Author Description

"In 2008, 95% of all music downloads were illegally obtained. In the same year, digital album sales increased by 36%. Pirate Nation is the story of modern-day digital piracy and how it affects business, society and culture. It traces the origins, methods and motivations of modern-day digital pirates. Roanoke-based "Piracy Happens" blogger, Darren Todd, covers topics such as copyright, creativity and piracy's potential role in business, and also explores the idea of using file-sharing and remixing as an asset instead of a liability. Looking critically at both sides of the piracy issue, Pirate Nation explains intellectual property, explores whether some degree of piracy is inevitable and discusses the limitations of current copyright law"-- "The 21st century is awash with pirates, but not the cutlass-wielding, pieces of eight kind. Today's pirates are more interested in hijacking movies, music and video games than doubloons, in subverting traditional business models and copyright, not galleons. Pirate Nation is the remarkable story of modern-day digital piracy, and how it affects business, society, creativity and culture, now and in the future. It traces the origins, methods and motivations of modern-day digital pirates, focusing not just on copyright law or file sharing music, but also game, movie, literary and software piracy. It explores the 'pirate mind' and the rise of the 'free for all' culture. It also investigates international government and industry attempts to clamp down on piracy, and considers how businesses can work with piracy without criminalizing customers"--