Essay On Book Piracy

Copyright piracy is a phenomenon prevalent worldwide. Piracy means unauthorised reproduction, importing or distribution either of the whole or of a substantial part of works protected by copyright. The author of a copyrighted work, being the owner, enjoys certain exclusive rights with respect to his or her works. These include right to reproduce, to publish, to adopt, to translate and to perform in public. The owner can also sell, assign, license or bequeath the copyright to another party if he wishes so. If any person other than the copyright owner or his authorised party undertakes any of the above mentioned activities with respect to a copyrighted product, it amounts to infringement of the copyright. Copyright piracy is thus like any other theft which leads to loss to the owners of the property. Besides economic loss, piracy also adversely affects the creative potential of a society as it denies creative people such as authors and artists their legitimate dues.

Computer software is pirated by simply copying it onto another machine not authorised for its use. Book piracy takes place when a book is reproduced by someone other than the real publisher and sold in the market. A performer's right is violated when a live performance of an artist is recorded or telecasted live without his/her permission. In a cinematographic work piracy generally takes place through unauthorised reproduction of the film in video forms and/or displaying the video through cable networks without taking proper authorisation from the film producer (the right holder). In fact, there are numerous other ways through which piracy of copyrighted works take place. The nature and extent of piracy also vary across the segments of the copyright industry. It is, therefore, necessary to discuss the nature and extent of piracy problems segment wise. Such an attempt is made in the following