I am not going into moral issues. Companies only care about moral issues when they are using them to sue in court. Companies only care about money and sales so that is the theme of my arguments.
Companies get funny about illegal downloads because they think that if those downloads did not exist their sales would increase and they would get more money(it is nothing to do with the moral issues.)
This is true to a tiny extent. There is a very small minority of people so tight fisted that they will now not buy a legal copy purely because they have a free pdf.
These are the kind of people who would write out the rules on the back of used envelopes and wrapping paper rather than spend a penny if they did not have to. These people are very very few.
Most of the people who have a pdf and are not going to buy the books were not going to buy the books anyway - pdf or not. They only have the game because it is free and if it wasn't they would just shrug and do something else. (These people are not reducing sales but are creating more players or DMs potentially improving sales)
Some with the pdf will not buy the books because they have decided they do not like the game. This is only the same as checking out a friend's book or a book in the shop and putting it back. These people will probably just delete the pdf anyway. (Not reducing sales much - a little because someone has not wasted their money on something they were going to put in the bin or give to someone else.)
Some people with the pdf that will not buy the books wont purely because they cannot afford to. Maybe in the future they will. Either way - no money - no buyey. (No sales loss.)
Some people will look at the pdfs and think 'Oh nice - I didn't know I would think this was so cool. I'll have to buy these.' (Sales increase.)
3.5 had loads of pdfs and sold very very well. If the companies made out any different it was because they wanted even more, unless they were some of those splat books that were only good enough for toilet paper - in which case boo hoo.
My point is
IMHO the sales will not be affected much. The core 3 definitely not. Everyone who really cares about D&D really wants those books and stuff an eye bleeding pdf that would cost 10 times normal cost to print out a really crap pile of wrinkly, smudged, one sided A4s.
Later books will depend on the quality - but that is their problem. Put the work in to something worth owning and they will buy them.
*I'd just like to say I have pdfs of the Wizard's Presents books. I also bought the Wizard's presents books for the sake of physical and digital collecting purposes. These are the most pointless books ever but I got a little out of them and had enough money to not mind paying for them. The same will happen with the new books when amazon pulls their finger out.
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