J.S., send R.L over here for his answers. Good qtseuions.I am not going to do a myth article about piracy because, to be honest, unlike some of these areas, I don't feel like I can stay in any sort of balance. My belief is that I stop anyone with threat of lawsuit who is trying to make money off of my work. It is the same as going into my house and taking my living room furniture. Same thing. Theft of property is theft of property. You take something of mine and try to sell it, you will hear from my publisher's legal department or my own attorney. And by the way, I have won a number of suits and got a settlement from SFFWA for theft of an article of mine. So no myth about piracy. It is just theft and should be punished as just that.Now, note, I allow in my Sacred Cows posts to let people send them along to others who might be helped. But I have already stopped one person who tried to sell it online. Passing along with permission is fine, linking is fine. Theft is not fine. Copyright is a property right. Just think of it as your car and the topic makes sense.And I will NOT LET THROUGH comments from the nut cases out there who think information needs to be free, you know the ones who believe that silliness gives them an excuse to commit theft all they want. Nope, my car is my car, my copyright is my copyright. I just don't know enough about the close internal workings of the music industry to comment much, but remember as C.E. pointed out a few times, the music industry and the publishing industry are not big single things, but instead are made up of huge areas that are often very different and have different rules of operation and standards. I talk about the fiction side of the publishing industry here. Sorry I couldn't help you on that one.
