really stupid. Motivation? I’m just guessing, but it’s probably some juvenile orgasmic thrill to doing something illegal against “the man” — you listen to them, apparently they think they’re doing something daring and new, even noble, but it’s the same old dumb story.

Well, for the most part, members of this second group interestingly enough seem to be into the whole scene mainly for the act itself, and not necessarily for the illicit use of the products. Oh, they do use the stuff, but that’s a bonus to these nothing-better-to-do bozos, is what I can figure. I mean, there’s so much illegal digital content and products being distributed and moved about through these channels, these guys couldn’t possibly be “consuming” more than just a fraction of it. Heck, most in this group probably don’t really know exactly what they actually have stored on their massive drives let alone are users of said files. Long story short translation: Like the first group, they are of no direct economic consequence to you and your ebook.

Here’s where a bit of irony slithers its way into the picture. We often hear many in this second group minimizing their illegal activity by explaining that what they get is for personal use only, unlike those in the third group who are really out to steal digital products and content outright, repackaging and then selling them illegally, like what happens in many Asian countries. (Before you PC-heads start getting all worked up and whiny, I was born and raised in Southeast Asia and visit frequently. They respect intellectual property rights? Phffft. I know the drill. And you can complain to the hand.) Now guess what resources these third groupers tap heavily to supply themselves with illicit product? Yup, the very same easy to use P2P networks constantly supplied and trafficked by the second group nitwits for their own “personal use.”

Man, I sure can go off on a tangent.

Back to the point of this post, which is this: Despite the fact that piracy is very real and pretty much technically unstoppable, certain measures can be established to not only minimize the economic effect to you of such nefarious activity, in some cases it may even help you capitalize on it. And both of the following two ideas are completely practical in nature and have absolutely nothing to do with copy-protection technology or schemes, etc. etc. etc. Meaning: Anyone can put them into play. Really.

Idea #1: Very low no-brainer pricing. Price the digital product so low, only an idiot would steal it. If the in-your-pocket pay off is so low that a theft (or even just the effort of finding something to steal) is just downright silly, a legal purchase is a highly probable outcome.

This doesn’t work for everybody, of course. Maybe you just don’t want to price your book that cheaply. Hey, absolutely your call. I’m not even a bit curious why you think your ebook novel is worth, say, the $9.99 you’re charging for it. That’s between you, your customer if any, and your bank acount.

Idea #2: Give away a free bonus. Instead of futzing around with low-pricing (or on top of), consider doing a giveaway to all legal purchasers of your ebook. It may be a digital download or a physical product or whatever works with your particular subject matter and readership. Work in the notice of the giveaway into the ebook itself and in a way that it can’t be edited out, or will be difficult to do so — frequent repetition throughout the ebook may be something worth trying.

It goes without saying that the giveaway must be perceived as valuable. Especially in light of the following…

Notice how Idea #2 suddenly turns pirated copies (through group 1, 2 or 3, doesn’t matter) into a mechanism to promote a legal sale. Only a legal sale will get the “bonus” into the reader’s hands; presumably, there is a way for you to check this (receipt #, etc.). Make the giveaway valuable enough, and you suddenly have a very realistic chance of converting a lot of the group 1 and 2 pirates into paid customers, and maybe the assistance and cooperation of group 3 “victims” — maybe in exchange for a discounted legal purchase price — to help you pursue legal action against the group 3 bad guys.

And don’t forget to collect all those customer email addresses while you’re at it and build a marketing list!

– EES

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25 Ways to Write for Money. Open your eyes to a variety of ways to make money with your writing skills, many probably previously unknown to you!
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