Is not IP if it's public domain, probably the main reason is not the authors property is because it never was in the start as they just copied from someone else's work.
If you love capitalism then it's horrible and evil, if you love literature and society of ideas then it's great.
A lot of stuff I release is cc0 explicitly so people can copy it freely, some uses copy-left so it can't be sold for profit - These are informed choices I make, of people aren't making informed choices then do I really have to care if they don't get what they want?
If someone wants to put my stories into a physical volume that's fine, I created them to create and to spread my mind virus.