A few weeks ago I received an email. The sender had just finished listening to an illegal download of the audiobook and he wrote me how much he liked it. He then told me that he actually sells illegally downloaded content. But his email got even more interesting when he explained that some of the principles discussed in my book relate to his own life. For example, he described how he recently attempted to find a regular, legal job. But giving up the illegal business he had created and nurtured for five years was very difficult for him.
A second aspect of loss that he described was that of his social network of customers and friends who are linked to him through business ties. He proposed that the bond between himself and his customers is much deeper than the traditional retailer-consumer relationship. After all, in his line of illegal work the relationships have to involve more trust, reciprocity, and friendship. All of this makes it even harder to leave that circle.
