If I have an apple and you steal it, I’m out one apple. But if I have a copy of a newsletter, and you borrow it for as long as it takes for you to copy it, or scan it, then I still have my newsletter.

It’s even worse with electronic files. Remember when everybody was sharing music on Napster? It made it feel like you were being stupid if you actually paid for a song.

But there are two sides to this issue. If somebody (illegally) photocopies a newsletter and likes it, they might buy it. It’s free promotion for the publisher. And if somebody watches an (illegal) video of a song on Youtube, they might then go buy the song on iTunes.

Believe me, I’m absolutely not justifying the theft of copyrighted material. The owner of the copyrighted material should be the one who decides who gets to see free, promotional copies — not the consumer. I’m only pointing out that sometimes it works out to the benefit of content provider. At least a little.

Content providers see all this theft going on and, quite reasonably, want to find ways to get that lost revenue.

“If I send my subscribers a PDF of my newsletter, what’s to prevent them from forwarding it to all their friends for free?”

One option is “digital rights management.” Various DRM packages can protect the content so that only authorized users can view it, but DRM can also annoy the heck out of your customers and can create lots of customer service problems.

Sometimes DRM can work well, but I have always felt that, when in doubt, it’s safest to err on the side of trusting your customers. Tell them the material is copyrighted and can’t be reproduced. Tell them they can’t forward it. Send them disapproving letters if they do it. But don’t make them jump through hoops, and absolutely don’t treat them like presumptive criminals.

Here’s a story that supports my idea. The New York Times seems to be doing well with a paywall that is riddled with holes.

I haven’t tried (because I respect copyright law), but from what I hear, it’s trivially easy to get past their firewall. If you want to cheat, you can. But if you’re willing to pay, you can. And lots of people have.