E-books

[pvcliff]

I've been watching several listings for sets of paperback books all by one author. Today up popped an e-book set.  Is it "allowed" to sell e-books? Is this legit? Where exactly are they getting a set of a couple dozen books? Excellent feedback, including indicating the seller was helpful to the buyer in figuring out how to get the books to their Kindle. That's where I am now, unsure how the download process works, and asking the seller for help.

[pvcliff]

So the answer back as to how this works, is they send an email to my paypal address, then I forward that to my Kindle email address. I just wonder how it is that the author is getting his cut, and if this is legit in general.

[fashunu4eeuh]

E-books can only be sold if the seller is the author and/or copyright holder or has official permission to resell.

https://www.ebay.com/help/policies/prohibited-restricted-items/digitally-delivered-goods-policy?id=4...

Not allowed

These digitally delivered goods may not be sold on eBay:

• MP3 music copied from a CD you own or recorded at a concert
• eBooks you don't own the copyright to and aren't legally authorized to resell
• Songs you bought from iTunes
• Movies you copied from DVDs you own
• Video games you copied from the original CDs
• Electronic copies of product manuals or user guides for which you don't own the copyright or which you aren't legally authorized to resell

[pvcliff]

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@fashunu4eeuh wrote:

E-books can only be sold if the seller is the author and/or copyright holder or has official permission to resell.

https://www.ebay.com/help/policies/prohibited-restricted-items/digitally-delivered-goods-policy?id=4...

Not allowed

These digitally delivered goods may not be sold on eBay:

• MP3 music copied from a CD you own or recorded at a concert
• eBooks you don't own the copyright to and aren't legally authorized to resell
• Songs you bought from iTunes
• Movies you copied from DVDs you own
• Video games you copied from the original CDs
• Electronic copies of product manuals or user guides for which you don't own the copyright or which you aren't legally authorized to resell

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I can't imagine a 20+ ebook set is legit. Question is why does eBay allow this sort of thing to be listed? I even feel like the books could be "repossessed" by the rightful owner, by eBay or by Amazon Kindle. It is tempting, to want to get all these books for $20, but just feels the whole concept is wrong. I'll just keep watching the physical book sellers for five times the price, but at least I can resell them right here! Did that with all the Kay Scarpetta novels I bought -- took me three years to get through them all, but resold them easily.

[wpt05]

@pvcliff 

The majority of those listings are just blatant copyright theft.  That is why they are able to sell them for so cheap.  Many of these are sold by sellers outside of the United States.  

When searching for new books, I see listings for $2.  The normal price for these books is $15-$20 on kindle, paperback, or hardcover.  These listings just clog up the search.  

I have reported many in the past, but they just keep popping up.  

[impalajohnny]

Not encouraging anything illegal here.

Some classic books are public domain and there is nothing wrong with downloading them for free or selling them to the non tech savvy.

Some current authors offer one book free online to the public in the hopes of selling more books. I read a free one on kindle that ended in a cliffhanger that was to be concluded in the next paid book and I was very angry. But maybe shame on me for expecting something for nothing. lol.

Often if the seller has a big lot of ebooks from a living author with active copyrights those books have been downloaded from a site that hosts pirated material.

And once again I'm not encouraging illegal activity but it would make more sense to get it free yourself from the sellers source which is probably easily found than give money to middleman criminal.

A final note on the topic is that no one but the rights holder can know for sure if something is pirated. Or who they have granted what permissions to. I have a friend who wrote a few books and she lets her loser brother sell as many e-copies as he wants. Another friend is in a band and they want people burning and sharing CD's as much as possible as long as it's not for profit.

[clu3]

Is the book in PDF format that you are sending to your kindle?

Selling them in bulk does seem suspicious.  If you're uncomfortable, you should notify ebay.

I've reported many sellers hawking PDF versions of textbooks, and I let ebay know that I was also notifying the publisher of potential copyright infringement on this site.  I haven't looked any up recently, but I'm relatively sure it's still happening.

I once notified ebay AND the FBI (even Trump has never called the FBI) of potentially child porn on ebay.  I did notice that the listing restrictions were updated since to exclude the item I was complaining about. 

[wpt05]

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@impalajohnny wrote:

Not encouraging anything illegal here.

Some classic books are public domain and there is nothing wrong with downloading them for free or selling them to the non tech savvy.

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Yes, a lot of old classics are off copyright.  Some are even available to download from government websites.  

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@impalajohnny wrote:

Often if the seller has a big lot of ebooks from a living author with active copyrights those books have been downloaded from a site that hosts pirated material.

And once again I'm not encouraging illegal activity but it would make more sense to get it free yourself from the sellers source which is probably easily found than give money to middleman criminal.

---

Those are ones that I was referring to.  Some are fairly obvious like when you see books that came out in 2018 being sold for $2.  I find it hard to believe that an author is giving permission to somebody in Morocco to sell their brand new books for 90% off on eBay.    

You should be careful going to those other sites as well.  Anytime I am diverted to one of those sites my anti virus program starts popping up like crazy.  

[11333tank]

I just purchased a really cool 1899? booklet from the makers of the old Magestic  Stoves called Magestic Stove Cook Book, it is not dated but there is a similar book, without government food preservation info, from the same year so I'm pretty sure it's dated close to that. It is just like stepping back in time, not so much for the recipes, but the glimpse into every day life back then and the helpful hints such as how to calculate how much grain that will fit in your wagon, it's a blast to read. It has all of the stove models and how to set them up with plumbing and how to cook in them with the recipes. I know people that still have these old stoves would love it. I would like to scan it to a pdf and sell copies reasonably priced on ebay, not to make money so much, but to share it with the world. That is what led me to this site. Any helpful hints out there as how to get started and what to watch out for would be greatly appreciated. PT

[wesk_36]

"Question is why does eBay allow this sort of thing to be listed?"

Same reason that there are sometimes 100-10000+ listings for certain  "banned" items on ebay. It's an imperfect system which allows fraud to run rampant.

 I think ebay only sometimes pulls listings when someone reports it or a VERO complaint. Ebay often does not adhere to its own policies, but only rather selectively and minimally, according to what is often voiced on these boards; "Ebay pulled my listing saying it's not allowed but there are 1200 other listings for the same thing."

Some of the PDF book listings are legitimate but most of them selling popular authors are not, in my opinion.

I am like you, I want the author or musician to get their rightful revenue; I fell like I'm supporting the artist. So I don't buy digital books or music on ebay.