No sympathy for textbook publishers at all.
So? What does this information tell us about LibGen case? The author could've just released the book free online and "free the information"(like what LibGen does, according to HN comments). However he chose to self-publish on Amazon at $9.99.
There must be some reason, right? Perhaps the author actually desires monetary compensation more than he desires to set his information free? A very devilish idea, I know.
It's pretty clear: that publishers do not fairly compensate authors.
The correct way to read your the parent comment of your original comment in this thread is: Pirating a self-published book hurts authors far more than pirating books sold by a publisher. Because publishers pay pittances to authors.