I’m ok with library Sci-Hub, but less so with Library Genesis. Pirating books reduces the incentives for authors to write more books. Pirating academic articles won’t reduce academics’ incentives to write papers.
Considering certain technical books range between 70 to 300 dollars per copy, and libraries are unable to afford them, it seems to me that the incentive system is already broken.
The publishers are very comfortable with the high prices they are able to charge the quite expensive American universities.
In some academic fields, books are also just collections of technical papers on some topic, or one really long paper, which is probably not something to earn money from. I assume most are sold to libraries, similar to journals. Though Library Genesis also contains other, more commercial books.
Good. There no reason to rewrite undergrad calculus books every semester besides money grabbing. The math hasn't changed in 100 years and there shouldn't be an incentive to write an updated version of the book for the 50th time.
The language changes, but more importantly students backgrounds and facility with the English language changes. Not that dumbing down the text or replacing old timey words should cost much, but cost disease and all that.
Granted, but they definitely do not change enough to warrant a new edition every year. This can and has been experimentally confirmed by countless students even before Library Genesis simply by showing up to class with an old edition of the textbook and still learning the material fine.
Does it? It seems complicated. Higher availability of books means more readers for a start. Large numbers of people don't read at all and therefore aren't even in the market for books. Then you have to consider the absurd length of copyright. How does an author receiving money for something they wrote 50 years ago incentivise them to write more? Even worse, how does a dead author's estate receiving money incentivise anyone to write anything?
>How does an author receiving money for something they wrote 50 years ago incentivise them to write more?
Receiving money for something you wrote 1 week ago doesn't encourage you to write more. It's the knowledge that you will receive money for next thing you wrote that incentivizes you to write more. And a 50 year payout should obviously provide more incentive than a 6 month payout.
There's going to be a point of diminishing return where adding extra years doesn't provide enough extra incentive to justify the cost, but I haven't seen any convincing evidence that 50 years is over that threshold.
The same holds true for copyright extending past the author's lifetime. Especially if an author is older, the knowledge that their children will benefit is certainly an incentive.
I don't get this argument for writing or anything else. I do things now for which I don't expect to get paid for the next 50 years. What's my incentive?
The publishers are very comfortable with the high prices they are able to charge the quite expensive American universities.