conuly | Oh, don't you love it.

This is the same type of person as the ones who defended that plagiarist the other day. Clueless.

Forget clueless, and go right to stupid. As soon as you defend something illegal and unethical, you can't take the moral high road by whining that you yourself have never done it.

Agreed. It pisses me off even more because it harms people very near and dear to my heart: Independent Bookstore Owners. I hope to be one, one day.

I know! I can understand the temptation to screw B&N, or Borders. These are big, faceless corporations which, on the large scale, can tolerate a *lot* of theft. (Each independant store may have problems, but I can understand not thinking like that.) But how the hell do you make a conscious decision to fuck with a small business? SMALL! They can't afford that!

And now, we segue into my stealing story...

It was summer. I was hanging out at the Borders in the WTC with my books and theirs. Somehow, without thinking, I put one of their books in my bag and started to leave.

When I realized what I'd done, I was shocked. It was completely unintentional. Ever since then, I've been paranoid that I'm subconciously robbing bookstores. I check and recheck whatever I'm carrying in order to make sure I'm not taking any wayward books with me.

I've never seen a second-hand bookshop that uses stickers- they usually pencil the price in on the front page.

I'm lucky, since I live right near Baggins (http://www.bagginsbooks.co.uk/). It is both paradise and proof of L-Space. They confiscate any possible book-hiding bags on the way in and keep them behind the counter for you, just so people are less likely to take stuff.

Most of the used, second-hand and rare book stores in Canada write the prices in pencil inside the front cover. The bag confiscation thing is quite common too.

Okay, I will admit to having switched prices to get a better deal. BUT--it was at Goodwill, where all of their stock is donated to them for free to begin with, and it was also to change a totally preposterous price ($7.50 for a teapot with a broken spout and no lid?).

I have NEVER swapped prices at a bookstore of any sort, nor ever thrown away a book (even the ones falling apart because of superannuated paperback glue). And as others are saying, most of the used bookstores I've been to either have a posted price list (Paperback Exchange, Half-Price Books) or pencil the price on the flyleaf (Orca, Powell's).

people who switch tags at goodwill defeat their mission statement. all the money they get from you for buying their stuff goes to help people with barriers to employment. so, when you rip off their [very reasonable, when you actually compare them to other stores] prices, you're being a jerk. plus, this very definitely is considered stealing, and that in itself makes you a jerk. you can't justify stealing by trying to qualify it with "but they get their stuff free" -- it still doesn't belong to you. jerk.

i've had goodwill help out a few of my friends who needed jobs but had things in their life that prevented them from getting one. i find it remarkable that you think it'd be bad to rip off a small business, but think nothing of ripping off a nonprofit business.

To address the point, I don't think the loss of $3.50 (I retagged it at $3.99) is going to make or break Goodwill. They get lots of my money, regularly. My point was that by repricing, it was not "cutting into their profits" because there was no expense of restocking involved.

My other point was that this price was NOT reasonable. If it had been, I would have paid it. For something that is not only broken but incomplete, anything over $5 is too much.

A small part of me thinks that thread should be posted to

mock_the_stupid.