Book Piracy: 63% of Kindle Bestsellers are Pirated
May 13th, 2014Does book piracy affect sales?
There is a great dispute on book piracy whether it harms the sales or not. For example Springer, one of the larger book publishers, has informed its authors that the company has not seen any harmful effects from piracy. Authors, on the contrary, are apparently being annoyed and are fighting to remove piracy.
How many titles are actually pirated?
The effect of book piracy on sales is unknown, and so is how many titles are actually pirated. To answer that question, PiracyTakedown has examined how many titles are being distributed over cyberlockers and torrent.
The statistic was run against bestselling books at Amazon Kindle store on May 12th. PiracyTakedown's search engine has searched each titles for piracy.
Book piracy: result
Its result is shown below. Among the top 30 bestsellers on Kindle store, 19 titles are being distributed over cyberlockers or torrent — in short, 63% of the bestsellers are pirated.
| Kindle Rank | Title | Author | Cyberlocker | Torrent |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Fault in Our Stars | John Green | Found | Found |
| 2 | Balancing It All | Candace Bure | ||
| 3 | Finding Me: A Decade of Darkness | Michelle Knight | Found | Found |
| 4 | The One (The Selection) | Kiera Cass | ||
| 5 | Unlucky 13 (Women's Murder Club) | James Patterson | Found | |
| 6 | Field of Prey | John Sandford | Found | |
| 7 | The Target (Will Robie) | David Baldacci | Found | |
| 8 | Moving Day: A Thriller | Jonathan Stone | ||
| 9 | The Goldfinch: A Novel | Donna Tartt | Found | Found |
| 10 | Dragon's Triangle | Christine Kling | ||
| 11 | Sleep Tight | Rachel Abbott | Found | |
| 12 | Archer's Voice | Mia Sheridan | ||
| 13 | Havana Lost | Libby Fischer Hellmann | ||
| 14 | Allegiant (Divergent Series) | Veronica Roth | Found | Found |
| 15 | Insurgent (Divergent Series) | Veronica Roth | Found | |
| 16 | From the Moment We Met | Marina Adair | ||
| 17 | Pushing the Limits | Katie McGarry | Found | |
| 18 | The Husband's Secret | Liane Moriarty | Found | Found |
| 19 | Divergent (Divergent Series) | Veronica Roth | Found | Found |
| 20 | A Shade of Vampire | Bella Forrest | Found | |
| 21 | Paradise Valley Mysteries Boxed | Debra Burroughs | Found | |
| 22 | The Kindness of Strangers | Mike McIntyre | ||
| 23 | The Collector | Nora Roberts | Found | Found |
| 24 | Bender (The Core Four) | Stacy Borel | ||
| 25 | Orphan Train: A Novel | Christina Baker Kline | Found | Found |
| 26 | Natchez Burning (Penn Cage) | Greg Iles | Found | Found |
| 27 | Gone Girl: A Novel | Gillian Flynn | Found | Found |
| 28 | Dark and Deadly | Jennifer Ashley | ||
| 29 | Abducted (The Lizzy Gardner Series #1) | T.R. Ragan | Found | |
| 30 | Monster in His Eyes | J.M. Darhower |
Below is the result for top 31-100 bestsellers. Among these 70 titles, 26 titles are pirated.
| Kindle Rank | Title | Author | Cyberlocker | Torrent |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 31 | The Fixed Trilogy: Fixed on You | Laurelin Paige | Found | |
| 32 | Chasing the Sun: A Novel | Natalia Sylvester | ||
| 33 | Rush Too Far: A Rosemary Beach | Abbi Glines | ||
| 34 | The Divergent Series Complete Collection | Veronica Roth | Found | Found |
| 35 | Gorgeous Chaos (Beautiful Mess) | T.K. Leigh | ||
| 36 | Heaven is for Real | Todd Burpo | Found | Found |
| 37 | I Am Livia | Phyllis T. Smith | ||
| 38 | Alpha | Jasinda Wilder | ||
| 39 | Beyond Desire Collection | J.S. Scott | ||
| 40 | Obsessed (The Obsessed Series) | Deborah Bladon | ||
| 41 | Twisted Vine (Lei Crime Series) | Toby Neal | ||
| 42 | Vatican Knights | Rick Jones | ||
| 43 | Home to Stay (An Anchor Island Novel) | Terri Osburn | ||
| 44 | NYPD Red 2 | James Patterson | Found | Found |
| 45 | Jailbird (Kurt Vonnegut Series) | Kurt Vonnegut | ||
| 46 | Capital in the Twenty-First Century | Thomas Piketty | Found | Found |
| 47 | Beautiful Ink | Nicole Reed | ||
| 48 | A Sweet Life Boxed Set | Bella Andre | ||
| 49 | Top Secret Twenty-One | Janet Evanovich | ||
| 50 | The Normans: From Raiders to Kings | Lars Brownworth | ||
| 51 | Obsessed: Part Two (The Obsessed Series) | Deborah Bladon | ||
| 52 | I've Got You Under My Skin: A Novel | Mary Higgins Clark | Found | Found |
| 53 | Cold Blue: Volume 1 | Gary Neece | ||
| 54 | Obsessed: Part Three | Deborah Bladon | ||
| 55 | The Memory Child | Steena Holmes | ||
| 56 | Missing You | Harlan Coben | Found | |
| 57 | Never Been Ready (The Ready Series #2) | J.L. Berg | Found | |
| 58 | Phenomenal X | Michelle A. Valentine | Found | |
| 59 | It Ain't Me, Babe | Tillie Cole | ||
| 60 | George R. R. Martin's A Game of | George R.R. Martin | Found | Found |
| 61 | Out on a Limb: A Smoky Mountain | Carolyn Jourdan | ||
| 62 | The Invention of Wings: With Notes | Sue Monk Kidd | Found | |
| 63 | Last Second Chance | Caisey Quinn | ||
| 64 | The Circle Maker: Praying Circles | Mark Batterson | ||
| 65 | Legends of the Fall | Jim Harrison | ||
| 66 | SEALs Of Summer: Military Romance | Sharon Hamilton | ||
| 67 | Don't Let Me Go | Catherine Ryan Hyde | Found | |
| 68 | The Broken Path | Cami Checketts | ||
| 69 | Shame On Me (Fool Me Once) | Tara Sivec | ||
| 70 | Giving In (The Surrender Trilogy) | Maya Banks | ||
| 71 | KNOX: Volume 4 | Cassia Leo | ||
| 72 | Hidden | Catherine McKenzie | ||
| 73 | Born to Ride - A Clubhouse Collection | Kasey Millstead | ||
| 74 | Shadow Spell: Book Two of The | Nora Roberts | Found | |
| 75 | It Happened One Wedding | Julie James | Found | |
| 76 | Her Highness, the Traitor | Susan Higginbotham | ||
| 77 | Merkiaari Wars Series: Books 1-3 | Mark E. Cooper | ||
| 78 | Timebound (The Chronos Files, Book 1) | Rysa Walker | ||
| 79 | The Nazi Officer's Wife: How One | Edith H. Beer | Found | Found |
| 80 | Communication Miracles for Couples: | Jonathan Robinson | ||
| 81 | A Game of Thrones: A Song of Ice | George R.R. Martin | Found | |
| 82 | If You Can: How Millennials Can Get | William J Bernstein | ||
| 83 | Act of War: A Thriller (Scot Harvath) | Brad Thor | ||
| 84 | Little Girl Lost: A Lucy Black | Brian McGilloway | Found | |
| 85 | The Book Thief | Markus Zusak | Found | Found |
| 86 | Bared: Club Sin | Stacey Kennedy | ||
| 87 | KNOX: Volume 1 | Cassia Leo | ||
| 88 | Dead Weight | T.R. Ragan | Found | |
| 89 | Ready To Kill | Andrew Peterson | ||
| 90 | When We Met (Hqn) | Susan Mallery | ||
| 91 | Inferno: A Novel | Dan Brown | Found | |
| 92 | Me Before You: A Novel | Jojo Moyes | Found | |
| 93 | Chestnut Street | Maeve Binchy | ||
| 94 | The Rosie Project: A Novel | Graeme Simsion | Found | |
| 95 | Say Goodbye to Survival Mode | Crystal Paine | ||
| 96 | The Maze Runner | James Dashner | Found | Found |
| 97 | Carnal Curiosity (Stone Barrington) | Stuart Woods | Found | Found |
| 98 | The Selection | Kiera Cass | Found | Found |
| 99 | The Girl Who Came Home | Hazel Gaynor | ||
| 100 | Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt | Michael Lewis | Found | Found |
What's next?
We are not for sure for the effects on sales however, two tables above show undeniable facts that might make authors furious. It might not affect sales although, it clearly proves that e-book sellers and publishers are out of control over book piracy.