If you have not convinced me, I must not be interested in a discussion, I must not be listening, and I always do it. Let's see. How do any of these additional attacks on my character and/or expertise address any of my arguments? I think they fall into the yellow and orange areas of the pyramid, don't you? So let's get back to the facts here. Feel free to address the actual arguments, or not, but if you argue by throwing ad homs at me, I will call you on them. I've not argued with your description of Amazon's overworked legal team dealing with millions of complaints daily. -- I've argued this represents inadequate resources invested in the problem. You've argued Amazon has to be careful about suspending legitimate authors and publishers. -- I countered asking, why are they not equally concerned about copyright infringement? While investigating AgentKirb's specific stolen book, it came to our attention there is common wholesale theft of material being lifted off of blogs and websites and repackaged into Amazon Kindle books for sale by thieves. Do you have anything to say about these suggested actions being within Amazon's capability to take or not? How many of these actions or alternate actions do you think Amazon will implement if there is no financial incentive or regulation requiring them to? That's not my outrage against big corporations. It's my recognition of reality, there aren't many Ben and Jerry business models out there.
It's a given there needs to be a critical mass. Where the most effective place to direct that effort is, I don't yet have an opinion. I'm more than happy to start a spin off thread but it seems only a few people think the discussion has gone off topic. Is there a discussion of the OP that has been sidetracked and is not occurring because of the broader discussion? You seem to be saying the original discussion is completed. On a bit of a side note, and not directed at you Ed, I'm having a hard time understanding what people in this thread are pissed off about. What am I arguing that irritates them? Am I insulting Amazon? Attacking big business? Not right wing or Libertarian enough in my underlying philosophy? Or just not agreeing with someone and that knee-jerk, 'I don't like people to disagree with me, ergo that is a bad person' comes out reflexively? I am not angry that people don't agree with me. Why should I be? People who disagree with me are out there in the world whether they are posting in the forum or not. People don't need to be irritated that other people don't agree with them. I wish more people would figure that out.
You seem to be the only one getting irritated and making it personal. But undoubtedly I'm wrong about that as well...
Yes, you are wrong about the irritated part. Pointing out fallacious arguments does not necessarily indicate irritation, while saying someone isn't listening, never listens and must not know much, is. What is it about my disagreeing that you are irritated about? You felt the discussion was veering off topic, that's fair, but it was not unanimous.
I can only offer my opinion, based on my reading of the thread. The OP asked for advice on dealing with a particular problem, for which there are specific steps to be followed, as pointed out by [MENTION=18889]Steerpike[/MENTION] and commented on by others, and I think Steerpike's advice was as good as anything one can find on a forum of this kind. I have a theory about advocacy, which I have developed after a couple of decades of advocating for people with disabilities - there are two kinds of advocacy, what I call inside advocacy and outside advocacy. Inside advocacy is working within an established structure to achieve a desired end - through a governmental agency, say, or a specific process. What [MENTION=11825]agentkirb[/MENTION] needed here, and asked for, was advice on inside advocacy. In my experience, inside advocacy is limited in scope, specific in intent and generally involves a small number of players. Success depends to a fairly high degree on understanding the process. Those who are conversant with inside advocacy processes don't necessarily agree with them or consider them just, they just understand them well enough to get what they need to get (as the parent of two children with special needs, I was often placed in this position). OTOH, outside advocacy is working outside of a structure to generate large-scale pressure to change the process, to change the rules by which inside advocacy functions. Letter-writing campaigns, group lobbying efforts, ad campaigns, boycotts and embargoes are all examples of outside advocacy. What you have been talking about in this thread is outside advocacy, and even if such an effort were successful, even if Amazon completely changed how they handle accusations of plagiarism, it wouldn't help [MENTION=11825]agentkirb[/MENTION] at all (except maybe with his next publication). So, from Steerpike's perspective, what you were offering may have been interesting, engaging, stimulating and even correct (I happen to agree with your sentiments, although, as I pointed out, I think the economics make it almost impossible to make outside advocacy effective in this case), but they were, for the purposes of the OP, beside the point. Normally, I wouldn't care if the general issue were spun off or not, but I suggested it here so that the excellent advice offered won't be lost in the shuffle.
When I gather up more of the information I've been pursuing about how widespread and far-reaching the problem is, I will begin a new thread. I do believe there is an issue here that all authors, Indie or not, should be concerned about.
I want to thank you guys for being so kind to agentkirb. Some on this site weren't so gentle when I came with the same problem. Anyway, agentkirb, you want to deal with this now. Believe me, it doesn't get any easier with time. I've had to live with plagiarism since 2008. I never received justice. No, I don't obsess about it every day, but it does still eat at me. Please don't let this criminal off easy. You deserve recognition for all the work you put into your story. I'm definitely rooting for you.
Sad to say, it's unlikely. Most of the plagiarists I've encountered here in my years as a moderator show no remorse. Indeed, they typically react with vociferous denials, even in the face of overwhelming evidence, and with indignation and threats.
I had a look at some of the comments by the other authors on Amazon who also had their work stolen by Jessica Beckwith. Apparently she has gone to the trouble of changing the character names. It's odd then that she wouldn't change the titles? It kind off makes me think that this woman isn't quite right in the head. If you click on "look inside the book," there is a photograph of her on the back-cover. It might just be a random picture of a woman, but I'd just bet that its really her! I think she did this because she had some sort of delusional fantasy about being an author. http://www.amazon.com/Jessica-Beckwith/e/B00BR0ILS0/ref=ntt_dp_epwbk_0
huzzah!... that's good news, indeed, ak... sad to say, i have to agree that it probably won't stop this perp from stealing work from other victims... just as recurring prison terms don't stop career criminals from continuing to ply their trade...
You've given me courage, agentkirb. I'm going to the media with my own story. I've put it off long enough. It's time for justice to reign!
Hooray! This is good. Unless you are Jinx, AgentKirb, it looks like one of the other authors also got a response: But I still don't understand why Amazon has no concern about copyright infringing repeat offenders (repeat as in 11 stolen books for sale). I would think if a person tried to pawn stolen goods in the past, a pawn shop owner would not want to accept anything else from the person. Given this has now come to someone's personal attention in the legal department, I wonder if they will act regardless of making limited comments on the phone to people. They may feel the need to be more conservative about what they say than what they end up actually doing.
I agree with everyone here. I had to deal with some pretty serious legal proceedings (not criminal) that had nothing to do with plagiarism. But I represented myself. Many a good friend strongly discouraged me from doing this saying it would be an unmitigated disaster. You know what? I won. Any reasonably intelligent person with a decent education can research the law enough to handle stuff like this themselves. Also, if you published it anywhere in ANY public domain you own it plain and simple. As long as you have a date stamp and support of the original site administrators you should have no problem at all proving your case. I also noticed that it is still up on Amazon. And, I am not bashing here so don't take it wrong, but it only has one star. I am just saying, you likely aren't going to get any money out of this. The very least YOU MUST DO is have it taken down and make sure that as many people as possible know that this person is plagiarizing people. Best of luck... Kelson
Hi, Just a quick question (after the obligatory congratulations for having someone go to the trouble of plagiarising your work of course - it's actually a step up from the mere compliment of being pirated in my view!!!). Are you a member of the SFWA or other similar writing groups? If so they may have some legal advice people who might be able to help. In fact the SFWA was taking action against someone for exactly this sort of thing last I heard. Can't remember the details I'm afraid. Cheers, Greg.
Just check the requirements. You have to have certain story sales at a professional rate of pay to join SFWA.
Five of the six stolen books have been removed! I'm glad Amazon responded, hopefully it was because each author sent in a notice and not because more than one person did. But I still find the idea of leaving the six stolen books for sale, despite such an easily investigated theft, disconcerting. I'm continuing to collect information to start that new thread.
Another update: One of the books is still up, while the author says she has contacted Amazon several times.
