Fantasy-Hive

Main Menu

  • Home
  • About Us
  • Interviews
    • Author Spotlight
    • By Author Surname
  • Book Reviews
    • Latest
    • Hive Reads
    • Self-Published
    • By Author Surname
  • Writing
    • Write of Way
    • Worldbuilding By The Numbers
  • Features and Content
    • Ask the Wizard
    • BookTube
    • Busy Little Bees Book Reviews
    • Cover Reveals
    • Cruising the Cosmere
    • Excerpts
    • News and Announcements
    • Original Fiction
      • Four-Part Fiction
    • SPFBO
    • The Unseen Academic
    • Tough Travelling
    • Women In SFF
    • Wyrd & Wonder
  • Top Picks

logo

Fantasy-Hive

  • Home
  • About Us
  • Interviews
    • Author Spotlight
    • By Author Surname
  • Book Reviews
    • Latest
    • Hive Reads
    • Self-Published
    • By Author Surname
  • Writing
    • Write of Way
    • Worldbuilding By The Numbers
  • Features and Content
    • Ask the Wizard
    • BookTube
    • Busy Little Bees Book Reviews
    • Cover Reveals
    • Cruising the Cosmere
    • Excerpts
    • News and Announcements
    • Original Fiction
      • Four-Part Fiction
    • SPFBO
    • The Unseen Academic
    • Tough Travelling
    • Women In SFF
    • Wyrd & Wonder
  • Top Picks
Blog
Home›Blog›Ebay Ebook Piracy – A Brief Guide

Ebay Ebook Piracy – A Brief Guide

By Mike Everest Evans
September 27, 2019
3799
1

Ebay ebook piracy. It’s not as hard to say as ‘Irish wristwatch’ but it’s still pretty tricky – and it’s tricky to unravel as a subject, too. I posted about this on Twitter recently, and after receiving some pretty good feedback, I thought it might be worth posting here on the Hive, too.

If you search for an author/book on eBay, the large majority are legitimate listings for either brand-new books or second-hand copies from businesses and private sellers.

However, look long & hard enough (or ‘smart’ enough) and you’ll find ebooks for sale.

I’m not going to get into the technicalities of copyright laws, but by and large these listings are for ‘pirated eBooks’. In rare – VERY RARE – circumstances, these may be perfectly legit listings (e.g. when copyright has expired or for licensed resellers), but 99% of the time they are illegal.

So, what is ebook piracy?

Ebook piracy is when someone ‘steals’ a copy of your book and puts it online for people to download.

BUT – I hear you cry – isn’t ebook piracy when someone puts it up to download for FREE?

Yes.

But it also covers someone putting it up to download for $$$.

Both are equally as damaging to an author (lost moneyz) but IMHO someone selling your ebook is worse. (Note: I’m not going to debate the rights and wrongs of free illegal downloads so don’t @ me).

The pirated ebooks are even being sold illegally on Ebay (below) for a higher price than the legitimate listing on Amazon (above). Furthermore, this puts the author at risk of inadvertently violating Amazon’s terms of service in cases where the ebook is meant to be Amazon-exclusive.

How do I find out if my ebook is being pirated on eBay?

Simple: search for it.

But as I said earlier, this can require looking long and hard, unless you’re looking ‘smart’.

To make this easier, try adding any/all of the following to a search for your author/book name: Ebook / .pdf / kindle / .mobi

And don’t forget to check the international results! Some that don’t appear on eBay.co.uk will appear on .com and vice versa.

What do I do if my ebook is being pirated on eBay?

Report it.

On every listing there is the functionality to ‘report item’ found by the ‘item description’.

Some users may find that they encounter a ‘too many redirects’ error when trying to report an item. If this happens, use eBay’s ‘Help’ section to search for their ‘report an item’ process which doesn’t require you to report from the product homepage.

Additionally, you can also ‘report seller’.

What about eBay’s Rules/Community Guidelines?

Lol.

Next.

What about authorised resellers?

Sure, these are a thing. But it’s pretty obvious when someone is an authorised reseller, or a pirate. No, they don’t have a peg-leg or eye-patch avatar on their eBay profile (though that would help), but they’re not hard to spot.

Illegal resellers don’t have a peg-leg or eye-patch avatar on their eBay profile (though that would help), but they’re not hard to spot once you know what to look for.

What about the publishers? Isn’t it their job to stop this from happening?

I know that some publishers have robust processes for actioning take-downs on websites offering pirated eBooks. But eBay is a little different.

Of course, publishers have skin in the game when it comes to pirated books for sale (this still adds up to lost sales for them after all), but I don’t know what process they have for checking eBay. I mean, it’s a full-time job in itself, searching the internet looking for pirated books; and it can get costly actioning DMCA take-downs (unless you are comfortable doing it yourself). And anyone can do a search of eBay for pirated ebooks and report them – yes, even readers.

In summary…

Pirated ebooks are bad. Legit ebooks are good.

Don’t do the bad drugs. Stay in school.

And don’t forget: ebook piracy harms everyone. Writers, publishers, and readers alike. If publishers don’t make sells, they don’t buy books from writers, and we as readers don’t get to read said books. It’s the circle of life. Kinda. But with moar dragons (in the case of fantasy).

TagsBlogEbayeBook piracyEbooksPublishingWriting

Mike Everest Evans

Mike ‘Everest’ Evans is a Security, Intelligence and Crisis Management consultant by day, and reader, reviewer and aspiring writer by night. Day to day is a mix of natural disasters, war & terrorism, geo-political instability, crime, corporate espionage, and most recently cyber warfare – stopping them, not being involved in them, or so he claims. Having worked in ‘Intelligence’, were he to write a book he’d not be short of experiences to draw from, though the security services might have a thing or two to say about that. Mike can be found on twitter @MikeEverestEvs and on his personal site https://michael-everest.com/

1 comment

  1. Happy Birthday Mike! | The Fantasy Hive 27 June, 2020 at 09:49 Reply

    […] 14. That time Mike laid down the law about eBook eBay Piracy dammit eBay eBook Piracy […]

Leave a reply Cancel reply

Welcome

Welcome to The Fantasy Hive

We’re a collaborative review site run by volunteers who love Fantasy, Sci-fi, Horror, and everything in-between.

On our site, you can find not only book reviews but author interviews, cover reveals, excerpts from books, acquisition announcements, guest posts by your favourite authors, and so much more.

Have fun exploring…

The Fantasy Hive Team

Visit our shop

Features

Support the Site

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue to use this site we will assume that you are happy with it.Ok