An Irishman's Diary

Good luck to Paul McGuinness in his campaign to have people who illegally download music struck off the internet. But we all have our own vested interests to defend.

And what I'd like to see is action to deal with a problem that bedevils journalism: the illegal uploading of newspapers.

Yes, this notorious practice is already discouraged by the service providers, or "newsagents" as they're generally known. In bigger shops, a member of the floor staff will occasionally put on a stern voice and say: "No reading of newspapers and magazines, please". This is as far as it ever goes, however; and the effect is minimal.

At best the copyright infringer will shuffle awkwardly until the floor-person moves away. Sometimes he will put down the paper he's reading and pick up another one. He will do this with a furrowed brow, designed to give the impression that, rather than really reading, he is engaged in product sampling prior to purchase. But he's not fooling anyone.

My long-term hope, raised inadvertently by U2's manager, is that we could get these people banned from shops. In the meantime, I would settle for their harassment by store security. Perhaps they could be escorted noisily into back offices and at least questioned about possession of information for which they have not paid.

I wouldn't mind if they stuck to skimming the headlines - although even this contributes to the well-known and regrettable phenomenon whereby, when buying a paper, customers always avoid the one on top of the pile.

This habit goes well beyond the usual double standards consumers apply when buying, say, bread. All of us will squeeze a sliced pan before purchase to make sure it's fresh; whereas, if it looks like it has been fondled by others, we won't even touch it. But we impose a higher standard on newspapers. Not only will we avoid buying one that appears contaminated by human contact. However unsullied it looks, the mere possibility that the top copy has been "sampled" is enough to stigmatise it, so we prefer to take the one underneath.

Unfortunately, in any case, illegal uploading of newspapers is not confined to headlines. Even premium content is fair game for these people. Death notices are a popular target. And I swear I once saw a man in Eason's mentally completing the cryptic crossword while pretending not to read the paper.

I hasten to add that, as Paul McGuinness would say, this issue has to do with more than mere self-interest. It's not established, internationally successful brands such as The Irish Times I'm worried about. God, no. It's the smaller publications, the plucky little independents (no pun intended, Sir Anthony), and those starting out in the business that concern me. We have to protect their futures.

IF THERE IS a breed worse than the shop-based uploader, it's the freeloader who frequents cafés, ready to swoop on your newspaper the moment you take your eye off it.

I have no issue with those who avail of the complimentary copies that many places offer. Provision of free reading material is a hallmark of European café society - though I prefer the classic Viennese model where the house papers are attached to large wooden holders. Not only does this discourage the customer from slipping them in his coat pocket. But - and again this arises from my concern for the industry's future - it adds an element of discomfort to the reading experience that may make the cheapskate in question buy his own damn copy next time.

No. What irritates me - far out of proportion to the seriousness of the misdemeanour - is when you're reading in a café and you leave a newspaper, or a supplement, to one side. Whereupon, without so much as word, another customer picks it up and takes it. You know on such occasions that it has simply not occurred to him that the paper is yours. Not being in the habit of buying his own copy, he may think nobody else does either. But suddenly, every fibre of your being is flexed with indignation.

It doesn't matter that you had finished reading the supplement in question, or that you had no intention of reading it in the first place. You may well have planned to add it to the café's existing library. But until it got there, it remained yours. Now you are like a dog without a bone; except that, unlike a dog, you're trying to think of some witty put-down for the newspaper pirate. Failing to find which, you settle for a long, dirty look; and being the sort he is, he doesn't even notice.

In fact, as newspapers grow ever bigger, I find myself deliberately shedding supplements everywhere I go these days, especially on Sundays.

The alternative, if you buy three or four titles, is to have a pain in the arm carrying them from bar to café to bar again (perhaps I'm sharing too much information about my social life here). It seems wrong to discard the unwanted bits in bins. So instead, I "donate" them to cafés, where somebody else might benefit.

Of course the suspicion is that the cafés don't want them, that they have more than enough already, and that they will end up dumping mine with the general refuse, while my conscience thinks they've been recycled. Even so, I still do it. And I probably will, until café society threatens a ban on those engaged in illegal offloading.