Is readaing a magazine in the store unethical?

[Chairman Pow]

On any given night, I could walk into the local magazine store (or big book store, or anywhere where they sell lots of magazines) and there are plenty of people looking through the magazines. That's cool; they want to see what's in it before they buy it or not.

However, there are plenty of people who also just read the magazines and don't buy them.

Now, the magazine knows that given X sales, Y people will actually read the magazine (Y, from my understanding, is generally larger than X) and advertisters pay based on Y, not X. I would assume that Y includes people who read the magazine in the store.

Now, there are other media that don't necessarily have ads paying per eyeball. Specifically I'm thinking about anytime I go to a bookstore and see anywhere from a couple to a couple dozen people reading comics/manga, etc.

What nearly drove me to a screaming fit was a guy who was reading a trade and finished. He then called his friend (or his friend called him, I forget which) and the guy said, "Oh, I was just reading [this comic], it was pretty cool, but I wouldn't buy it."

I limited myself to wishing he got hit by a bus, but this begs the question: is it "stealing" to read a work in its entirety while one is in a store, especially a work that one isn't going to buy and has no intention of buying.

Let's get a few things on the table:

1) A library is for lending and letting lots of people read a given work. That's cool.

2) If someone lends their friend a copy, I'm fine with that too.

3) If someone wants to trade their magazine for their friend's, I'm cool with that.

4) If someone wants to flip through and read a little to see if it's worth buying, I think that's acceptable. To me this is like someone taking a car for a test drive, or asking a salesman to operate a piece of machinery under consideration.

However, I would maintain that reading a work in its entirety in a store is unethical.

I understand that, in a practical sense, it's not possible to keep everything wrapped in shrinkwrap (nor is it desirable), or otherwise keep people from reading a magazine. I understand that peopole reading and not buying/libraries lending/friends trading is a cost of doing business and should be accounted for by a dilligent publisher.

However, I'm wondering the ethics of the above.

For purposes of discussion, let's keep this strictly paper-based and not assume that people are scanning and uploading onto the internet. In fact, let's try not to bring the internet and filesharing up at all.

[even sven]

My bookstore encourages reading magazines with signs saying to stay as long as you want and comfy chairs. If the stores are cool with it, then I think it's cool.

[hazel-rah]

Most major bookstore chains (such as the one I currently work at) are fine with this behavior and encourage it by providing comfy chairs, cafes, etc. But the fact that stores let you do this shouldn't be used as an ethical get out of jail free card. Some customers clearly abuse the privilege, but where to draw the line between use and abuse isn't so easy and depends on many factors.

[Manda JO]

The reason they let you do this is that they know, overall, the longer you hang out in the store the more likely you are to buy something--maybe not the thing you spend the most time looking at, but something. And this is true even if it is "a work that one isn't going to buy and has no intention of buying." That's the point: browsing convinces poeple to buy who had no intention of buying when they started to browse. Not every customer, every time, but often enough that the big comfey bookstore model has certainly become widespread.

[davenportavenger]

I'll admit to being one of those people that will read entire magazines in stores. The way I see it, there's usually only two or three really interesting articles in any given magazine, which doesn't justify the expense of four or five dollars. I think that as long as the store is cool with it, there's nothing wrong--these magazines are out in the open for anyone to read. Hell, the contents of half of them are available for free on the Internet now (I know you didn't want this to be about the Internet but I'm not talking about piracy, I'm talking about a licensed online version of the magazine), so it's pretty clear that it's not just sales that's keeping these magazines afloat--ads are the biggest source of revenue. Using that logic, it's actually beneficial if someone reads the magazine in the store and doesn't buy it. If someone buys a magazine, the only people who are going to see it from that point on is the consumer and maybe their friends or family. That might come out to a dozen ad-viewers, tops. But if a bunch of people read the mag and look at the ad and don't buy, you could get fifty ad-scans out of one magazine, which would offset the fact that none of the viewers are buying the magazine. Hardly anyone even buys magazines full price off the rack anyway; almost all magazine buyers are subscribers.

So yes, I read magazines in the store and don't buy them. Ever since moving to the city, though, I tend to read magazines in the library. The fact that magazine publishers allow their products to be in libraries is one of the signs that they don't really care if readers buy their product. It's all about getting you to look at the ads. (Oh yeah, and that whole "informing the public" thing... but it's mostly advertising.)

[Shagnasty]

Hardly anyone even buys magazines full price off the rack anyway; almost all magazine buyers are subscribers.

I know you said "hardly anyone" buys magazines off the rack but that is not true. I spend over $100 a month on single issues. I don't subscribe to them because I only want a single issue with certain articles. I subscibe to the ones that I consistently need or enjoy. Lots of other people do too. That's why they have those big displays. Sure, many don't ever sell but a lot do.

OTOH, I am a bookstore magazine reader too. My bookstore of choice is Barnes and Noble because there is one nearby. They make things quite comfy for people to read magazines at leisure. I do it at least once a week for an hour or more. However, I am also a B&N member and I buy many books there just by browsing the shelves.

I believe that is the way that they compete with Amazon and others. I buy many books and magazines but I almost always do it there because of the way that they treated me. If they hazzled me after five seconds of opening a cover, I would walk out and never come back. I can have everything delivered to my house with a few clicks. However, it is much nicer to be able to browse at leisure and maybe purchase something that you weren't intending while putting something else back that you came into the store for. That is where physical bookstores excel. Magazine reading is a huge draw.

[Ruby]

As a business owner (not a bookstore), I have to disagree with the general sentiment here. Would you also expect to be able to read the complete works of Shakespeare just because the store offers comfy chairs?

It's about the advertising revenue. In order for a magazine to sell it's ad space, they have to be able to show the circulation numbers which of course don't include the "Bookstore Vagrants".

It's about sales. The mags are not placed there for you to read cover to cover. They are placed there for you to PURCHASE, providing the retail merchant a PROFIT, to purchase more product for you to BUY.

[Manda JO]

As a business owner (not a bookstore), I have to disagree with the general sentiment here. Would you also expect to be able to read the complete works of Shakespeare just because the store offers comfy chairs?

It's about the advertising revenue. In order for a magazine to sell it's ad space, they have to be able to show the circulation numbers which of course don't include the "Bookstore Vagrants".

It's about sales. The mags are not placed there for you to read cover to cover. They are placed there for you to PURCHASE, providing the retail merchant a PROFIT, to purchase more product for you to BUY.


Right, but bookstores have learned that people are SUCKERS and that if they think that they can come in and read a magazine for FREE, they will end up BUYING it, or something else. On the other hand, if people are worried about the morality of browsing and they aren't in the mood to buy a magazine, they won't go to the store at all. Which means that at the end of the day, fewer magazines are sold, because a lot of poeple go into the bookstore "just to look" and end up buying something. Allowing extended browsing means they sell more books and magazines than they would otherwise.

In any retail business, turning the people who think they are "just looking" into people who actually buy products is important. This is how you do this in a book store.

[Ruby]

In your defense, it must work for the bookstores because that is certainly the prevalent business model for even the locally owned ones. Perhaps it's just my mother's voice that I hear when I see people taking advantage (yes, I know it's just my opinion) of the retailer.

[FriarTed]

Are you saying I should actually BUY the Left Behind novels?!?!

(yeah, in the space of two days, I read the latest one- about the birth & childhood of Nicolae the AntiChrist- in the store. Heck, I might just buy that one. It at least had some surprises.)

[even sven]

My store's sign says something along the lines of "We know not everyone can afford purchase our products, and we invite you read as long as you keep our products in the store. If you do need to take a book home overnight, please purchase it or check it out from the library. We will prosecute shoplifters."

[BrotherCadfael]

Magazines in the drugstore rack are fair game while you are waiting for a prescription.

[Left Hand of Dorkness]

I figure the rule is, as long as you're in the bookstore, you play by their rules.

If they don't want you to read the magazines and they let you know that, then it's unethical to read the magazines.

If they don't you reading the magazines, then it's fine to read them.

Another customer has zero influence over the ethics of the situation, and there's no overriding morality that enters into it, except for the ethic that when in Rome (or Barnes and Noble), do as the Romans (or Barnes and Nobleans) do.

Daniel

[Malodorous]

It's about sales. The mags are not placed there for you to read cover to cover. They are placed there for you to PURCHASE, providing the retail merchant a PROFIT, to purchase more product for you to BUY.

But the mags are placed there so that people can read them from cover to cover. B&Ns obviously know that people are doing this, they put chairs out to facilitate them doing this and they don't put signs up asking people not to do it.

So if the owners of the magazine (as B&N is once the mag is in their store) allows you to read the magazine, and you do, why is that wrong?

[Ruby]

It just feels like stealing to me. IMO, the mags aren't there for my pleasure to read from cover to cover. (That's what libraries are for) They are displayed so that I may purchase them.

My B&N doesn't have "comfy chairs" in the magazine area. There are upholstered chairs in other parts of the store but there are no seating in the magazine department. The magazine section is elevated from the rest of the store insinuating that the staff wants to keep an eye on that part of the store.

I'd like to hear from a bookstore owner/employee to explain what their policy and intent really are.

[Manda JO]

It just feels like stealing to me. IMO, the mags aren't there for my pleasure to read from cover to cover. (That's what libraries are for) They are displayed so that I may purchase them.




Right, but if you go to the library every weekand spend an hour reading magazines, there is a 0% chance you will ever buy anything from the bookstore, whereas if you go to the bookstore every week and spend an hour browsing magazines, there is a chance you will buy something--and marketing types seems to feel that that chance is not trivial--even if you, yourself, think you are immune to the prospect. People spend more money than they plan to, given enough opportunities.

[Malodorous]

My B&N doesn't have "comfy chairs" in the magazine area. There are upholstered chairs in other parts of the store but there are no seating in the magazine department. The magazine section is elevated from the rest of the store insinuating that the staff wants to keep an eye on that part of the store.

I've never been in a B&N that had an elevated mag section. And the building for the one near my house was built specifically to house a B&N, so I don't think that it's a standard thing. Also, while they don't have upholstered chairs, they do have benches in the mag areas.

As for thier policy, I've pretty blatently grabbed a mag of the rack, walked into the cafe with it, bought coffee while reading the mag but not paying for it and then sat down and continued to read. No one has ever said anything.

They must know that people do this in their book stores, but they don't make any move to discourage it. If they want me not to read thier magazines, they need to make some effort to tell me that, and I'll stop.

[Malodorous]

Just emailed customer service, I'll report back with their response later.

[Theobroma]

As for thier policy, I've pretty blatently grabbed a mag of the rack, walked into the cafe with it, bought coffee while reading the mag but not paying for it and then sat down and continued to read. No one has ever said anything.



Sure they didn't say anything...you bought coffee, didn't you? I've seen folks buying pastries, too. Think they would sell just as many if they didn't allow reading of unpurchased materials in the cafe? Or if they hassled people for their receipts while they were sipping and reading?

I'm going with the general flow here...if the bookstores don't mind, it's not unethical. It's not about the ads, so much...but the bookstores encourage unpaid reading. I know I read quite a bit of stuff that I don't buy, but then I seldom walk out of a bookstore with nothing when I've been browsing for a while.

I do think the comfy chairs are significant, though--you don't see tables and chairs in grocery stores, because you are expected to pay for anything you eat (other than tiny samples given out).

[hazel-rah]

I'd like to hear from a bookstore owner/employee to explain what their policy and intent really are.

I'll be interested to hear the "official" response from customer service, but Manda Jo has pretty much nailed the intent, I'd say. The longer you keep people in the store, the more they'll buy.

As an employee I've never seen rules on the subject written down anywhere, but the following is generally true:

-You can take the magazines anywhere in the store to read them, including in the comfy chairs and in the cafe. Exception: the bathroom. Can't take them in there.

-You can read the magazines from cover to cover and not buy them.

I say generally true because people abuse these privileges. Taking two or three magazines to a comfy chair and reading them while having a coffee? Fine, not unusual. Taking a stack of twenty magazines and reading through them all, then throwing them on the floor and leaving? Not technically against the rules, but clearly taking advantage.

If you really want to be ethical at the bookstore, put the magazines you've read back on the rack where you found them instead of leaving them scattered all over the store or worse yet, back on the magazine rack but in the wrong place.

[clairobscur]

It's not at all unethical as long as the store allows it, hence obviously think it's in their best interest. A major parisian bookseller, from what I read, increased very significantly its sales (many years ago) when it began to let people read the comics in the store. It costed them some room occupied by the readers, but increased very significantly the number of potential customers entering the store, and at least part of them would buy something.

When I was a teenager, I would go there to read (and essentially never buy) comics. At the time, I doubt it was a good deal for them since they hardly got a cent from me. However, I became accustomed to this store, and now, that generally there that I go to buy books, CDs, etc...and essentially never to their main competitor. So, in the long term their policy was successful.

(and still sometimes read comics that now I buy when I liked them. I essentially never buy a comic without having read and enjoyed it first. Now at least, they're way more likely to get money from me by letting me read it first).

Anyway, I still wouldn't think it's immoral if they didn't make a cent with such a policy. It's up to them to decide whether or not to allow it. There's nothing immoral in doing something you're allowed to by the owner.

[Shalmanese]

In Australia, I don't think I've ever seen a major bookstore which didn't go out of it's way to specifically discourage extended browsing. No chairs, layout so that it's impossible to sit anywhere without feeling uncomfortable or blocking traffic etc.

How exactly does this whole concept work? What if you take a mag into the cafe and spill some coffee over it? Or smear a bit of chocolate cake on the cover? Are there display copies meant to be read and pristine copies for browsing? Does the store eat the cost of damaged magazines?

Same with books, I don't want to buy a dogeared, wrinkled book that 10 other people have read cover-to-cover.

[hazel-rah]

How exactly does this whole concept work? What if you take a mag into the cafe and spill some coffee over it? Or smear a bit of chocolate cake on the cover? Are there display copies meant to be read and pristine copies for browsing? Does the store eat the cost of damaged magazines?

On the whole, it works very well. The store takes a very relaxed attitude towards browsing and customers reward the store with their patronage and increased sales.

Customers generally won't be asked to pay for accidental damage like a coffee spill. If you're being recklessly selfish you can expect a conversation with a manager about your behavior. It rarely happens though. The biggest problem is just that people are slobs... they don't damage product, they just never put it back where they found it and they leave their trash all over the store.

If you think an item is too thrashed to be worth the purchase price, you don't have to buy it. The store will order you a fresh copy from the distro if you want to be sure it hasn't been handled by strangers. The more messed up stuff is removed from the shelves by employees as it is noticed.

In my experience, people don't care if magazines are a little used... they're going to be read once and thrown away anyway.

[Mr2001]

Ultimately, I'd say it comes down to the store's policy. If their policy is that you have to buy a magazine before you read it, then that's it. You're on their property, and you're ethically bound to follow their rules. If not, then you're free to read them.

As Manda JO pointed out, you can go to a library and read the magazines for free, eliminating any chance that you'll buy them. Clearly, then, there's nothing inherently wrong with reading a magazine you aren't going to pay for. The only difference between a magazine at the library and one at a store is that the library has an explicit policy of letting you read things for free; if the store allows you to read magazines before paying for them, they have the same policy, but it's implicit.

The store puts magazines out for free reading in the expectation that you'll be enticed to buy them (or something else), but just like a grocery store selling milk below cost to attract customers, they're taking a calculated risk. They're telling customers, "We dare you to come in, take advantage of this offer, and leave with nothing else. Our products are so appealing, we think you'll probably buy something anyway." And you're just taking them up on it. If so many people take them up on the offer that it cuts into their profits (i.e. their expectation of how many customers will buy something else turns out to be wrong), they'll change their policy.

[Malacandra]

I view it as mildly unethical (*), so I only read mags in stores when I'm in there to buy something else anyway, and would not actually buy the mag (so I'm not costing the store a sale: if they had a rigid no-read policy, I'd just go without), and take care that the mag is as saleable after I've read it as before.

With some higher-value items, I've sometimes read part or all of the thing and then decided to go ahead and buy it anyway; not always.

(* "Mildly unethical" as in a darning-to-heck transgression, you understand.)

[Maeglin]

How exactly does this whole concept work? What if you take a mag into the cafe and spill some coffee over it? Or smear a bit of chocolate cake on the cover? Are there display copies meant to be read and pristine copies for browsing? Does the store eat the cost of damaged magazines?

I am sure the store is perfectly happy to eat the cost of damaged magazines. The margin on cafe products is much higher than the margin on magazines. In every B&N that I can think of in NYC, the magazine rack is always located either inside or just adjoining the cafe. The purpose of magazines in these stores is evidently to sell $3 cups of coffee and $3 brownies. A brownie and three cups of coffee probably nets the retailer more than purchasing a dozen magazines.

[Scissorjack]

Are you saying I should actually BUY the Left Behind novels?!?!

(yeah, in the space of two days, I read the latest one- about the birth & childhood of Nicolae the AntiChrist- in the store. Heck, I might just buy that one. It at least had some surprises.)

The butler did it?

[nivlac]

I don't understand the fuss. My standard practice when I go to the bookstore (B&N or Borders): grab a few books I'm interested in, find a comfy place (sometimes at the coffee shop inside the store), thumb (gently) through the books, sometimes reading all the interesting stuff (I'm more into non-fiction than fiction), and at the end might buy one or two of the books. More often than not, I walk out without any purchase. I always reshelve the books where I originally found them. I've never had any adverse response from the store personnel.

Magazines? I might flip through them while standing and skim an article or two, but I rarely buy magazines at the bookstore. I have subscriptions for all the magazines that I read regularly. None of the bookstores I go to discourages magazine reading.

How could any of the above activities be unethical if the bookstores allow them to happen?

[elfkin477]

I've never been in a B&N that had an elevated mag section. And the building for the one near my house was built specifically to house a B&N, so I don't think that it's a standard thing. Also, while they don't have upholstered chairs, they do have benches in the mag areas.

The B&N in Newington, NH was built - and it was built new to house the store - exactly as Ruby said: in order to get to the magazines you must go up three steps above the rest of the floor. The only other thing elevated like that is the cafe immediately adjacent. There are no chairs in the magazine section. The magazine section of the Salem, NH store isn't raised, but there are no chairs there either. However, the Newington store is one floor and the Salem two, so maybe the difference lies there.

I'm slightly scandalized by people sitting there and reading something they haven't paid for, since it seems like stealing and ripping legitimate customers off. If one is going to pay the price of a new book, they ought to be the first one to read the book. Given the chairs scattered about the stores, however, it seems as though B&N doesn't worry that much about it, so... I still don't like the practice, but I can't really condemn people for doing something the store encourages. It just makes me more likely to order online (and from Amazon rather than B&N) if there's a book I want in mint condition.

[bclouse]

I'm an avid magazine reader and spend a lot of time in front of magazines stands. I always flip through magazines to see if I interested enough to buy it. I don't read it in the store. But I do see a lot of people who do. It's not for me but I never thought of it as unethical. However, I think you're pretty chintzy if you want to read an article but don't want to purchase it. I'm more bothered if you park it in front of the bookshelves so I can't see or reach what's behind you. Those people should be shot. But I see this in front of regular book shelves as well. I think the bookstores make their establishments a little too comfortable for people sometimes.

As for the argument that it doesn't hurt the bookstores, that's probably true. They don't actually buy the magazines from the publishers. After a certain amount of time, they send the covers back for credit and toss the rest away. At least, that's how it used to work. But I wonder how much it hurts the publishers. I'm sure Time Warner isn't sweating bullets if you read Time magazine while having coffee in the cafe area. Nor is Ziff Davis or any of the larger publishers. But the smaller, more specific ones, I worry about. They probably don't sell that many anyhow. It doesn't help if people are reading their articles but not purchasing their products.

[hazel-rah]

It just makes me more likely to order online (and from Amazon rather than B&N) if there's a book I want in mint condition.

I wonder if buying online really guarantees you're getting a mint copy. The brick and mortar stores send books back to the distributor all the time, and there's no way they're getting marked as used books just because they spent some time on the shelf. At least a few of those books probably end up getting shipped as web orders.

[Othersider]

I think a factor that may play into how the situation is handled, but not necessarily how unethical it may be, is the location. For example, here in the United States, I've gone to the magazine stand and read some magazines in depth. When I was in Da Vinci Airport in Roma, I went into a gift shop and picked up a magazine, and started to peruse it. Without thinking much about it, I read a few pages. After a few minutes, the store clerk came over and said something to me, so I put the magazine down and left.

Obviously, whether it's ethical or not doesn't change based on where it happened, but I think it's interesting that he actually said something, whereas I've never heard of anyone doing that here in the States. It's interesting to observe cultural differences such as this. :)

[Chairman Pow]

I wonder if buying online really guarantees you're getting a mint copy. The brick and mortar stores send books back to the distributor all the time, and there's no way they're getting marked as used books just because they spent some time on the shelf. At least a few of those books probably end up getting shipped as web orders.

I believe that the stores rip the covers off of the books and send the covers back, disposing of the now-coverless books on their own.

[hazel-rah]

I believe that the stores rip the covers off of the books and send the covers back, disposing of the now-coverless books on their own.

That happens to magazines, some mass market paperbacks and some other types of books, but most trade paperbacks and hardcovers? Those don't get turned into strips... those get shipped back to the distro and are still considered new product. They get shipped out to other stores that need them, and I'm guessing are also used to fulfill web orders. Hence buying online not always being a guarantee you'll get a mint copy.