Dan Slott (comics writer) started a debate when he demanded that his fans buy the comic he writes rather than download it illegally. The series he writes seem to be well liked by those who read it , but sales are poor which might cause cancellation hence the challenge.
Scott Adams has also written about the topic of copyright abuse.
So herein my history.
I was first introduced to comics scanned and downloaded by folks when my friend from the states wrote half a dozen of CD's of comics we read. DC's aren't easily available in India and the prices are exorbitant(comparatively) and we didn't think much of it. It was a way to read books that weren't otherwise available and expensive to boot.
But after awhile i remembered the software piracy promise i had made myself( once i can afford it i wasn't going to pirate software) and then i thought was it really different?. And i haven't read any more pirated comics anymore(well except two below, pirated tech books is a different matter).
Lucifer(by Mike Carey) was one comic(a paradox) , for which i started buying single issues instead if the trade paperbacks because i sympathised with the low sales and i didn't want to see this series cancelled(it didn't , dont you love happy endings), and this was my contribution.
But when issues 74, and 75 were out and i desperately wanted to read the series end and the monthlies were available in UK but with no means to get them to India, i went and downloaded these issues. I suppose it was alright because i had bought those two issues already and they were in London. Oh yes i did download Nirvana and read, but it was the book was out of print and there was no way to get it. Back issues cost 75$ which was really ridiculous. Since then nirvana has been collected in the last trade , but to buy it i would have to buy the issues i already have , and so i haven't. Which is my entire comics book piracy history.
Having a collection of 2000+ comics, i don't think I've hurt the industry much :)
But the issues being debated are moral, ethical ones.
Analogies are being thrown about.
I remember seeing a software book license. it said that you could distribute the copy to someone else , free of charge , so long as you delete it from your machine (similar to if you lend a book, you cant read it yourself)
Overall though i think allowing people to scan books and distribute them to other people to read is good, especially for books from vertigo which have a low readership. and are actually very good reads. Because a lot of people (me for instance) , really detest reading from the computer screen. So if we like a book , we more often than not buy it. And we follow it , instead of waiting for the download to be available. We buy it as gifts for others, and we explore other books on the same theme, books by the same author, books about the same character.
That doesn't make it right however. Whether or not you disagree with copyright law, you have to follow it. Though i wish people would show some sense before passing absurd(e.g. American patent) laws.
