It probably has to do with how word of this book and the book itself was practically viral among parents and the content was good enough to deem buying in hardcopy for a lot of those pirates. I was under the assumption that this is generally how the piracy success stories work. A lot of people pirate something only to discover that they really like it, and they'll buy it to make up for the piracy.

I'm not even a parent, but I saw the book on facebook through a friend-with-kids and was howling the entire way through. I preordered a copy on Amazon immediately after finishing reading the book and I bookmarked it for future reference for gifts to new parents. If it wasn't for the book being on facebook, I never would have heard of it and I probably wouldn't have bought it if I only saw the cover or a page or two on Amazon or at a physical bookstore.

I'm not buying to make up for piracy.

But I like books in printed form, so I usually try out reading a 2-3 chapters of the pirated version, then if I like it I'll buy it.

The book in the article also appears to be a nice gift. You obviously can't give pirated PDFs as gifts :)

Yeah, more I think about it, I think the gift effect is crucial here.

This article is an example of where piracy has positively benefited a creative work. Previously the debate was that "All piracy is always bad". People are starting to find evidence that piracy can be good. This changes the debate.

I don't think this changes the debate. It adds another data point to the idea that piracy can give exposure to works that don't have massive amounts of money to spend on PR campaigns; such things that if they weren't heavily pirated, you probably wouldn't know about them. This idea has been around for a long time.

I suppose it's similar to the debate that "pulling out" is a safe contraception method. It works in very few cases.

Coitus interruptus has a failure rate of 15%-28% per year, 4% when used perfectly. In comparison, condoms have a failure rate of 10%-16% (2% when used perfectly).

You were perhaps aiming for a sound-bite, but saying "It works in very few cases" is inaccurate.

I think it made my point quite nicely. Piracy works in a very small percentage of cases. We shouldn't be clinging to this fact and saying that it's an effective way to market and advertise.

If we were able to say why, definitively, something went viral, then viral wouldn't seem so unusual or special, would it. We're all left to guess when something like this takes off in an organic, viral way. What's more interesting than guessing at that is what the fallout will be for business--and the publishing model. That's what this story explored.