A Rotten Serbia-Texas Guy Who Steals UK Cancer Money

Some wonder, "Gosh, why so concerned about little old EBAY bootleggers? It's the Internet. EVERYBODY steals!"

Mmm, yeah. Except eBay is supposed to be competing with Amazon as an HONEST website. And side from whatever royalties the book thieves are stealing away, and aside from the damage done to the publishing industry and to libraries (if you don't want to buy, go to a library), here's a fact:

The EBAY parasites are NASTY BASTARDS with no soul. Instead of getting a slap on the wrist, five aliases, and apathy from morons at Random House and Digimarc, they should be reported and removed ASAP.

Take THIS guy.

Among his items? Of course, a Random House hack (E.L. James), the "Wimpy Kid" series, and, oh, a fake charity demand. Yes, this guy's use of Internet technology involves grabbing an eBay ID and swindling people for $10 donations that supposedly go to a British cancer victim.

Only this guy is not in Great Britain is he? How about SERBIA. How about TEXAS?

But first, take a closer look at the "Cancer Victim" hoax:

First off, if eBay sellers want to raise money for charity, they have to pick an eBay-approved charity where the money definitely goes to the REGISTERED charity via Paypal. Ebay isn't GoFundMe. They don't want con-artists. Sellers are not allowed to simply claim "all the money goes to charity."

Note that the seller in this case claims he is in TEXAS.

Funny, he registered in SRI LANKA.

The percentage of parasites from Sri Lanka who steal books and sell PDF downloads on eBay is huge. Probably 50% are from Sri Lanka. Ebay shrugs.

This seller was reported about five days ago. Yes, the guy has no right to offer a fake charity auction. Yes, the guy also is playing the scam of "I own copyright" on the books he's copied. And yes, he should not be claiming to be in Texas if he's registered in Sri Lanka. But has this auction or ANY of his auctions been stopped? Mmmm, not yet. Ebay's wheels of justice grind a bit slow. When they grind at all.

For the record, the "Wimpy Kid" auction in which the guy claims, as they all do, that he "owns the copyright" to a famous book series.

This guy would've been suspended long ago if individual authors, like Mr. "Wimpy Kid" or the overfed E.L. James bothered to send in takedown requests at eBay.

Likewise, it would be helpful of rich fatcat book companies (who claim they have no money when they dole out advances to most anyone BUT Mr. "Wimpy Kid" and overfed E.L. James) kept an eye on eBay. Digimarc, supposedly experts at finding abuses, missed Random House/Penguin's "Grey" series from this guy. Then again, Random House has a very random policy on piracy.

Our hipster book-thief and charity con artist even tosses a photo of himself (or somebody he'd like you to think he is) on his EBAY PAGE, along with some tripe about how wonderful the world of technology is.

It would be helpful if authors and publishers, who pretend to be caring, intelligent and up on good causes, took a few minutes to simply file takedowns. Isn't PIRACY a good cause? Isn't keeping con artists from exploiting people with phony charity requests and dupe PDF files a good cause?

It would also help if "we're just a venue" eBay took fast action when complaints are reported to them.

Ebay No Read English Too Good

I reported an auction in which the eBay seller blatantly admitted he was offering an illegal item.

Ebay, bless 'em, actually has a rule against "digital downloads," or selling PDF-KINDLE-MOBI-MP3 files that can be stored on an Internet cloud/locker or squirted through cyberspace via e-mail.

THIS guy is doing just that.

I did NOT highlight the offending, illegal sentence in red. The seller did, because quite often eBay bidders THINK they're getting a real book at a bargain price, and want their money back when they discover it's just a file they have to read on their computer.

The problem in reporting this auction? Ebay sometimes doesn't speak English any better than the jerks in Sri Lanka, Macedonia, Romania, Venezuela or Florida who copy off each others' ads just as they go to the illegal forums and torrents and copy off the actual files.

The average person has a 50-50 chance of getting an abuse on their favorite author removed.

Ebay may or may NOT read the ad copy and understand it's a "digital delivery" violation. Or care.

That's why it's so important that James Dashner (and every author) and every publisher join VeRO and file takedowns. Ebay is the most high-profile site on the Internet for pirated goods. Most people have no idea how to find a free file on James Dashner's book series, but in coming to eBay to maybe get a used set cheap, they come across THIS type of ad, think it's legit, and buy it.

Dashner obviously isn't hurting, and if he's aware of the problem, then he hasn't the morality or intelligence to care about the problem. He's not willing to take one minute away from his Tweeting to file a takedown.

The more takedowns eBay gets, the quicker the pirates get suspended, and the less likely more bootlegs will appear. Pirates are like any thieves. They go for the open window, or the car with the key in the ignition. They think twice about a "Beware of the Dog" sign or an area that seems well protected and policed.

Ebay makes money by NOT removing a file like this, by accidentally NOT reading the ad. The pirate makes money. The publisher makes a little less and that means a rise in list price on next Fall's books, and less of an advance for most authors (other than Dashner and a few other privileged superstars).

It also means that there's less traffic to libraries. If someone can't afford Dashner's books they should go to a library, not to a bootlegger. A bootlegger doesn't have a building loaded with obscure volumes paid for in the name of scholarship. Libraries do; they buy plenty of Dashner's books AND enough of lower-selling authors so that these authors can at least get some kind of advance.

A Dashner fan, an intern at the book company...it doesn't have to cost a PENNY to send in takedowns. Ebay only needs to know they're hearing from an authorized rep who has a "good faith belief" and is acting at the request of the copyright owner. Why leave it up to eBay to "interpret" whether a non-English speaking bootlegger is sending a file legally or not?

THIS seller puts in a dopey caveat in the last line of the ad, but tells the real story in the first line. That's how much of a jerk he is. But he's jerking money off eBay every day and banking it. So he thinks he's pretty damn clever. Smarter than authors or publishers.

The Author's Guild and the Random House Portal of Doom

At the BEA convention, and other events, you can always count on some salesmen-saps from the "Author's Guild" or some other union to tell you how important it is to give them money.

Ask them WHY, and they mutter about low cost health insurance, which usually is no better than deals you can find elsewhere. Next? "Oh, we stand up for authors!" Yeah?

Like, you'll contact eBay and get pirates removed on behalf of your members?

Well, no.

Some time ago, the Author's Guild website happily reported on a random notion from Random House and their Penguins: they'll ALLOW their authors to report piracy when they see it. On their own books only. Meaning, if E.L. James sees an eBay pirate abusing George R.R. Martin, her complaint to Digimarc (Random's idea of an enforcer) will likely be ignored or obfuscated with "thank you, we took appropriate action" which was nothing at all.

If you're an author and you somehow have Googled yourself and discovered the wide world of "forums" that let members upload PDF/MOBI/KINDLE files, you can report the problem yourself. You contact the "cloud server" that hosts the file, and let 'em know you're the copyright owner, and to take down the abuse.

They will. Or they won't. It depends on what country the "cloud server" is in. Fact is, Digimarc can do no better for you. If your file is at Kickass or Pirate Bay or some other well known abusers, they get ignored.

So much for the great "authors only" portal, which looks like this:

As this site has proven time and time again, the publishers and their sheriffs aren't doing that good of a job when it comes to EBAY. All they need to do is type in some hot author names and book titles, and add "ebook" or PDF and they'll spot the latest parasites from Sri Lanka, Macedonia, Romania or FLORIDA.

They don't.

Is there any day that you CAN'T type in "Game of Thrones" and add "e book" or "MOBI" and see a bunch of bootlegs being sold? It's not that there are too many moles to be whacked. It's that nobody's looking, and the message is, "Hey, we're so rich, we don't care." Which is interesting news to any mid-list author trying to get an extra five hundred bucks advance or an extra five copies on their contract.

Random's proud of what they claim they do for authors:

Why don't they let the general public report piracy on their website, as many other publishers do? Why don't they even allow a Random House author to report piracy on behalf of another author? And what IS the "Author's Guild" and other nitwit anemic groups doing about this problem on eBay?

The late Joseph Heller would find all of this to be quite ludicrous. So would a lot of other beloved authors who spent their lives pointing out idiocy, apathy and foolishness. The Catch-22 here is beyond laughable: publishers NOT welcoming piracy reports, NOT allowing authors to file them on behalf of other authors, and NOT taking the easiest steps to virtually eradicate piracy on eBay.