I’m a pretty passionate person and therefore, I have a hot button or two.
One is censorship in any form. (as noted by my outrage over the proposal to ban books because of the word scrotum)
Another is forcing your beliefs onto someone else…whether they be political, religious, or parenting styles.
And another is copyright infringement. Even before I was a writer, I believed in supporting the artist whenever possible. I don’t like to buy books or CDs at garage sales or resale stores because I think it’s important the artist gets paid for their work. So, imagine my shock and frustration to discover that esnips.com allows its members to post full books in their entirety for free download.
Authors like Meg Cabot, Susan Elizabeth Phillips, Kasey Michaels, Lemony Snicket, John Grisham, Jayne Ann Krentz, Linda Howard, Sherrilyn Kenyon, Alison Kent, Gena Showalter, Jaci Burton, Jennifer Crusie…need I go on?
Offering free downloads of books is taking money directly out of the author’s pocket. It has to be stopped.
Bitchin' Fiction: Musings by author Melissa McKenzie / Melissa Francis 
I’m not easily shocked or appalled, but this one got to me. Even my kid, a VP and senior fellow at a D.C. think tank, who specializes in intellectual property rights, was surprised by the extent of this theft.
He also told me on the phone last night that the pages were so clear it was obvious that someone had cracked the ebook encoding feature. Which, of course, is something many of us have been worried about for some time.
Thanks for passing this on, sweetie. Writers, publishers, AND readers need to get up in arms over book theft. Because the day writers stop being able to earn a living writing books, there will be no more books to read.
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God, that’s just scary. Like it’s not hard enough to make a living though writing, now they want to fuck us this way, too? Bastards!
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Oh, I’m up in arms! That’s truly maddening!
Good post, Mel!
~Marly
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I’m shocked.
Great post, Mel.
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It would seem like anyone who likes reading would not be willing to do this.
That site can’t last very long.
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