Amazon. TWO rounds with pirates selling on Amazon, one I suspect being an offshore seller outright pirating everything in print and selling subscriptions to their ‘service’—the other being a piece of equipment I need to get the Rusalka cover done—which the seller says was already delivered by UPS [not true] by a tracking number UPS tracking does not recognize, and if I have trouble about that shipment I should contact the US POST OFFICE…yeah. Sure.
AND phoning Amazon about the book download pirate gets the response that it’s up to me personally to confront this seller.
One round of damned spammer using a webcrawler to find keywords inside text on sites and trying to sell windows. Fried.
The next person to cross me today is going to walk into it.
Suspicion confirmed. Books LLC should be taken in context with this report:
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/04/indias-copyright-proposals-are-un-american-and-thats-bad.ars
This is part of a determined effort by offshore sellers to use the looseness in our mass-market sites to sell counterfeit goods.
If you need us to go on there and give them bad reviews or otherwise make people in charge pay more attention to their shenanigans I’m sure we would.
Give us the link & we will File! Nothing like bad reviews & “illegal pirates”.
I’m pulling up multiple Kindle editions on amazon. Are these the pirated books?
I am hoping Amazon will pull this seller off their site. They are also part of other mass-market sites, notably from India, and I wouldn’t be surprised to find them on things like the mass shopping sites in the US…if not now, very soon. Amazon’s got some major weaknesses, imho, in their accepting people as sellers. Keep an eye out for this seller, or for anybody using their promo spiel, which could be them in another guise: this is a quote from what they are advertising on Amazon: THIS IS THE TEXT THAT IS THEIR OPERATION: IF IT HAS THIS, IT’S BOOKS LLC.
“Purchase includes free access to book updates online and a free trial membership in the publisher’s book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Chapters: Science Fiction Book Series by C. J. Cherryh, the Chanur Novels, Finisterre Universe, Downbelow Station, Foreigner Universe, Cyteen, Serpent’s Reach, the Morgaine Stories, Gate of Ivrel, Finity’s End, Cloud’s Rider, Faded Sun Trilogy, Cuckoo’s Egg, Tripoint, Merchanter’s Luck, Rider at the Gate, Well of Shiuan, Forty Thousand in Gehenna, Alternate Realities, Rimrunners, Fires of Azeroth, Regenesis, the Gene Wars Universe, the Scapegoat, Hestia, the Merchanter Novels, Brothers of Earth, Devil to the Belt, Hunter of Worlds, Exile’s Gate, Wave Without a Shore, Voyager in Night, Port Eternity, the Faded Sun: Shon’jir, the Faded Sun: Kesrith, the Faded Sun: Kutath, the Kif Strike Back, the Pride of Chanur, Forge of Heaven, Hammerfall, Conspirator, Deliverer, Foreigner, Invader, Pretender, Defender, Destroyer, Explorer, Inheritor, Precursor, Angel With the Sword, Chanur’s Homecoming, Chanur’s Legacy, Chanur’s Venture, Heavy Time, Hellburner. Excerpt: Alternate Realities Alternate Realities is an omnibus collection from 2000 of three short science fiction novels by science fiction and fantasy author C. J. Cherryh . The three books included in this anthology are: Wave Without a Shore (1981), Port Eternity (1982), and Voyager in Night (1984). All three novels are set in Cherryh’s Alliance-Union universe and share a common theme of people encountering and coping with a reality different from their own.The original books as well as the omnibus edition were all published by DAW Books . The novels are what Cherryh and her publisher at DAW, Donald A. Wollheim , referred to as “magic cookie” books. Such works explore unusual themes and ideas in science fiction, and can in some sense be seen as thought experiments . Wollheim encouraged Cherryh to experiment in this way during the late 1970s an…”
A casual google for their advert wording yields a presence at:
http://www.chapters.indigo.ca/
http://search.barnesandnoble.com/Eureka/Books-LLC/e/9781155992679
http://www.isabelspizza.com/dominou0027s-pizza-games-free-online/ [would you believe?]
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8409032-short-stories-by-kurt-vonnegut
http://www.amazon.com/Marillion-Albums-Clutching-Misplaced-Childhood/dp/1155461088
http://www.ffcomics.com/indrajal-comics-free-download/
http://www.pricecheapbooks.com/zane-books/19
http://duanesimolke.blogspot.com/
http://www.bentoandstarchky.com/forum/YaBB.pl?num=1279503318/5
http://www.friedbeef.com/best-places-to-get-free-books-the-ultimate-guide/
……..and it goes on into hundreds and hundreds. This thing has all the characteristics of a ‘bot’s operation.
Okay, I’ve gone ahead and renamed Books LLC on GoodReads.com into Books LLC (Illegal editons) and added this link to your page in their author info – however they have auto-added 60.000 books to Goodreads.com and I’m not sure if I can delete those.
But you as copyright holder could apply for their removal according to the terms of Goodreads.com
http://www.goodreads.com/about/terms
Another librarian says they are legally publishing wikipedia article collections? Anyway, she changed the author description into pointing out that they legally publish those wikipedia article collections, but are not “not a licensed reseller or editor of modern, in-copyright novels. “
Another librarian pointed out that using their DMA NOTICE procedure would only be effective if they were a user no the site, but those books are simply added via Amazon.
So I guess it would just be a waste of time for you to do the procedure.
Sorry to not be of more help.
I think I am going to go out and sift some more rocks. I am not in a mood to write this morning.
I can report that ebay, at least at present, seems to be Cherryh-download free. Ebay is notorious for sketchy sales of this type, so maybe you haven’t made the radar yet. I will monitor the situation. As the copyright owner(s), Closed Circle should have little trouble getting illegal downloads removed from the various sites, one might hope.
It’s better than this, friends: these people have the same ad up for every author I’ve yet checked. You might check your favorite authors and musicians on Amazon for starters with the following in the Kindle section “authorname books llc” and see what turns up. Then advise the writer of any findings via their website.
I’m beginning to think it is time to inform Amazon that a boycott campaign of their services is starting because of the blatant theft that they are encouraging.
Sad. Amazon can’t seem to weed out the pirates from the genuine article (no pun). When they do, their response is to penalize the people who have inadvertently downloaded the illegal copy (think the 1984 kafuffle), and who knows what happens to the pirates. I was considering buying a Kindle, but until Amazon can vet all its downloads to be non-pirated, I think I’ll wait.
I have finally gotten through to Amazon, and they are asking me to file a separate copyright violation complaint proving I’m the writer and they’re the pirate for each separate title involved—talk about insult to injury. Since this involves every working writer, for every title these jerks can google, this would take an operation the size of the federal government to fill out their paperwork.
I have sent back a letter to Amazon explaining that fact, and if the ‘bot doing the answering can contact a human being, perhaps they will realize their tail is on fire.
Sorry to here about your skirmish on the Cyberseas. It seems to me as long as Amazon gets their percentage of the transaction, it’s not really in their interest to care.
Reading this is giving me flashbacks to some of my battles with the federal bureaucracy.
I have no idea if it would help, but you also might try filing a Freedom of Information Act request to Amazon, in hopes of getting some more account information about your pirates and making the Feds aware of this.
CJ: It seems as if you’re going to need some boilerplate set up so when this recurs you have everything in hand to fire off the proofs of copyright “to whom it may concern”, just varying the names of the people involved.
I think the DCMA complaints are the way to go. Do you have the list from the Google ****? Seems like you should massage that into as many form emails as you have books, and if Amazon wants to be buried in DCMA take-down emails, let ’em! If they miss one, they’re out of the DCMA safe harbor.
I know in California you could easily do a power of attorney (POA) solely for the purpose of issuing DCMA warnings (if you could find a volunteer). Under CA law, if you use the standard (statutory) form, anyone who ignores the POA is liable to be sued in the CA local court and must pay attorney fees. I have personally gotten BofA to fold in five minutes by showing them the POA with the highlighted statues appended. They sent it to Legal, and Legal folded fast. You might see if WA has such provisions.
Meanwhile, feed the nice koi:
http://braingames.nytimes.com/partner/nytimes/playing-koi
I’m with OSG, File! File! File!, and then carry out said Filing! I have just the thing for long distance “carrying out” of missions such as that. Effective range: 2,000 yards. projectile: .30-06 150 gr Spitzer boat-tail FMJ, velocity: > 2,700 feet per second “Launch” platform: U.S. Rifle, .30 Caliber, M1, also known as the Garand. We can set up “shop” on a rooftop, I’ve got a spotting scope, and the rest, shall we say, is history. We can take out monitors, computers, networking equipment, keyboards, desk lamps, and USB hubs. That’ll l’arn ’em! Of course, I would never endorse violence against individuals, unless said individuals were threatening me with immediate bodily harm.
Are you sure that they really sell pirated books?
So far I only know Books LLC and its ilk (Alphascript and Betascript) as sellers of Wikipedia articles. Which they can legally sell, if the keep to the license requirements, and do sell at outrageous prices and which they make appear as original books.
So their statement “Purchase includes a free trial membership in the publisher’s book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge.” might simply refer to them mirroring or simply linking to the millions of Wikipedia articles which are indeed free and under certain circumstances can be described as books (Wikipedia has it’s own create-a-book function).
The excerpt they give after the chapter list (all articles on Wikipedia) is word for word part of Wikipedia’s entry for Downbelow Station.
So far the company is very flaky and misleading, but I have never before heard them in regard to illegal activities. They are misleading their customers, but I never before heard of a case of them not respecting copyrights and the licenses.
Currently they seem to be more of a problem for Wikipedia, as some people don’t register that it’s just Wikipedia articles and use the Books LLC books as references in the Wikipedia.
I don’t think that you can do anything against the books, or need to do anything.
I’m 99.9% sure that you are not the author of these books but people like Alvestrand, BoLingua and 24.148.58.219 are, who can do nothing either, as they licensed their contributions under a GDFL or CC license which allows commercial selling.
The Librarian at GoodReads.com where I posted a question about Books LLC says the same – that they sell small pamphlets about Wikipedia articles. I’ve never bought anything from them, so I have no idea personally.
Sabina is right.
Books LLC is a scam, but it’s not the kind of scam that it appears to be at first.
They are not selling pirated copies of your books. They are selling collections of Wikipedia articles about your books.
See, for example, on Amazon,
Science Fiction Book Series by C. J. Cherryh: The Chanur Novels, Finisterre Universe, Foreigner Universe, the Morgaine Stories [Paperback]
It would not be possible to include all these books in a single paperback. It would have to be thousands of pages long, even with very small print.
Now look at the Product Details.
Paperback: 54 pages
Look in the product description.
Chapters: The Chanur Novels, Finisterre Universe, Foreigner Universe, the Morgaine Stories, Faded Sun Trilogy, Alternate Realities, the Gene Wars Universe, the Merchanter Novels, Devil to the Belt.
i.e. Each chapter in their ‘book’ consists of a Wikipedia article about your novels. It consists of 54 pages of Wikipedia articles about the Chanur Novels, the Finisterre Universe, etc.
This may be technically legal. However, people who buy this are not getting what they expect. The whole thing is a scam and a rip-off, and it’s deeply disgusting that Amazon would allow such a scam to run on their site, but it doesn’t seem to involve copyright violation.
I must say that my opinion of Amazon has just hit rock bottom. There’s no way they can be unaware of this, but they are obviously making money out of the gullible and unethical people who buy these ‘books’, hoping to get pirate copies at a cheap price.
GW has a point. I’m not sure it’s proven, but it’s likely from what I’ve been able to see. Maybe someone can comment with more legal authority (in the technical, knowledge sense), but it seems to me you have to fight on a trademark basis. Fortunately because your choice of “Cherryh”, this should be easy, though possibly not inexpensive. As I understand it, “Cherryh” is your un-registered trademark now. I am unsure how much legal authority you have without registering the TM, though. Anyone?
Way back when, the magazine OMNI was going to be called NOVA. WGBH, Boston public tv, went to court and won even though NOVA was not a TM name.
My memory is hazy on this as it happened ages ago. I guess you could look it up.
For now I will stay away from Amazon.
DAW is receiving the same information, which is a great relief: people who pay for anything from books llc are being scammed.
The head of DAW said she herself put up a review saying so and Amazon took it down.
I think they should get more reviews.