[michael_dorfman]

In the example I offered, the economics are no mystery, but if it helps you to put numbers in the picture, let's go for it.

Suppose I write a book of sonnets. I negotiate with a publisher whereby he has the exclusive right to print, distribute, and sell said book of sonnets for a period of five years, and I will be paid $1 per copy sold. The book proves popular, and a pirate publisher produces, distributes, and sells an identical edition, but fails to pay me the $1 per copy sold.

In this case, I am being deprived of the income (by the pirate publisher) to the tune of $1 per copy that they have sold during the period in question.

Clear?

[icebraining]

You are being deprived of something you never had. If someone says they'll gift me a car, and then they don't, have they stole from me? No, because I never had the car in the first place.

And who's to say you are being deprived of such income? For all you know, you could have received the exact same amount even if the pirate publisher had never sold it - maybe he did all the marketing work that enabled those sales.

More: for all you know, maybe the marketing work that the pirate went through has helped sell more of your publisher's copies that it would had the pirate never copied it at all.

It's simply impossible to tell if you were deprived of any 'potential income' or not.

[Jach]

Not really. Why is it $1? Suppose you make a contract with one publisher who will pay you $1 per copy sold and also negotiate with a different publisher who will pay you $2 per copy sold. How much are you deprived then, $1.50? $2? You're assuming that every copy the pirate sold could have been sold by your current publisher(s) but wasn't.

[michael_dorfman]

Because I stipulated that the contract was exclusive and time-limited. In other words, the assumption that every copy the pirate sold would have been sold by my current publisher is accurate-- hence the simplicity of the hypothetical.

[gnaritas]

> Because I stipulated that the contract was exclusive and time-limited

And why should you have the right to control that?