Don’t forget to check the winner announcement for Brooke Taylor’s Undone! Yeah, she’s a friend, but I’ll plug this book forever. I loved it that much.
Today, I’m getting a little serious. This is a big, big deal to me. the ramifications are incredible. Scary!
Jeaniene Frost shared a fantastic post with us yesterday at The Deadline Dames. It’s all about how e-piracy (IT’S STEALING PEOPLE) damages us. I try explaining this to people and it doesn’t seem to sink in. I happen to know someone who believes everything should be available to everyone-that we need to all share. Sure, this is a wonderful idea. Unfortunately, it isn’t logical. Not with the way our world currently works. We have to make a living to survive and every book, movie or song downloaded illegally isn’t taking from The Man. It’s taking from the person who created it. The person who sweated and dreamed and worked hard for it.
I currently don’t earn a living writing my books. I hope to. (So much!) But I’ve been working with writers who do earn their living this way–I have been for a long time. These people spend months creating, months waiting on submission and then they go through rewrites and page proofs and promotion. This is a long, long process and they have agent fees, taxes, promotional costs, healthcare and oh yeah, bills.
They earn every dime they get and this perception that stealing a book here and there won’t hurt them because they’re rich? NO! In fact, Jeaniene Frost has another enlightening post here. Please, I urge you to read both these posts and if you know someone who steals books, movies or music online, share them. Maybe something will click and they’ll realize that if so many keep doing this, pretty soon there won’t be books, movies and music. All the people who create our entertainment will be too busy trying to find paying jobs elsewhere. As it is, most already are.