If I copy a page out of a book and give it to my friend, should I be sued for a zillion dollars?

Question

Why is it that the book industry doesn't go crazy about this sort of thing, but the music and movie industries go absolutely ape?

Answer 1

absolutely

Answer 2

You can't compare a page in a book to a song. For the purpose of entertainment, a single page out of a book is essentially worthless. If you copy the ENTIRE book, and distribute it, you will see the book industry does go crazy.

Copying an artists work and distributing it may seem harmless enough, but here's the rub... an artist makes his or her living by creating a work, and then selling it again and again. A single piece may take a week, or a month, or a year, and the artist must live off of that work until the next work is complete. By not paying for copies, you are taking the revenue that the artist depends on to LIVE away from them. How can an artist continue to create more for you if you don't want to pay for what they've already made? If you love an artist's work, don't you think you SHOULD pay them, so they can afford to make more great things for you to love?

Do you get it now?

Answer 3

"Should" is a value judgement, and "a zillion dollars" seems to be an awful lot. If the book you copy is not in the public domain, then you can be sued for copyright infringement, which is exactly what the recording and film companies are doing. Book publishers are a bit less rabid about it than the other two, but mostly because there aren't a lot of p2p book-sharing networks out there.

Answer 4

It's not the same thing. When people copy from a CD or a DVD they usually don't just copy a few seconds of it, they copy the whole thing. If you compared that to copying a whole book, it would be a different matter.

Answer 5

because
1) it's more then 10% (i assume it's not a children's book with less then like 10 pages)
2) it's entire song (like entire books) not just say 1 verse

Answer 6

Because that's how they make their money.