About a year and a half ago, a client of mine sent me an unexpected gift in the form of five books: Ender’s Game and Ender’s Shadow by Orson Scott Card, and Titan, Wizard, and Demon by John Varley. The three Varley books were a trilogy, and I actually really enjoyed it. The two books by Card are the first in their respective series of books set in the Ender’s Game universe … I’ll let you guess which one started the whole thing

It’s important to note I didn’t pay for the books. They were shipped to me straight from Amazon, so it’s clear they were brand new, but money didn’t leave my pockets to cause those books to land in my possession.

I actually read the Titan trilogy first — when I realized how big the Ender’s Game series was, I decided to tackle a smaller pile of books first. When I finally got to Ender’s Game, I absolutely loved it, and immediately set about acquiring the rest of the books in both Ender’s Game series and the Ender’s Shadow series. To do this, I went to half.com … no point in paying retail for six books when I could snag them all for under $20 (including shipping).

Fast-forward a few months. About two weeks ago, I finished the last of the series, Shadow of the Giant. I still have the First Meetings… book of short stories to go through, though I’m a little burned out on it right now so I’m not rushing through it.

I described the series to my mother, and she expressed interest in reading them. I figured “well, I’m done with my copies, so why not send them along to her?” I bundled them up in a big padded envelope ($1.79) and sent it to her via media mail (a disgustingly inexpensive service offered by the United States Postal Service … one of the few things they get right) which only cost $3.15. Now in a week or so, she’ll have them, and will get a chance to enjoy them.

So, here comes the quandary for the folks at the RIAA and MPAA: I never paid a dime to the original publishers (or authors) for the books I read. Not one. Yes, I bought six of them used from other people, but not the original producers of the material. Once I was done enjoying them, I mailed them off to someone else to enjoy, free of charge. Not a single step in this process is illegal — the original owners of these copies of the books bought the books lawfully, sold them to me lawfully, and I gave them away lawfully. My mother is now the lawful owner of these copies of the books.

That means these books have now had at least two (in the case of the two series starters I received as a gift) or three (the used books I purchased) owners, each who have read them cover-to-cover (or will soon). The publisher only got one sale for each of them, but lots of people are enjoying their products. And it’s all legal.

This is exactly what the music and movie industries want to stop. It’s funny — the publisher of these books can’t ever take away from me the experience of reading those books. Not even the author can “undo” the impact his books had on me (positive impact, not to worry ). The direct, literal equivalent of what I’ve done here (taken advantage of the “doctrine of first sale”) in the music and movie industry would be buying (or receiving as a gift) a used music CD, listening to it, then sending it on to a friend to enjoy (the actual, physical CD, not a copy).

When you stop and think about it, sticking the disc into a PC, grabbing MP3’s of the music, and sending that to a friend isn’t a whole lot different, is it? Yes, it is different, but not that much. The first way (sending only the physical copy) is legal. The second is too (though the RIAA and MPAA would love you believe differently).

The question becomes: where do you draw this line? Have I committed an act of piracy if everybody in my car gets to listen to a CD I lawfully obtained? What about if I’ve got the window down and someone in the next car over hears what I’m playing? What about when I bring a movie over for friends to watch?

All of these things are legal, but very greedy people are trying to change that. They’re even trying to completely kill used CD and bookstores.

The next time someone tries to convince you that “pirating music” is ruining an industry, ask them where they get their music. Ask them if they’ve ever bought a used CD, borrowed a CD from a friend, or listened to another person’s CD in their car. Then make sure to tell them how disappointed you are that the industry is doing all it can to attack the two components that make the whole thing work: the artists (that get very little money from each sale, if any), and the people who buy the music.

And make sure you frequent the used shops as much as you can for things like books, CDs, DVDs, and games.

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