Book Publishers Whine To USTR That It's Just Not Fair That Canada Recognizes Fair Dealing For Educational Purposes

from the you-know,-like-US-law dept

A few years ago, Canada's Supreme Court made it clear that "fair dealing" should be applied broadly, especially in educational settings. Fair dealing, of course, is similar to fair use -- and, in the US, in theory, educational uses are also supposed to qualify for fair use. As Section 107 of the US Copyright Act states:

The fair use of a copyrighted work, including such use by reproduction in copies or phonorecords or by any other means specified by that section, for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright. In determining whether the use made of a work in any particular case is a fair use the factors to be considered shall include—

(1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;

Thus, it seems like the Canadian interpretation is very much in line with the US's statutory view of fair use. Of course, over the years, in the US, publishers have repeatedly chipped away at fair use, such that now that Canada has moved to a position more akin to what the US's is supposed to be, those same publishers are absolutely flipping out. Last year, we noted that those US publishers submitted a recommendation to the USTR claiming that fair dealing in Canada was simply piracy. This was the publishers' submission to the USTR for consideration in preparing its annual Special 301 Report.

Apparently, this "fair dealing = piracy" argument didn't play well enough at the USTR and didn't make this year's Special 301 charade. So, the publishers are pissed. Or so reports a recent bit in Politico's Morning Trade (I'd link to the actual story, but Politico apparently doesn't believe in making it easy to permalink to its Morning Trade tidbits, so it's no longer there), where it notes they've asked the deputy USTR (and former BSA boss) to do something.

Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Robert Holleyman is traveling to New York today to attend the opening ceremony of BookExpo America, put on by the Association of American Publishers. The industry group is steamed over USTR’s failure in a recent report to confront what it regards as Canada’s overly broad copyright exception for educational purposes. “Active engagement by the U.S. and Canada to remedy the damage should not be put off any longer,” the AAP said.

Think about that for a second. Here are American publishers flat out complaining about Canada setting up its laws to help people get educated. Do these publishers think even in the slightest about the kind of message they're sending out? "Fuck educating children -- we want more money."

Filed Under: book publishers, canada, education, fair dealing, fair use, robert holleyman, ustr
Companies: association of american publishers

Book Publishers Circulating 'Talking Points' To Counter Arguments That Ebook Prices Need To Go Lower

from the fighting-basic-economics-is-never-a-good-idea dept

For a while now, we've been discussing how the pricing on ebooks doesn't make much sense, and almost certainly needs to fall. Like many industries, the book business could learn a lot from other businesses that have realized that drastically lowering the price on digital goods can massively increase sales, and better maximize profits. But, instead, book publishers seem to be pushing in the opposite direction, and trying to push the price of digital books up. We recently wrote about a NY Times article that suggested consumers might revolt if the publishers keep moving in this direction, which is actually supported by reports of how consumers are reacting to publishers' anti-consumer activities with regards to ebooks.

Given all that, I was amused when a friend "in the business" forwarded me an email message sent to a mailing list of book publishers in response to that NY Times article about consumers' potential revolt, that encourages publishers to get out there and fight back against such perceptions. The email contains a list of "myths and potential talking points." Some of which are amusing. It starts out by saying $9.99 doesn't need to be the price for ebooks, which is true, but they don't even seem to consider the notion that the price could be less (or even free), focusing only on examples of people paying more for ebooks. It then suggests that publishers start blaming the ebook device makers for "the implicit, false promise" that ebooks can be cheap. That's ridiculous. The idea isn't "false," it's just basic economics, and we've already seen it playing out in music. Why wouldn't the same economics play in the ebook space as well?

The talking points also tries to attack the claim that Amazon is losing money on every ebook sold by not actually responding to that (mostly accurate) claim, but instead directing your attention elsewhere, by pointing out that Amazon has a $50 billion market cap and can sell products like ebooks at a loss and still make massive profits. Yes, this is true. And it's true because Amazon seems to understand the basic economics of where the money is made: which is in scarce goods, not in infinite ones.

Among the other talking points is the claim that people who buy ebook readers for hundreds of dollars shouldn't bitch about ebook prices, because they're obviously rich enough to afford whatever publishers think the books should be priced at (again, ignoring basic economics). Also there's a claim that publishers are really lowering the prices on ebooks even as consumers see higher prices. While this is technically true in cases like Macmillan, where the company is lowering its wholesale price in order to get Amazon to raise its retail price, it misses the fact that this doesn't matter to consumers. Consumers don't care about the wholesale price. The talking points also included one about how publishers' deals with Apple might actually price books lower anyways -- and it seems like that particular talking point has been "anonymously" pushed into a NY Times article already.

The list goes on in this nature, but it's worrisome that publishers are thinking this way. Just as we were recently discussing, they're acting like the recording industry ten years ago: hunkering down for a "war" of words, rather than actually focusing on new business models or figuring out what consumers actually want. Instead, they're trying to dictate what consumers want and hoping for some sort of magic bullet in the form of ebook readers. This is a dangerous move by publishers that can only come back to haunt them. Instead of focusing on "countering" what consumers are saying, why not actually listen to them, and look for ways to provide what they want?

Filed Under: book publishers, ebooks, publishing, talking points

German Music And Book Publishers Demand ISPs Block File Sharing Sites

from the because-no-good-can-come-of-that dept

Michael Scott points us to the news that German book publishers have joined with recording industry representatives to demand that a variety of file sharing websites be blocked by German ISPs, claiming "I don't see any other way than access controls to get to platforms like these that are based in foreign countries." Or, you know, the labels and book publishers could (*gasp*) try to figure out way to use these sites to their advantage rather than denying their existence. Blocking the sites, of course, won't do much of anything, other than moving those who file share to alternative sites or proxy's/encryption, making it that much more difficult for these companies to learn how to use these sites to their own advantage.

Filed Under: book publishers, file sharing, germany, music publishers

Bookstore Demands Publisher Payola For Stocking Books In Store

from the the-fight-for-survival dept

Similar to the RIAA's attempt to get radio stations to pay it for playing songs, it appears that another struggling industry is demanding payments from partners instead of adjusting to the changing market. BoingBoing points us to the story of a large Australian bookstore that apparently demanded that certain publishers pay it a fee to continue stocking their books. The publisher in this case sent back a rather caustic and mocking letter, calling the bookstore's bluff. We all know that the market for bookstores has changed drastically, thanks to the internet, but the answer clearly is not about stocking fewer books that people want or by artificially limiting what books you stock. Since the internet already has unlimited shelf space, you're only making things worse if you do that. Other booksellers have realized that they need to change and play up what makes them valuable beyond their shelf space -- doing such things as becoming destination sites, publishing their own books and playing up the expertise of the staff. Instead, this Australian bookseller has simply resorted to a weak and unsustainable payola scheme that will likely only hasten its demise. In fact, as this story becomes more well known, even fewer people will be interested in going to Angus & Robertson's bookstores, since they'll now know that the books aren't chosen by popularity, but by who will pay off A&R.

Filed Under: book publishers, bookstores
Companies: angus and robertson, tower books