Earlier quoted context omitted.
How is this victimless? I write a book, put it out on the market. Someone copies it and puts it up on a website (crime alert). Someone like you publicises it. I don't get paid because from your point of view, it is out there free for the taking. Meanwhile, I have lost hundreds or thousands of potential sales from people who may have paid, but have now been tempted to join your illegal caper. Everyone revels in the ve…
So many assumptions are embedded in your comment. Firstly, it's not proven that piracy affects sales. Quite the opposite: it usually raises popularity for an item, because – if it's good – people sing its praises, which leads to more sales. You didn't respond to my actual comment. Again, it is victimless because no one would've bought the overpriced book except for those who have $40 to throw away on a lark. If we fo…
In the middle ages, books were written by the elites, for the elites. Necessarily so, because education itself was an elite activity. You want a return to those times?
"Are you so sure your book would have maid those thousands of dollars in an era before it was possible to widely distribute it? Who would buy it? And moreover, who would hear about it and how?"
Surely you don't mean to say that a product would never be heard of if there weren't the means to copy it. Surely you don't go into a theatre and livestream a play or concert or standup, because the poor "victims" outside wouldn't have a chance to be enriched. If broadway is expensive, go elsewhere for your entertainment. You don't have the right to give away or consume someone else's work just because technology brings the cost of watching it down to zero.
This is the last I am going to say about this argument. I'm quite done.