Today's Circuit's column in the NY Times by David Pogue concerns copy protection in the ebook world. Specifically Mr. Pogue relates his own bad experience with distributing his work free of copy protection:

"Unfortunately, I've had terrible experiences releasing my books in electronic form. Twice in my career, 'blind' people e-mailed me, requesting a PDF of one of my books. Both times, I sent one over--and both times, it was all over the piracy sites within 48 hours, free for anyone to download.

"I've got a mortgage and three kids to put through college, and it broke my heart! Unfortunately, the bad apples have once again spoiled it for everyone else."

Link is to the printable version which hopefully everyone can read without having to log into the NY Times site.

New York Times Article (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/22/technology/personaltech/22pogue-email.html?_r=2&8cir=&oref=slogin&emc=cira1&pagewanted=print&oref=slogin)

"I've got a mortgage and three kids to put through college, and it broke my heart! Unfortunately, the bad apples have once again spoiled it for everyone else."


Unfortunatley there is no way he can travel to a parallel universe where he didn't do that and see what the difference was. My guess, he sold less books in that parallel universe since there was no way for people to get the book, and realize how good it was so they could buy it.

BOb

I am of the opinion that most of the people who downloaded it wouldn't have purchased it anyway, so why beat yourself up over it?

Unfortunatley there is no way he can travel to a parallel universe where he didn't do that and see what the difference was. My guess, he sold less books in that parallel universe since there was no way for people to get the book, and realize how good it was so they could buy it.

What he needs to do is travel to the parallel universe where everyone is guaranteed to make a living, even if nobody wants to buy their stuff.

Problem with most of this speculation is: You can't assume how much money he's potentially lost, any more than he can. No one can.

But the fact remains, the system as-is likely has cost him money, and to anyone who is trying to make a living, losses have to be a concern.

Also fairness... as he points out later in the article, others try to accept the system by telling artists to go out and "play live, sell T-shirts, etc"... IOW, do twice the amount of work (or more) for the same profit. How many people working for an employer, for example, would be satisfied if their boss told them to do their full-time work for free, then go out and sell umbrellas with the company logo on the street for their income? Not many? Then why should an artist have to do that, just to make a living?

It's a whole new ballgame, the ball is filled with helium, and the gloves have spikes on the fingertips. I feel for Pogue in that he is being put in the position of the companies he often ridicules, the music industry, in trying to figure out how to quantify his losses and deal with piracy. But he isn't being given too many choices, nor much support from the public, for his efforts to make a living... so can you really blame him? His concerns are legitimate, and shouldn't be dismissed as lightly as they tend to be by consumers (and some MR members).

efforts to make a living... so can you really blame him? His concerns are legitimate, and shouldn't be dismissed as lightly as they tend to be by consumers (and some MR members).

I certainly don't dismiss his concerns. And, I certainly think an author should be paid for their work.

However, as we said...

1. There is no proof or way to prove that this affected his book sales for the bad, and could have improved them.
2. Even if he wasn't nice and didn't send out PDFs himself to blind readers... that doesn't mean there would not have been a pirated copy of his book floating around.

BOb

I'm an author myself, so I certainly don't dismiss his concerns lightly, I just think he's overthinking it. It's like stressing out over used book sales or people borrowing the book from the library or a friend. Most of the people buying used copies or borrowing would not have bought the book anyway. Are you going to not sell your books to libraries, or forbid used booksellers from selling it? Good luck with that! I maintain that a lot of the people who downloaded it on the darknet not only would not have bought the book, likely they will never read it. They are collectors.

I see that a lot on the needlework lists and forums. I can't tell you how many times I posted "I made a scarf out of really nice yarn" or something like that and received several e-mails demanding the pattern. You need a pattern for a scarf? It's a giant rectangle. Figure it out. ;) I usually make up that kind of thing, and use interesting stitches or pretty yarn, and that's what makes it interesting. But they MUST HAVE EVERY PATTERN. There's a site that offers (or used to offer) a free crochet pattern every day, which goes away at midnight and is replaced by a new pattern. If they miss downloading one day's pattern, they're on the list having a nervous breakdown, and trying all kinds of underhanded ways to get someone to give it to them (the listmods don't allow discussion of distribution of copyrighted patterns). Nobody can make a new item every day, and a lot of them are free for a reason (because no one would buy a pattern for such a fugly useless thing), so there's no reason to be upset over it. But they MUST HAVE EVERY PATTERN. It's a form of OCD, I guess. I think a lot of darknet e-book collectors operate from the same place. I do it myself a bit with the free books here at MobileRead. I'll see a book that looks interesting and I download it and I have no idea when or if I'll get to it, but maybe I will someday, and there is plenty of room on my SD card, so why not?

So my point (and I do have one) is that there's no use stressing over illegal downloads too much, because the sales you lose are infinitesimal compared to the bad will you will engender with actual readers if you treat them like criminals by locking up your ebooks with restrictive DRM. I'd rather see authors turning their energies to finding a better solution. I'm not sure what it is, but complaining about a tiny minority snatching the bread from your mouth is not it.

Nice responses. I'm not a published author (yet) but I can feel his pain. I agree MaggieScratch, that he shouldn't sweat the illegal downloads, and instead focus on getting DRM-free legitimate copies into the hands of more readers.

The library analogy is interesting. Once or twice, if I could not buy an ebook for a particular title, I would buy the paper edition, and then go out on the darknet to find the digital. It may be a violation of the law, I suppose, but I am willing to pay the author for the work, and then find a way to get the convenience of an ebook.

So my point (and I do have one) is that there's no use stressing over illegal downloads too much, because the sales you lose are infinitesimal compared to the bad will you will engender with actual readers if you treat them like criminals by locking up your ebooks with restrictive DRM. I'd rather see authors turning their energies to finding a better solution. I'm not sure what it is, but complaining about a tiny minority snatching the bread from your mouth is not it.

I understand what you're saying here... I just often find myself wondering how realistic it is.

For one thing, how do you quantify "the bad he will engender"? And does that "bad" directly correlate with the amount of sales he will lose? Looking at services like iTunes that use DRM, one can say the "bad" engendered by those artists still seems to be getting them good sales. That's even more vague than the guesstimate of his "losses," and ultimately unhelpful in trying to compare one perceived "loss" against another... you might as well try to guess the weight of two clouds on sight alone.

Also, suggesting that all DRM makes people feel they are being treated like criminals is, I think, an over-reaction. DRM is designed for security... but security in itself doesn't really imply that everyone is a criminal. It just acts to protect the producer from the unlawful consumer, in as fair a way as possible (in theory) given that the unlawful consumer is hiding effectively amongst us. I don't feel I'm being treated as a criminal because I shop in a store with surveillance cameras... I just shop and leave, and let the criminals feel like criminals. And again I bring up iTunes' use of DRM as proof that the process doesn't automatically alienate and piss off everyone. If done right, DRM can be a publicly-accepted security tool.

Anyway, I didn't mean to simply promote DRM here...

My point is, Pogue has a right to be concerned, because in "normal" society, the law and the public work in concert to weed out unlawful activities, through mutual cooperation... and on the web, the law and the public refuse to work together for any purpose (other than catching child porn, maybe). And one can't work without the other. I think copyright can adequately address digital files and guarantee a producer's rights, but only if it has the acceptance and cooperation of the public at-large.

Until the public proves that it is willing to hold up its end in law enforcement, by accepting a system that permits some security for Pogue's product, there is no reason for him to expect that he won't be robbed blind by the public (based not just on supposition, but on the experiences he's already had). And with that expectation, if he decides it is not worth his while to put his documents online, because he can't see how he will profit from it, I wouldn't challenge him about his decision.

Looking at services like iTunes that use DRM, one can say the "bad" engendered by those artists still seems to be getting them good sales.

Have sales gone down since the non-DRM files (iTunes Plus and Amazon MP3 store) opened? I'm thinking no, sales have increased at iTunes month over month, year over year, even with nonDRM files out there. Yes, people still pirate, but buyers still buy. DRM only hurts the legit customers.

Ug... am I invovled in another neverending DRM thread?

BOb

I wonder whether he looked for pirate copies before he sent out the pdf. One thing he doesn't mention is whether what he found online was the pdf as he emailed it... As it is we have a report of two quite possibly unrelated events: pirate copies and blind people. As we all know, lack of a pdf from the author does not seem to hinder the production of pirate copies of books.

A second possibility is that demand for his books is so low that without a zero-effort pirate copy being available no-one had ever bothered to produce one. I know there are a lot of authors who I personally would never bother to rip their work. It's just not worth the effort.

P... How many people working for an employer, for example, would be satisfied if their boss told them to do their full-time work for free, then go out and sell umbrellas with the company logo on the street for their income? Not many? Then why should an artist have to do that, just to make a living?
...

On the flip side, Steve, how many people working for an employer have the possibility of becoming wealthy because their work was made into a movie that became a success thereby selling more books and more movies?

I realize that the number of authors that experience this is very small, but it is infinitely larger than zero which is the chance that it could happen to people working for an employer.

Selling, which is what authors end up doing, is a hit or miss thing. You can get rich but you can also go broke.

Admittedly success in the entertainment fields is not always related to the quality of work. Sometimes it's a matter of time & place. However, being one of those people working for an employer, I knowingly gave up a possibility for potential wealth (or the opposite) for the security of a consistent pay check. (Never mind that I evaluate myself as very poor in "any" entertainment field.)

That said, I still believe (and apparently I'm vastly in the minority) that you can not lose that which you never had. I agree that it is unethical to take what is being sold without paying but he never had the money from those copies that were downloaded without paying. I could say that I had lost millions because nobody has bought a copy of my life with my employer but I would not have lost it since I never had it.

Enough of my rant.:o

moz's post reminded me of something: another thing about the darknet (at least from my admittedly small experience therein) is that most of the books available do not seem to be pirated ebooks, but scanned hard copy books. One suspects they are loaded with OCR errors, because nobody has that kind of time to not only scan but also proofread all those books. ;-) The larger point is that DRM won't stop those kind of ebooks from being produced and distributed. It will just annoy and inconvenience paying customers.

Steve--the author will engender bad will when the reader, who paid good money to purchase a book, has to repurchase it or do without when s/he decides to switch to a different reading device and, when s/he complains, is accused of stealing from the author and forcing him to live in a garret and his children to walk to school barefoot in the snow because they want their legally purchased books to work on their new device. That hasn't really been a major issue with iTunes because iPod users tend to stick with iPods. Also my understanding is that there is a fairly easy workaround--burn the iTunes music to a CD and re-rip it as an mp3. A mild pain but doable for the average person. Breaking ebook DRM is possible but you have to be reasonably tech-savvy to do it and many people won't think it's worth the bother.

I think the answer is make ebooks affordable and worth the money (that is, have some kind of added value, like DVD extras) and readers will buy them and probably not share more than they do hard copy books. The collectors will continue to play with their substandard toys. The constituencies should not be confused.

On the flip side, Steve, how many people working for an employer have the possibility of becoming wealthy because their work was made into a movie that became a success thereby selling more books and more movies?

I realize that the number of authors that experience this is very small, but it is infinitely larger than zero which is the chance that it could happen to people working for an employer.

In fact, I'd argue that probability is about as small as someone who works as a cashier, gets discovered by an agent, and becomes the next supermodel. Nice dream, but not enough of a reason to make me work two jobs for such a slim possibility.

Steve--the author will engender bad will when the reader, who paid good money to purchase a book, has to repurchase it or do without when s/he decides to switch to a different reading device...

Actually, I tend to blame the publisher for that, myself. But I get your point. My only point there was, it's too unquantifiable, much like the piracy debate. Without hard numbers, either on the extent of "piracy," or the losses due to "bad karma," nothing can be solved on that front. We need to move on to concrete solutions.

Also my understanding is that there is a fairly easy workaround--burn the iTunes music to a CD and re-rip it as an mp3. A mild pain but doable for the average person. Breaking ebook DRM is possible but you have to be reasonably tech-savvy to do it and many people won't think it's worth the bother.

I (a non-iPod user) have an even easier workaround: My MP3 player includes SW that will record anything played on the PC... including something being played BY the PC. I just start the recorder, play the song from iTunes, and save it as a new MP3. It's not hard. My point here is that even with DRM, you can find a way to make it work for you that makes it worth the discomfort of some DRM.

I think the answer is make ebooks affordable and worth the money (that is, have some kind of added value, like DVD extras) and readers will buy them and probably not share more than they do hard copy books.

I think the answer is somewhere in the middle... namely, an amount of value, an amount of DRM, and (this is the important part) an amount of customer cooperation to make it manageable. Yes, that means rules we'll have to abide, sacrifices we'll have to make, and DRM we'll have to accept. But they don't have to be horrible or insurmountable, or make us feel like criminals.

Who feels like a criminal when they look at the surveillance cameras at their grocery store? Who feels like a criminal because they have to put in their credit card before they pump their gas? How many of us have sworn off grocery stores and driving because of it? All of those are the equivalent of DRM, yet we've learned to live with them, because of the value we get from those products.

DRM can be simple, and workable for people who feel it is justified for the value they get out of it. Ask anyone who owns a Kindle... they bought into a DRM system to buy Amazon books, but if they consider it worth the value of the books they receive, they're okay with it. And they can still work around their DRM by buying non-Amazon Mobi books for their Kindle.

Bob, you're right... we're in another DRM thread. Should we kill it now, before the monster rises up and trashes the place, or do you think there's still room for discussion before it wakes up? (If you want, I'll willingly abandon ship right here...)

For the average person, DRM is not really an issue. The 505 & Kindle are the two easiest ones to use. You don't need to go and find a PID and plug it into some website to then purchase eBooks. The 505 you plug in and it's a simple registration for the device with Sony's software. The Kindle is already registered when you purchase it. So you can then just purchase eBooks, load them and go.

The average person just wants to read the purchased eBook and is not really concerned with rereading it or the fact that it may not be transportable to some future device.

The average person just wants to read the purchased eBook and is not really concerned with rereading it or the fact that it may not be transportable to some future device.

Darn it Jon!

You've just proved to me I'm not 'average'...

Also fairness... as he points out later in the article, others try to accept the system by telling artists to go out and "play live, sell T-shirts, etc"... IOW, do twice the amount of work (or more) for the same profit. How many people working for an employer, for example, would be satisfied if their boss told them to do their full-time work for free, then go out and sell umbrellas with the company logo on the street for their income? Not many? Then why should an artist have to do that, just to make a living?


No, that's not what that means. They're not saying do twice the amount of work for the same profit, they're saying that if you want to continue to get paid, you have to continue to work. In every other profession I can not expect to keep getting paid for work I did yesterday. If I want another paycheck today, I have to do work today. I don't just make something and then expect to get paid over and over for the same thing.

Darn it Jon!

You've just proved to me I'm not 'average'...

Deal with it, green eyes!

Deal with it, green eyes!

Oh, how did you know ---- :D

Actually they're hazel... ;)

No, that's not what that means. They're not saying do twice the amount of work for the same profit, they're saying that if you want to continue to get paid, you have to continue to work. In every other profession I can not expect to keep getting paid for work I did yesterday. If I want another paycheck today, I have to do work today. I don't just make something and then expect to get paid over and over for the same thing.

I think you've got that wrong. What he's suggesting is that those artists should give away their chief creative product for free, and make their money on throwaway extras like T-shirts and posters (none of which they "constantly create" either). That IS working twice as much for the same profit... or, giving away half your product (the best half, no less) for free.

It's a different business model, and makes sense if you think about it. In a digital world, your intellectual property (mp3, ebook, whatever) has an infinite supply. You can try to artificially limit the supply in order to give value to the product (DRM, aggressive coyright enforcement, etc), but that's almost impossible to control (as we've seen). They obviously have artistic value, that's why people want them, but because it's trivial to create an infinite supply they have little (if any) financial value. The general idea with changing the business model is that you give away the things that have an infinite supply, and sell things where you can control the supply/demand. Either charging for services instead of products, as in live performances, concerts, etc. Or else charging for traditional physical products, as in t-shirts, posters, etc, including your time/labor in producing/marketing those physical products.

What many people are saying is that the concept of creating something that is trivial for anybody to copy/distribute and trying to make a living off of artificially limiting the supply is doomed to failure. As with any other profession, you need to earn your living by either doing or producing something that people can't easily do themselves. That's what provides your product/service with value.

It's not that you're doing more work for the same profit, it's that the original item (the easily copied/distributed intellectual property) doesn't have much profit potential because there's little financial value in it. In order to make a profit, you need to do other things.

Actually, I tend to blame the publisher for that, myself. But I get your point. My only point there was, it's too unquantifiable, much like the piracy debate. Without hard numbers, either on the extent of "piracy," or the losses due to "bad karma," nothing can be solved on that front. We need to move on to concrete solutions.


Okay, fair enough; I see your point now and agree. I was just as bad there. :)

I don't see DRM in itself as evil, I see limiting portability of ebooks across devices because of DRM as evil. If one can't break DRM, one can't convert an ebook for a new reader. That's not a problem if you stick with one brand of reader, just like for those music consumers who stick with iPods are never going to have a problem buying their music from iTunes, and certainly sticking with iPods is an attractive proposition as Apple does a great job updating the hardware regularly. A combination of light DRM with ePub might be the answer. If each reader can take a DRMed ePub document and convert it for that reader, then consumers can switch devices with confidence that their electronic library won't become useless overnight. I'm assuming that's the idea of ePub--someone please correct me if I'm wrong.

And yes, we're back into a DRM thread. To bring it back to the original topic:

The rhetoric coming from a writer of the stature of David Pogue is one thing. He has a day job. I really don't think his kids will end up flipping burgers at the truck stop because a few readers downloaded his book on the Internet instead of ignoring it entirely (and hey, somebody has to flip the burgers, after all). On the other side we have Cory Doctorow. I appreciate Cory's position on ebooks and DRM but at the same time, giving away free electronic versions of all your books as a loss-leader to get people to purchase the hard copy books essentially devalues the electronic edition. I don't think that's quite the right approach, either. Making electronic editions of books worthless certainly will put an end to piracy--technically--since you can't pirate what is yours to freely trade, but it's throwing the baby out with the bathwater IMO. Ebooks should be on a par with at least MMPBs, I think.

I suspect the solution--as it usually does--lies somewhere in the middle, but we have to get the extremists to give up their position a little bit. There's the rub, I think.

It's not that you're doing more work for the same profit, it's that the original item (the easily copied/distributed intellectual property) doesn't have much profit potential because there's little financial value in it. In order to make a profit, you need to do other things.

Well, then... to put it bluntly... why do it at all? That model is reversing the role of product and promotional tool, and it makes no sense.

If I'm expected to give away my e-books for free, then go out on the street and sell Kestral T-shirts... it's not worth it to do so. If that was the only way I could make money, I'd get out right there. Or better yet, I'd make better T-shirts, worth good money, and create cheesy online promotional freebies (like Kestral porn ;) ) to attract more customers.

Well, then... to put it bluntly... why do it at all? That model is reversing the role of product and promotional tool, and it makes no sense.

If I'm expected to give away my e-books for free, then go out on the street and sell Kestral T-shirts... it's not worth it to do so. If that was the only way I could make money, I'd get out right there. Or better yet, I'd make better T-shirts, worth good money, and create cheesy online promotional freebies (like Kestral porn ;) ) to attract more customers.

Certainly writing talent is very different from marketing talent. I think writing talent and compensation should not be tied to your ability to sell T-shirts. That is just stupid.

Dale

Shaggy, I think this statement: "if you want to continue to get paid, you have to continue to work. In every other profession I can not expect to keep getting paid for work I did yesterday. If I want another paycheck today, I have to do work today. I don't just make something and then expect to get paid over and over for the same thing." is a fundamental misunderstanding of intellectual property protection. A copyright entitles you, the creator, to collect monies for work that you did, not only yesterday but possibly years ago. So the copyright holder can indeed expect to get paid over and over for the same thing. The Constitution provides explicitly for protection for copyright (and patent) holders. Such protection, moreover, is an encouragement to create more and maybe better and more popular things. Pogue feels, as do other creators, that he is being cheated out of such earnings (maybe he is, and maybe he isn't, I don't know). The work is done once, no additional work should be required to reward the creator.

The average person just wants to read the purchased eBook and is not really concerned with rereading it or the fact that it may not be transportable to some future device.

Ok, lets consider I am an average person.

I bought a Sony PRS-500 when it first came out (got as Christmas present actually). Sony's ebook store didn't have alot available that I was looking for, what they did have cost more than a paper back down the street at Barnes & Nobel. I read the demo books that were on my machine. I ended up reading many free books and buying books from books stores like scifi-az that had sony formated PDFs.

Now, I see that Kindle has this new reader and they have thousands of books at better prices than the Sony store. So, I buy one of those since my son has been using my Sony alot, reading all the books I mentioned above that I managed to get for it.

What, I can't read the books I buy from Amazon on the Sony too?

To me, the above scenerio would be one a normal person would run into. As you say, not really understanding DRM and thinking the books would work on both devices.

So, now I have 4 options:

Option 1 (Technically illegal)
Start buying books that I can break the DRM on and convert for my Sony and Kindle... which eliminates one of the best features of the Kindle, the Amazon book availability and pricing (Wispernet not withstanding). Or, I have to buy the same books twice, once from Amazon and once from Sony (assuming we both want to read it and Sony has it.) Wait, why is this more convenient than paper backs?

Option 2
Return my Kindle and buy a second Sony due to the device lock-in that the DRM requires. (Granted this may save me money up front because the Sony is about $100 less than the Kindle. But, it might cost more as less books are available at the Sony store and many cost $5-7 more than the Kindle store. At my estimated reading rate of one book a week that adds up.)

Option 3
Sell the Sony and buy a second Kindle due to the device lock-in that the DRM requires. (This will cost me $200 more assuming I can sell the Sony for $200 or so. But the cheaper book cost at Amazon will probably pay for this difference in a year or so.)

Option 4
Forget eBooks all together... its too early at this point. I can buy a p-book, me and my son can read it (granted not at the same time) and I can sell it used to recover some money to buy more. Or I can get books from the library for free.

Most sane "average" people are going to go with Option 4. How does that help the ebook industry move forward? DRM is about vendor lock-in... it isn't good for the average person or the technical person and it only casues problems for the honest customers.

Me I'm not sane or average so I am strongly considering Option 3. As I said, due to the Kindle book availablity and pricing, not that I think the Kindle is a better device than the Sony.

BOb

I don't see DRM in itself as evil, I see limiting portability of ebooks across devices because of DRM as evil...

A combination of light DRM with ePub might be the answer...

We're in agreement here, as well: One ePub doc, bought with light DRM (like a CC or registration #), to be converted at will to any readers you have. Hopefully, if the ePub cost is low enough, people will be willing to buy their own, and won't just let copies loose at will.

I'm more on David's side than Cory's: I believe the work is the value, not the medium. Cory essentially considers electronic files worthless in his model. The problem is also with the public: Most of them feel as Cory does. This is fine for people like him, who have the support of the publishing castle, and therefore make their money through the castle system. For everyone on the outside of the castle, it's not so good. And it's not fair, to tell everyone on the outside that their work is valueless, just because no publisher has deigned them worthy of access to the castle.

Copyright is about enforcing fairness, making sure ideas with merit aren't just stolen by others with more resources or pull (or friends in the castle). My copyright is as good as Cory's copyright, which is as good as David's copyright, and I ultimately have as much control over my product as they do. Copyright works because the public, acting through the law, accepts that concept and largely upholds it... until recently, when electronic files have thrown a planet-sized monkeywrench into the works.

Salvaging the situation depends upon people agreeing that the work has value beyond ink on bound slips of paper, and upholding that through application of copyright law. If the people refuse to accept that, then the industry will eventually find all of its material on-line for free, and that won't be great for the publishing castle (or those inside it).

Ok, lets consider I am an average person.

We'll give you the benefit of the doubt... ;)

What, I can't read the books I buy from Amazon on the Sony too?

To me, the above scenerio would be one a normal person would run into. As you say, not really understanding DRM and thinking the books would work on both devices.

You're right, and this is likely to be the single biggest stumbling block related to all e-books: I can't read one book on another device; and most "normal" people won't realize that until it's too late. Therefore, the sooner we have a common format (like ePub) that users can buy, and have their device, whatever it is, automatically read/convert it, the better the industry will be.

Actually, there is another option for "normal" people, that should go before option 4: Stick with whatever you already have, grumble about the things others have that you don't, and hope things get better (in other words, wait for ePub to save us all), before you get fed up and go with 4. For early adopters, it's akin to Death By a Thousand Cuts. But if you're a patient person, this strategy actually works well, if slowly.

The Constitution provides explicitly for protection for copyright (and patent) holders. Such protection, moreover, is an encouragement to create more and maybe better and more popular things.

That was the original intent, and back when copying/distributing was very expensive and copyright terms were limited, it actually worked to encourage more artistic creation. These days, where copyright is constantly being extended (both in terms and punishments) and electronic copying/distribution costs are very cheap (compared to what they were), a lot of people would say that the only thing the current copyright law does is promote greed.

It's nice to think of copyright as trying to achieve a balance between the public good and encouraging the arts, but that is only true from a historical perspective. The laws are tipping that balance further and further towards the benefit of publishers/distributors, but technology is further and further reducing the value of what they provide. At some point, the old model is going to need to be changed. Right now the industry is doing everything it can to resist that change, and many consumers are reacting by losing respect for the industries rights. I think the artists are, unfortunately, being caught in the middle.

Well, then... to put it bluntly... why do it at all? That model is reversing the role of product and promotional tool, and it makes no sense.

Current technology is breaking the old model already. The business model for how to make a profit needs to adapt. I don't think anybody really has hit on the right model yet for digital content, but it seems pretty clear that the old model for physical content is becoming obsolete when applied to the digital world. Trying to cling to the old model by fighting technology in order to artificially limit the supply/distribution is never going to work. There is no such thing as an unbreakable DRM that will protect your digital work. Once you start distributing digital content, consumers are going to find a way of doing it themselves. Because of technology, the distributor is now irrelevant. That's not where the value is anymore with digital content, so that's not where the profit will be.

People can go out and shoot one another too, but that doesn't mean society should not decide to inflict penalties and punishment if they do. Since the advent of copying machines, it has been possible to reproduce and distribute books illegally. New technology has made that easier: if I understand you correctly, this means we should find a new business model and forget about copyright enforcement. Maybe this is a losing battle, but I am sure that if the punishment for illegal copying is severe enough (huge monetary fines, for example) then copyright will continue to mean something. I have seen a similar battle in the world of trademarks, where I spend some of my time: domain names have made trademark enforcement (generally protected by national laws) much harder, but because the price for domain name thieves and even nations can be extremely high, there have been plenty of triumphs. It's certainly a challenge to come up with effective protections, but the idea that technological advances have made enforcement of ip protections difficult if not impossible I do not accept.

Since the advent of copying machines, it has been possible to reproduce and distribute books illegally.

Sure, but it was expensive (compared to now). You needed to buy/build the machine, have the expertise to use it, and provide raw materials in order to produce copies. The only people who really did this on a large scale were doing it for commercial gain. You didn't see the average consumer doing this themselves, so there was still value in going to a distributor to buy content. Copyright was created because production/distribution was expensive. It's basically encouraging artists to produce by guaranteeing them that they'll have a chance to make a profit from the creation of the work, but also largely that the expense of distribution will be reimbursed. It protected them from somebody undercutting their distribution costs and taking the market away from them by granting them a limited monopoly on the supply of their content.

In the digital world a "copying machine" is now a free piece of software, the expertise required is essentially being able to click a mouse, and there are no raw materials since it's all digital. Basically, digitial copies are now easy to make and free. What changed is that you don't need to be making money at it in order to be able to do it since there are no longer large costs that need to be recouped. It is now trivial for the average person to be a large scale digital distributor. This means that the real distributors aren't seen as providing any additional value, so people will be less and less willing to pay for that link in the chain.

Artists still provide value, because the content is what people want. However, there is no longer as much need for a middle man to distribute content. In the old business model, it's the middle men that were making the most money. They are very powerful and have a lot of incentive to resist change, but I don't think it's going to last forever. I'm not advocating eliminating copyright, there still needs to be some guarantee that an artist will make enough money from creating a work that they are encouraged to create, but in the digital world there no longer is a need to guarantee them enough protection to offset production/distribution as well. There have been a lot of extensions/penalties added to copyright that protect the large distributors. Harsher penalties may prolong things, but ultimately that's not what this is about. The reality is that in the future, distribution of digital content is a lot less relevant than it used to be when products were physical. That means that the model that placed the majority of the profit in the distributors hands will change as well.

I think the original intent of copyright started to go wrong when it became more about protecting the large corporate middle men than it did about protecting the individual artists. It's the middle men that are being threatened by changes in how the business model will work.

The trick is figuring out a new model that will work. Creating the content still has value, but copying/distributing the content doesn't. That's where things get interesting. One method that some people are talking about is taking what used to be one of the highest parts of the price of an artistic work and turning it into either free or very low cost (valuable distribution has become trivial distribution in a digital environment). Then figuring out a way to make money for your labor in creating the original content elsewhere. Either as services (concerts) or additional offshoot products. The key for authors is to figure out something that works for them. Most of the ideas I've seen being thrown around in this area are more geared towards musicians than authors (probably because for most people that's where the focus is). Authors need to figure out what value they provide to consumers other than production/distribution of the book that will let them make a living from the labor of creating the book. That's the piece that's still missing, and finding the answer is not going to be easy.

I agree with you. Incredibly (or perhaps not so incredibly) Congress has gone to great lengths to protect what you call the "distributor" in lengthening, at very times over the past years, the term of copyright. This is a boon to companies like Disney that can now tie up their wares for ever longer periods, which was not the intention of the drafters of the Constitution. My concern is protecting the creator, but that means fighting the Disneys who see their interests threatened. Unfortunately, what digital has facilitated is piracy (cf. China), and only strong criminal law enforcement will help there, but only if the jurisdiction in question agrees. We shall see.

Current technology is breaking the old model already. The business model for how to make a profit needs to adapt.

Adapt, yes. But the day that my only hope to make money off of a novel is to sell a T-shirt, I'm turning the PC off.

Authors need to figure out what value they provide to consumers other than production/distribution of the book that will let them make a living from the labor of creating the book. That's the piece that's still missing, and finding the answer is not going to be easy.

This reduces the role (and value) of the author to that of a typist. Thanks loads.

I agree with you. Incredibly (or perhaps not so incredibly) Congress has gone to great lengths to protect what you call the "distributor" in lengthening, at very times over the past years, the term of copyright. This is a boon to companies like Disney that can now tie up their wares for ever longer periods, which was not the intention of the drafters of the Constitution.

One of the things the drafters of the Constitution understood is that Times Change, and laws must be flexible enough to change with them. That's the beauty of the American Democratic system: It is designed to be malleable.

The catch is, you have to be diligent, intelligent, and cooperative, to make that malleability work. That combination has become hard to come by lately, but it's not impossible. It just requires people to stop avoiding the issue, rolling over to government malaise, and allowing the Disneys of the world absolute control over the system.

All the talk about "killing off old copyright laws," "giving up on the old system," is just defeatest and lazy, and ultimately would be a disaster. The copyright system can be adapted to the new digital world. All we have to do is commit to getting it done properly. That's all.

This reduces the role (and value) of the author to that of a typist. Thanks loads.


That is not at all what I'm saying. The author still provides artistic value. Coming up with the stories is not trivial, and is not something that the average person can easily do with any degree of competency. That's where the author's value is (and in reality always has been). What an artist may not be able to do anymore is rely on a perpetual stream of revenue coming in based on the service of printing/distributing a digital work they created. In the physical world, that service is where the money is made. In the digital world, consumers don't need anybody to print/distribute (or at least there's not much value in it), so an author can't expect to make their money for that service. That's the specific role that has been reduced in value, not the role of the author in general.

Authors need to adapt their model so that they make profit off of the writing of the book, and then will need to start working on the next book if they want to continue making a living as an author (which is how it already works for everybody else). Realistically, they (or whoever they sell the rights to) no longer have a monopoly as the distributor once the digital work is released, so can't count on that service as their revenue source. Distribution is not where the money is anymore.

In the physical world, that service is where the money is made.

I don't think that's true at all. While a small portion of the retail price of a book goes to the printing an distrbution most of the money goes to the retailer, the wholesaler, the publisher and the author. Also, the publisher usually spends money to market and promote a book.

BOb

Bob, when you say, "a small portion of the retail price of a book goes to the printing an distribution most of the money goes to the retailer, the wholesaler, the publisher and the author", I don't think you are saying anything different. The retailer, wholesaler and publisher are all part of the printing/selling chain, i.e. the distribution chain, and it is precisely that chain that is eliminated by digital.

The author still provides artistic value. Coming up with the stories is not trivial, and is not something that the average person can easily do with any degree of competency. That's where the author's value is (and in reality always has been).

You say that... and you also say that the author/artist should give away his artistic product for nothing, and find a non-artistic way to make money, like selling pencils on the street. I maintain that this makes no sense for the artist who would like to make a living off of their work. They might as well give up the art, it's just dragging down their ability to make money.

What an artist may not be able to do anymore is rely on a perpetual stream of revenue coming in based on the service of printing/distributing a digital work they created. In the physical world, that service is where the money is made.

Actually, that's where the money is lost... those are the overhead costs that take away from the actual source of money: Sales. An author is paid according to sales, not printing and distribution. Those are publisher's costs, and they either absorb that with sales income, or with the final amount they pay the author (or, perish the thought, both).

I'll grant that the old business model is being turned upside down by digital distribution. However, requiring the author to take on an additional (and essentially menial) job to make money is counter-productive, and will not encourage anyone to become an artist. Another method of payment needs to be found.

I've suggested elsewhere either the patronage model (rich guy looking for tax deduction finances your artistic endeavors), or the advertisers model (a company pays you to add their advertising to your work, like a TV commercial or product placement finances a TV show), to finance artists. This makes much more sense, for it encourages the artist to work on their art, not selling pencils, while the patron or advertiser supports them.

And the added value of this is that it largely removes the concern about "piracy" of works, because consumers do not have to pay for the work... they just have to see it, to satisfy the patron/advertiser (who is banking on self-promotion or product sales based on the exposure in the artist's work). This would solve many of the issues that copyright attempts to satisfy, by taking it out of the consumer's concern, and making it the patron/advertiser's concern.

E-publishing can adopt an advertising model right now... publications are already essentially operating on a combination of advertising and subscription/counter sales (and some mags and papers don't even charge at the counter... they are solely supported by ads). The removal of physical printing and distribution should allow a significant lowering of production costs that can be absorbed by a combination of advertisers and subscriptions.

You say that... and you also say that the author/artist should give away his artistic product for nothing, and find a non-artistic way to make money, like selling pencils on the street. I maintain that this makes no sense for the artist who would like to make a living off of their work. They might as well give up the art, it's just dragging down their ability to make money.

I said they need to find a way other than relying on charging for distribution. The examples I quoted (concerts, t-shirts, posters, etc) where taken from other sources, they weren't my suggestions. As I mentioned, those are usually more meaningful to musicians than authors. Authors will need to figure out something that makes sense other than charging for distribution. I agree, selling pencils on the street would be rather silly.

Actually, that's where the money is lost... those are the overhead costs that take away from the actual source of money: Sales. An author is paid according to sales, not printing and distribution. Those are publisher's costs, and they either absorb that with sales income, or with the final amount they pay the author (or, perish the thought, both).

It's all part of the same thing. Yes, printing and distribution are costs to the publisher, but those are also things that the publisher does which provide value to consumers. A large part of the revenue that they bring in from sales is based on the value they are providing by printing the books, shipping them to retailers, getting them put on the shelves. That's the distribution chain, and people pay the publishers for providing that service. The sale is a certain amount of revenue. From that you subtract the costs of printing/distribution, what's left is the profit. The more value you provide, the more revenue you can charge (which means more profit). With digital distribution, consumers no longer need a publisher to print books, ship items to brick and mortar retailers... etc. The cost to the publisher of those services is gone, but so is the value to the consumers. Because there's no longer any value, the revenue people are willing to give you for distribution is gone, so the profits are gone as well.

I'll grant that the old business model is being turned upside down by digital distribution. However, requiring the author to take on an additional (and essentially menial) job to make money is counter-productive, and will not encourage anyone to become an artist. Another method of payment needs to be found.

Absolutely. As I said, the examples of t-shirts and posters applies more to musicians. The biggest example for them though is the concert. In that case, the live performance is a service that they can provide which does have a lot of value to consumers. Authors will need to figure out what works best for them. Harry Potter (an extreme example, I know) probably makes a ton of money by licensing rights to other markets for physical items like t-shirts, costumes, toys, movie rights... etc. Rowling doesn't need to setup a table on a street corner and sell t-shirts personally, but the companies she licenses the rights to will make a lot of revenue that way.

I've suggested elsewhere either the patronage model (rich guy looking for tax deduction finances your artistic endeavors), or the advertisers model (a company pays you to add their advertising to your work, like a TV commercial or product placement finances a TV show), to finance artists. This makes much more sense, for it encourages the artist to work on their art, not selling pencils, while the patron or advertiser supports them.

And the added value of this is that it largely removes the concern about "piracy" of works, because consumers do not have to pay for the work... they just have to see it, to satisfy the patron/advertiser (who is banking on self-promotion or product sales based on the exposure in the artist's work). This would solve many of the issues that copyright attempts to satisfy, by taking it out of the consumer's concern, and making it the patron/advertiser's concern.

E-publishing can adopt an advertising model right now... publications are already essentially operating on a combination of advertising and subscription/counter sales (and some mags and papers don't even charge at the counter... they are solely supported by ads). The removal of physical printing and distribution should allow a significant lowering of production costs that can be absorbed by a combination of advertisers and subscriptions.

Yep, that's exactly the kind of thing I'm talking about. Advertising is one possibility, but there may be others that a creative artist can come up with as well.

Well, then... to put it bluntly... why do it at all? That model is reversing the role of product and promotional tool, and it makes no sense.

If I'm expected to give away my e-books for free, then go out on the street and sell Kestral T-shirts... it's not worth it to do so. If that was the only way I could make money, I'd get out right there. Or better yet, I'd make better T-shirts, worth good money, and create cheesy online promotional freebies (like Kestral porn ;) ) to attract more customers.
So, when does that Kestral porn come out?:D

@shaggy: And musicians do still - and will continue to - earn money for each sell.

Yes, I DO NOT like DRM. Not at all.
But: I still assume, that selling a book should give you money - just as well as selling software (which is essentially the same) should make you money. Enough money for an author to continue living from his book-sells, for a developer to continue living from his software.
I do both - programming and writing (not published yet) - and I want to get money for both. Not for some obscure "second market" (dont want to sell shirts, really), but for the product itself.

I do not know how this can be achieved. But - on the other side - using a kind of "serial number" would be a possibility, just like registering books online to specific devices, etc - look at software, it's essentially the same problem (and the same solutions can be used).

So, when does that Kestral porn come out?:D

Cue the seventies syntho-beat!

boom-chica-chica-chica-boom-boom-chica-chica-
boom-chica-chica-chica-boom-boom-chica-chica-...

:zoiks: :drool: :clap::yahoo:

@shaggy: And musicians do still - and will continue to - earn money for each sell.

Will they? The RIAA lawsuits and P2P sharing is already starting to show that model is broken. If you're talking physical albums, then yes. But if you're talking mp3's, do you really think the RIAA will be getting a lot of money from online mp3 sales in the future? Musicians will make far more money from concerts than they ever will from mp3 royalties.

Yes, I DO NOT like DRM. Not at all.
But: I still assume, that selling a book should give you money - just as well as selling software (which is essentially the same) should make you money. Enough money for an author to continue living from his book-sells, for a developer to continue living from his software.
I do both - programming and writing (not published yet) - and I want to get money for both. Not for some obscure "second market" (dont want to sell shirts, really), but for the product itself.

As a programmer do you expect to be able to write one piece of software, and then make a living for the rest of your life without writing anything else?

An obscure "second market" for software is charging for support. There's already a huge number of companies out there that have adopted the business model of giving the software away for free, but charging for a support service. Open Source software is the one that people think of the most, but even companies like Oracle, Sun, IBM, etc (which historically made a lot of money off of sales) are giving away their software for free these days and making all of their money from support contracts.

I do not know how this can be achieved. But - on the other side - using a kind of "serial number" would be a possibility, just like registering books online to specific devices, etc - look at software, it's essentially the same problem (and the same solutions can be used).

There is no such thing as DRM that can't be broken, there is no solution that will work. As a programmer, you should know this. Going down that path is a losing battle that just acts to delay the inevitable.

Will they? The RIAA lawsuits and P2P sharing is already starting to show that model is broken. If you're talking physical albums, then yes. But if you're talking mp3's, do you really think the RIAA will be getting a lot of money from online mp3 sales in the future? Musicians will make far more money from concerts than they ever will from mp3 royalties.
Yes. But they WILL continue to earn money from MP3 royalties - no matter the drm, it is still forbidden to copy mp3 and it will continue to be so.
It is easy to copy MP3 - but they still get selled.

As a programmer do you expect to be able to write one piece of software, and then make a living for the rest of your life without writing anything else?
No. But do you know how few authors can do this? I guess you can count them with one hand, without using binary counting ... Harry Potter is a big exception, but most successfull authors write MANY years before selling their first book and writing MANY books before getting a top-seller.

An obscure "second market" for software is charging for support. There's already a huge number of companies out there that have adopted the business model of giving the software away for free, but charging for a support service. Open Source software is the one that people think of the most, but even companies like Oracle, Sun, IBM, etc (which historically made a lot of money off of sales) are giving away their software for free these days and making all of their money from support contracts.
Yes. But the majority still earns via selling software. The company, at which I work (boy, english is definetly not my first language), sells support - giving away software for free. But we also sell software - and both parts earn money.
Yes, there are many possible business models - e.g. flatrates, monthly paying, additional services, etc and authors will need to adopt. But they will continue to earn money selling (e-)books and this is as it should be.
Perhaps a flatrate? Calculate it - the complete industrie will earn more and it is possible to calculate market shares to calculate the profit of each author / musician / etc.
Authors selling their eBooks and special "additional packages"? Or direct selling of unprotected books (yes, it gets paid), etc There are many possible models.

There is no such thing as DRM that can't be broken, there is no solution that will work. As a programmer, you should know this. Going down that path is a losing battle that just acts to delay the inevitable.
I never talked about unbreakable drm. Can you break a serial number? Yes, without any problems, just by googling.
Can you copy copyprotected DVDs? Without any problem. Can I do this? Without any second problem. Do I still buy (and rend) DVDs? Yes. And most people I know do this as well - and not only since "breaking a copyright" is illegal in germany.
Hell - you can break ANY system...

So? Where is the problem? Most people still buy their software (not all, but a large chunk).
What about e.g. letting you download a book, then entering a serial for that given device, a short connection to the server validating your serial (and registering that book-serial to that device, so that you can share with a number of people and devices, but not with everyone) and then giving you access to that book?
Can it be broken? Yes. Even when using hard cryptografic approaches (each device with a given security-chip and a book-encryption specific to that chip, etc). Will most people break it? No. Not if the deal is fair - e.g. reading the book on multiple readers in your family, etc

It's not about unbreakable DRM - we can agree on this one. That the industrie is continuing to try to enforce something as laughable as this (see BluRay, Windows Vista, WMA, DRM'd eBooks, etc) is ridiculous. But thats really not the point. (Oh and we can agree that DRM in its current usage is evil).
And yes, authors (and the whole publishing industrie) need to adopt to the new market - but not to the point, that they give up earning with their products.

As a programmer do you expect to be able to write one piece of software, and then make a living for the rest of your life without writing anything else?


HA! It's been done.

As a programmer, if I wrote a program that I was selling, I would expect to get paid for every copy of it... even though making a copy is [close to] free. The value isn't in the CD it is shipped on, it is the benefit the end user derives from it. Much software is not sold [licensed] for $X as a download or $X + $Y for a shipped CD with packaging. The extra cost covers the package, shiping and handling.

Why should books be any different just because the delivery method changed... only the cost of that deliver method should be adjusted, the royalties the author makes should be the same.

BOb

(TO SELF: No more never ending threads!)

Yes. But they WILL continue to earn money from MP3 royalties - no matter the drm, it is still forbidden to copy mp3 and it will continue to be so.

I guess we just disagree on this. IMO, using laws to force a broken business model on consumers will only work so far. I think it's already obvious that there are a LOT of people out there who (intentionally or not) ignore copyright laws with regards to mp3s.

Will most people break it? No. Not if the deal is fair - e.g. reading the book on multiple readers in your family, etc

It only takes one person to break it. After that, everyone can easily get copies via digital distribution. The whole idea of DRM is that it's artificially trying to limit the supply (not to mention all of the other restrictions they try to use it for). That's already starting to fall apart in the music world, and to some extent ebooks as well. I think you'd be pretty surprised what you can find available if you looked around for illegal ebooks. Personally I still buy them because I want to support the authors (although I don't have much desire to support the publishers, especially when prices are rediculous), but if I wanted to I could find just about anything I wanted illegally as well.

The horse is already out of the barn, putting a bigger lock on the door won't do any good, especially if there's no such thing as a lock that can't be broken. The main issue isn't how to get the horse back in the barn, the main issue is that consumers don't need barns anymore, and the barn companies are very worried.

I tried to take the pledge...(Honest, I did, Steve!)

I'd like to give the generic problem a high falutin' name, so I dub it "The Poverty of Abundance", because of the terms "The Economics of Scarcity" vs "The Economics Of Abundance". (Remember, you heard it here first :D)

It's an economic paradox. When things are so abundant that nobody charges for it, it stops being produced, due to no economic incentive to produce it. Historically, this would lead to eventual shortages, which would raise the price and restore production. These, at least, were the economic reality under "The Economics Of Scarcity". (See the "Problems of the Commons" in an economics textbook.)

"The Economics Of Abundance" has kicked this into a cocked hat. When the cost of producing things hits zero, and the ability to produce is widely distributed (and also approached zero), there's nothing to cause a shortage of product to raise the price. This may sound like Nirvana to some but.....

What do you produce??? Creating a new item to produce is [B]not[B] free. And there is nothing in "The Economics Of Abundance" world that pays for the new designs. In "The Economics Of Scarcity", design and production were rolled into one, and used the overall scarcity to create a price for both.
Under the "Economics Of Abundance" the cost are completely separate, with no way to charge back the design, thus impoverishing the product designers. (Hence my term, "The Poverty Of Abundance".)

Currently, this is limited to the world of 1's and 0's. The rest of the world still follows the "Economics Of Scarcity" (price of gas, anybody?). But 3-D printers exist (poor quality, expensive, small). Who knows how it will go over the next 50 yrs? This problem is a BIG problem, and we're just looking at the tip of the iceberg in e-books, music and video.

Please note, I don't claim to have the answer. But it's impossible to solve a problem without fully defining it.

Yes, they can download each eBook, MP3, etc - and they already can today. But e.g. the selling numbers for MP3s are raising, not falling. You can download nearly every MP3 for free on the well known P2P-nets. Nevertheless - people are buying MP3s, WMA, CDs, etc.
Yes, the market will change - but IMO not as much as you think/hope. Lets see what evolves ;)

DRM is a bad idea - we agree on this one.

(Oh and btw: Laws are used to enforce EVERY SINGLE business model, there simply is no business model (and that includes manual labor) that works without the law protecting it and people agreeing to (or being forced to) keep to the law ... But that only as a side remark).

-- second thoughts:
One possible market-advantage for authors/publishers: Service. Have a good and nice page where you can buy (and use) your books/music very easy (easier and faster as downloading the product from grey/black market) and give away very high quality.
I personally do very much prefer simply clicking "buy this-and-that-book" on a fast server (prefarably from my reader and wherever I am) then searching, downloading, waaaaiiiitiiing on a p2p-net. Let's say I am waiting at the station and missed my train - if I can just start my reader, download the newest novell of my favourite author and begin to read it, I would prefer doing so, then waiting to come home and download it there ;) )
But we can possibly agree that the market will change - and the statement above WOULD be a change to the business model ..

Much software is not sold [licensed] for $X as a download or $X + $Y for a shipped CD with packaging. The extra cost covers the package, shiping and handling.

Why should books be any different just because the delivery method changed... only the cost of that deliver method should be adjusted, the royalties the author makes should be the same.

How many ebooks have you seen that were cheaper than the paperback? In most cases the publisher is charging the same, or even more for the ebook. They're still trying to charge for the physical delivery method, which is a significant part of the price. That's basically my point.

Yeah, you don't have to give away ebooks for free (that's just one model people have suggested), but you'll need to find a price point that consumers will be willing to pay versus just copying/downloading it themselves. I don't know how high that will be though. The idea is that a significant part of the price for physical books today are for things that no longer exist with ebooks, but the music companies and book publishers are not wanting to change.

It wouldn't surprise me if we start seeing more and more artists (both authors and musicians) selling directly to consumers without going through a RIAA or publishing company (some already are). With the internet, it's also conceivable that they could effectively promote themselves as well. The sale price of their mp3/ebook would be a lot lower than it is today (no middle men anymore), and the artist would probably take a much bigger cut than their current royalties. This idea is pretty scary to the RIAA/publishers though, and you can bet they're going to fight it very hard.

I'd like to give the generic problem a high falutin' name, so I dub it "The Poverty of Abundance", because of the terms "The Economics of Scarcity" vs "The Economics Of Abundance". (Remember, you heard it here first :D)


Excellent post. You've stated very clearly what I've (very poorly) been trying to say. Where were you about 50 posts ago? :)

How many ebooks have you seen that were cheaper than the paperback? In most cases the publisher is charging the same, or even more for the ebook. They're still trying to charge for the physical delivery method, which is a significant part of the price. That's basically my point.
Yes, and this is ridiculous - I agree. The problem is that they are simply afraid of totally loosing the "hard" market (real books, cds, etc) 'cause of the lower price of the new technology - and thus loose its controllability.

Yeah, you don't have to give away ebooks for free (that's just one model people have suggested), but you'll need to find a price point that consumers will be willing to pay versus just copying/downloading it themselves. I don't know how high that will be though. The idea is that a significant part of the price for physical books today are for things that no longer exist with ebooks, but the music companies and book publishers are not wanting to change.
Whoah! I agree again! It will need some try and error - but (greatly) reducing the price (adopting to lower production costs) and selling more service is a different thing from "giving away for free". Guess we were just misunderstanding each other ;)


With the internet, it's also conceivable that they could effectively promote themselves as well.
Publishers would need to rethink their business model - they give some service (e.g. lectoring, ads (dont underestimate the power of ads e.g. in stations etc - even better if you can just download the book there), etc) and get paid for it. Only the production-step gets lots, and that (I guess we agree) means lower prices and a higher profit-margin for authors / musician. Publishers ARE providing some service that is crucial for authors/musicians. But I agree, the internet gives creatives the possibility to decide for themselves...


The sale price of their mp3/ebook would be a lot lower than it is today (no middle men anymore), and the artist would probably take a much bigger cut than their current royalties. This idea is pretty scary to the RIAA/publishers though, and you can bet they're going to fight it very hard.
Yes - we can see this in germanys new copyright laws.

Yes, and this is ridiculous - I agree. The problem is that they are simply afraid of totally loosing the "hard" market (real books, cds, etc) 'cause of the lower price of the new technology - and thus loose its controllability.

I think the biggest thing they're afraid of is losing the cash cow that they have now with total control. In the digital world total control is gone, whether they will admit it or not. They're fighting a losing battle trying to keep it, rather than adapt.

Whoah! I agree again! It will need some try and error - but (greatly) reducing the price (adopting to lower production costs) and selling more service is a different thing from "giving away for free". Guess we were just misunderstanding each other ;)

There are several different ideas for models. "Free" is one that some people are talking about, and has worked surprisingly well in other markets, but it's not the only option. What publishers are trying desperately to do though, is keep the old model from the physical world (that pretty much made them the king of the mountain) and force it on the digital world. I don't think that's going to work though. Something is going to have to change.



Publishers ARE providing some service that is crucial for authors/musicians.

True, but it's getting a lot less and less, and they're fighting really hard to prevent it from happening. It wouldn't surprise me if eventually, they're no longer needed by either the consumer or the artist.

Excellent post. You've stated very clearly what I've (very poorly) been trying to say. Where were you about 50 posts ago? :)

I had taken the pledge to avoid these sort of threads. Some posters seem to get occasionally grumpy.....

"Free" is one that some people are talking about, and has worked surprisingly well in other markets, but it's not the only option.
That is true - are there are a number of possible "give away for free"-models for authors and musicians. As long as we agree that it is not the best model for everyone around - we agree ;)

I don't think that's going to work though. Something is going to have to change.
Correct.

It wouldn't surprise me if eventually, they're no longer needed by either the consumer or the artist.
Well - they are e.g. filtering (and though their would be some really good additional books out there - there would be a hell of a lot of crap), they can provide service (and a much better discussion base then a single author) to biggies like Amazon, etc - also I could think of e.g. Unions insted of .. say .. Sony.
I don't think they will disappear - but they are going to change, and they know it. This need not be bad for them - even a changed market can have very high (possibly even higher) profit margins.

I guess, that they are just trying to get as much money from it as they can, before it changes - and thus they can ignore disgrunteled customers (in their opionion) - at least this is the impression "they" cast on me.

I had taken the pledge to avoid these sort of threads. Some posters seem to get occasionally grumpy.....

Yeah, I generally try and avoid them too. This is the first one I've really shot my mouth off on. Hopefully I'll be able to shutup better in the future. ;)

Yeah, I generally try and avoid them too. This is the first one I've really shot my mouth off on. Hopefully I'll be able to shutup better in the future. ;)

Why? I thought your posts very worthy of reading and the discussion interesing - and I hope you didn't take my posts as offensive (they were NOT meant to be).

Yeah, I generally try and avoid them too. This is the first one I've really shot my mouth off on. Hopefully I'll be able to shutup better in the future. ;)

I was thrilled that new people jumped in and discussed this issue. Don't stop.

I had taken the pledge to avoid these sort of threads. Some posters seem to get occasionally grumpy.....

Well, y'know it didn't start out to be one of those threads...

I was ready to jump for the nearest airlock, too, but as we've managed to keep our matter and antimatter streams well-balanced, I was prepared to stick around for the ride.

The promotion thing is key. If you don't figure out promo, you'll never be noticed in the vast web.

Maybe publishers would essentially become promotion houses for artists (like me, who don't need them for anything else)... but they'd have a hard time convincing artists that they offered more than, say, Google, or some other web populating service. For an industry to change so drastically from their original focus would doubtless be an ugly process, but stranger things have happened.

The idea is that a significant part of the price for physical books today are for things that no longer exist with ebooks, but the music companies and book publishers are not wanting to change.

But you do have more costs than most people think. The only cost you really don't have is the actual printing (which isn't as much as some people think, about 10-15% of the cover price). You still have all the traditional production costs, plus the distribution costs just like pbooks. What they need to do is get rid of the old style distribution model where wholesalers & retailers get 70% of the books cover price divided between them (yes, they even use this for ebooks), every hand things pass through means someone needs to get paid. This of course applies mainly to the big traditional publishing houses. There are lots of e-publishers who are trying different things to figure out the best way to do things.

Some publishers (Hatchette Book Groups Orbit line for example) are cutting a few bucks off of pbook list prices on their ebooks. For example Lilith Saintcrow's Dante Valentine series books are $6.99 list as MMPB's, but $4.99 list as ebooks. Jennifer Rardin's Jaz Parks books are $12.99 list as Trade PB's, but $8.99 list as ebooks. Some other publishers are starting to try lower list on ebooks too, it's a start if nothing else (it's the biggies like Penguin that are the most guilty on pricing issues).

MaggieScratch
.....! I maintain that a lot of the people who downloaded it on the darknet not only would not have bought the book, likely they will never read it. They are collectors.

........But they MUST HAVE EVERY PATTERN. ........... It's a form of OCD, I guess. I think a lot of darknet e-book collectors operate from the same place. I do it myself a bit with the free books here at MobileRead. I'll see a book that looks interesting and I download it and I have no idea when or if I'll get to it, but maybe I will someday, and there is plenty of room on my SD card, so why not?

So my point (and I do have one) is that there's no use stressing over illegal downloads too much, because the sales you lose are infinitesimal compared to the bad will you will engender with actual readers if you treat them like criminals by locking up your ebooks with restrictive DRM. I'd rather see authors turning their energies to finding a better solution. I'm not sure what it is, but complaining about a tiny minority snatching the bread from your mouth is not it.

I DEFINITELY agree. I myself have a partial OCD complex. I don't care if the book is bad, if it's so and so author and the DL is free, I MUST DL it. Sometimes, I'll also DL other authors' works since, yeah, i have the HD space. I never actually READ most of my free DL'ded ebooks - I hardly have the time in my busy life - who does? - but sometimes in the future when it's talked about positively on a website or when I'm searching for certain books, if that author and book pop up, I"ll look thru my HD and WHOAH, I ACTUALLY HAVE IT!! So i'll go to read it. If i like it, i'll add that author to my "buy" list, whether it's ebooks or pbooks.

pilotbob
Have sales gone down since the non-DRM files (iTunes Plus and Amazon MP3 store) opened? I'm thinking no, sales have increased at iTunes month over month, year over year, even with nonDRM files out there. Yes, people still pirate, but buyers still buy. DRM only hurts the legit customers.

Oh so true. If I see my favorite author's ebook DRM-infested, I'll head over to the darknet. I don't care how much it costs, I'm not here to rent. I'm here to own my books. I consider myself an e-booklover and have shifted away from pbooks and now read exclusively ebooks.

Shaggy
............What many people are saying is that the concept of creating something that is trivial for anybody to copy/distribute and trying to make a living off of artificially limiting the supply is doomed to failure. As with any other profession, you need to earn your living by either doing or producing something that people can't easily do themselves. That's what provides your product/service with value.

It's not that you're doing more work for the same profit, it's that the original item (the easily copied/distributed intellectual property) doesn't have much profit potential because there's little financial value in it. In order to make a profit, you need to do other things.

I really can't agree with that. The author is still needed in order to create the stories no matter what the medium. As long as their books are sold online as ebooks at a reasonable price in a non-infested e-format, pirates have better things to do - they're consumers, too - and EVERY ebook consumer will just buy the ebooks.

MaggieScratch
On the other side we have Cory Doctorow. I appreciate Cory's position on ebooks and DRM but at the same time, giving away free electronic versions of all your books as a loss-leader to get people to purchase the hard copy books essentially devalues the electronic edition. I don't think that's quite the right approach, either. Making electronic editions of books worthless certainly will put an end to piracy--technically--since you can't pirate what is yours to freely trade, but it's throwing the baby out with the bathwater IMO. Ebooks should be on a par with at least MMPBs, I think.

I agree. I first read a publisher, Rob Preece, I think who stated that the ebook should be OVERvalued because it had more benefits than the pbook and after being shocked for a while, i thought it over and I agree.

The ebook is a DIFFERENT animal from the pbook. The ebook is portable, content can be accessed IMMEDIATELY rather than weeks shipped to you online or you paying for cargas to the large bookstore or library 5 miles away, no storage is needed thereby saving you storage dollars, font size can be changed without needing printing of a "Large Print" edition, many books can be stored without having to carry a luggage -full (again portability), access from anywhere in the world by just finding a coffee internet cafe, ability to buy a deeply backlisted work from an obscure author so consumer choices has increased, reading content from a 1980 or earlier book in ebook form is easier rather than going thru an old, mangled, yellow-papered, stained, binding falling apart, pbook which you have to be careful with.

Obviously, you can't charge more for an ebook than its pbook version since you want to stimulate more ebook sales, but neither can you put it under lock and key at a price equivalent or only slightly discounted from the hardcover format.

So my take is this, ebooks should be correctly valued. If the hardcover edition is $30, then the ebook edition should NOT be free but it should not be ridiculously priced either at $30 or above and it should not be in an infested format in a "lock and key" method such as DRM or a proprietary format. This just opens up the avenue for pirates to come at it at a cost of FREE in an OPEN format where consumers can do ANYTHING ANYWHERE with their FREED ebooks. Instead, the ecost should be perhaps $15 or less in, again, a non-infested format with perhaps a mixture of ads supporting it. I'm willing to go for ads and I'm sure many consumers are since it brings a reduction in cost. This already happens with television, radio, newspapers, magazines, reading articles online, etc.


Shaggy
There is no such thing as DRM that can't be broken, there is no solution that will work. As a programmer, you should know this. Going down that path is a losing battle that just acts to delay the inevitable.

I agree, but again, if the price for ebooks is reasonable in a non-infested format, there would be no need for pirates to step in to fill that market.

tirsales
Can it be broken? Yes. Even when using hard cryptografic approaches (each device with a given security-chip and a book-encryption specific to that chip, etc). Will most people break it? No. Not if the deal is fair - e.g. reading the book on multiple readers in your family, etc

Agreed.

shaggy
The idea is that a significant part of the price for physical books today are for things that no longer exist with ebooks, but the music companies and book publishers are not wanting to change.

I think the publishers ARE changing, at least for some genres. I was looking for a few romance books online and EVERYONE of the books I was looking for was in ebook form and at a reasonable price. Publishers may be scared and that's why the ebooks are available online, but I consider that a good thing. With more people doing more things online and on their computers and laptops and other devices, it has to follow that the publishers must also move their e-wares online.

AnemicOak
Some publishers (Hatchette Book Groups Orbit line for example) are cutting a few bucks off of pbook list prices on their ebooks. For example Lilith Saintcrow's Dante Valentine series books are $6.99 list as MMPB's, but $4.99 list as ebooks. Jennifer Rardin's Jaz Parks books are $12.99 list as Trade PB's, but $8.99 list as ebooks. Some other publishers are starting to try lower list on ebooks too, it's a start if nothing else (it's the biggies like Penguin that are the most guilty on pricing issues).

I agree. Price matters. If I can get a price discount online for a pbook that's not closed/infested, then I'll buy the ebook. Let's say the pbook is $20 but the ebook is $12, then I'll buy the ebook, but if the ebook is at $15 or more, then i'll head over to the darknet.

So yes, I can get that ebook for free at the darknet, but if the price is reasonable and the format is, again, not closed/infested, then consumers will buy them. After all, I'm looking for quality as well as content. I trust the publisher to give me quality content. This proves a positive experience for me such that I will come back AGAIN AND AGAIN to the publisher's website or designated e-tail stores to buy more ebooks. The publisher wins, the author wins, and the consumer wins.

As the Congresscrooks say in their speeches, I would like to revise and expand my remarks in #47 above.

The "Economics Of Abundance" force a particularly difficult kind of competition on the creators of new designs. Since this a <legal> competition, I need to point it out for clarity.

The public domain!

When a design enters the public domain, it becomes a legal competitor for new designs. And it costs nothing. This provides a further drag to charging the cost of new designs. Why buy a new design when an old, free design will do just as well? Why buy a new version of a Beethoven Symphony (or Britney Spears) when I can copy an 1957 LP version of the Beethoven Symphony (legally in Great Britain) for free? Harry Harrison or Mark Twain? Generic vs. new drugs? Why pay for new?

This is prevented in the "Economics Of Scarcity" world due to the saving of economy of scale in manufacturing. But if this ever goes away, the 21 year old designs (patent is only 20 years, remember) will become serious competitors for new designs.

This will slow down progress as the years go by. This may be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on your viewpoint, but it is an <is> thing. I felt I needed to point this out. ( To quote Hemmingway, "You either do something new, or you're beating dead men at their own game". Not only that, but the dead men don't charge you either.)

But you do have more costs than most people think. The only cost you really don't have is the actual printing (which isn't as much as some people think, about 10-15% of the cover price). You still have all the traditional production costs, plus the distribution costs just like pbooks. What they need to do is get rid of the old style distribution model where wholesalers & retailers get 70% of the books cover price divided between them (yes, they even use this for ebooks)

Why though? What possible reason is there for a retailer/wholesaler getting paid the same amount for selling an ebook as they do a pbook? If you can't run an online store with much less overhead than a traditional brick and mortar store, then there's a big problem there.

I definitely agree that the distribution model needs to change. They should be able to greatly reduce that 70%, which will go a long way towards making ebook purchases more attractive compared to copying/sharing via other means.

I suspect that it's more a case of the contracts that publishers have with retailers are the same whether it's for a pbook or an ebook, and that profit margins on ebooks are a lot higher than the same priced pbooks. In other words, the distribution chain is being treated the same whether it's physical or digital. That seems to me like the biggest problem with the current pricing.

Re: David Pogue's comment: "Unfortunately, I've had terrible experiences releasing my books in electronic form. Twice in my career, 'blind' people e-mailed me, requesting a PDF of one of my books. Both times, I sent one over--and both times, it was all over the piracy sites within 48 hours, free for anyone to download.

I understand that J. K. Rowling's books were pirated and on the Internet the day after the print copy was released. I'm sure she didn't send any PDF's to blind people. :-) As Eric Flint pointed out, anyone with a copier can convert a book to an ebook. It seems to me she or any author would be better off also selling electronic versions. I think most people would pay for their e books. I want my favorite authors to keep writing--I know they won't do that for free!

I understand that J. K. Rowling's books were pirated and on the Internet the day after the print copy was released.

I thought some of them were on the internet before the printed copy was released. Or am I mis-remembering?

I agree though, not releasing an ebook won't stop people from sharing digital copies anyway. So even if a publisher/author wants to avoid the whole issue of having to come up with a new business model by ignoring the ebook market, people are still going to distribute ebook versions of their work.

I think most people would pay for their e books. I want my favorite authors to keep writing--I know they won't do that for free!

However, we regularly hear from people on these forums who seem to give the impression that it only takes a small transgression from an author to satisfy their justification to take their e-book from the darknet and not pay for it. "Have you seen him... with that stupid big nose? I'm taking Big Nose's book! Ha!"

It seems that everyone can come up with a justification to take what they want, if they know where they can get it for free... and digital files are too easy to get. I may disagree with Rowling's intention to not release Potter e-books, but I cannot blame her for expecting to lose a potentially large sum of money because of e-books. The claim that "a book taken from the darknet isn't a lost sale, because they wouldn't have bought it anyway" is one that the publishing industry has not yet accepted (and for the record, nor have I).

Now you are mixing up collectin and reading. It is trivially true that all downloading from darknet is not a lost sale. I have not seen any empirical experiments that supports a given percentage of lost sale. Have you?

I just bought two paperbooks that I had downloaded from somewhere and not read in the electornic version. Definitely not a lost sale.

It seems that everyone can come up with a justification to take what they want, if they know where they can get it for free...
The point is - not releasing e-books won't change anything to this. As we have seen, book available in the darknet, wether they are released as e-books or not - without differing quality or availability.
And people still buy those books - in p- and in e-form.

I repeat: Not releasing e-books won't change anything. Fair deals for e-books WILL get bought - give good service (e.g. fast downloads, a good shop-system accessible from everywhere, clearly arranged and up-to-date), fair prices, and NO DRM - DRM does not protect e-books but annoys your customers.

A little remark for your i-tunes comparison: Playing an MP3 on your PC and recording with your MP3-Player would actually be illegal in Germany, as is e.g. transforming one kind of drm-protected format into another.

and digital files are too easy to get. I may disagree with Rowling's intention to not release Potter e-books, but I cannot blame her for expecting to lose a potentially large sum of money because of e-books. The claim that "a book taken from the darknet isn't a lost sale, because they wouldn't have bought it anyway" is one that the publishing industry has not yet accepted (and for the record, nor have I).
Well - I guess a number of people won't buy books (or music, films, etc) because they can download them for free. But most people (and yes, there are studies proving this) use the darknet to "test" new books, music, etc - stuff they wouldn't have bought - and buy them if they are good. It is quite possible, that the darknet will kill libraries - but not the book-sales...

In J.K. Rowling's case, in many times it WOULD be a lost sale, because Potter nuts have already shown they are willing to buy her books over again in different formats. Many Potterheads I know have the books in hardback, paperback, British "adult" editions, audiobooks, etc. (I have them all in U.S. hardback--the first three replacements for previously purchased paperback editions.)

I would welcome the opportunity to purchase legal versions of her ebooks, if they were properly formatted, because there are places in the books where handwriting fonts, etc. are used and would probably have to be rendered by images. I would also love the inclusion of the wonderful Mary Grand Pré line drawings at the beginning of each chapter in the U.S. versions. I would still keep all my paper editions if I purchased ebook editions. A friend sent me bootleg ebooks of all the novels and they are OCRed and not proofread and generally a mess. I've never bothered to read them through.

Also, my understanding is that JKR doesn't prevent the release of electronic versions not so much because she fears piracy as because she just doesn't like ebooks. I read somewhere that she said she doesn't want to deny someone the opportunity to read the paper version of the book. My answer to that argument is: she isn't. She's just giving them a choice. :)

Since publishers can't choose not to have ebooks of their output made available, the real question they're answering is: do we want to profit from ebooks? I'm surprised at how many say no.

I suspect that there's a second set of lost sales that counterbalances the first - people who will not buy pbooks. In my case, because I don't want to encourage the wrong behaviour. Every time I say "well, it's not available in a sensible way so I guess I'll just kill a few trees" I'm paying someone to do the wrong thing.

The point is - not releasing e-books won't change anything to this. As we have seen, book available in the darknet, wether they are released as e-books or not - without differing quality or availability.
And people still buy those books - in p- and in e-form.

I repeat: Not releasing e-books won't change anything. Fair deals for e-books WILL get bought - give good service (e.g. fast downloads, a good shop-system accessible from everywhere, clearly arranged and up-to-date), fair prices, and NO DRM - DRM does not protect e-books but annoys your customers.
This can't be stressed often enough. There's been a huge community for digitalizing pbooks since the beginning of the internet. Unlike videos, ebooks are small and the equipment for digitalizing pbooks has been around for a long time.
Not releasing ebooks will never stop this unless nobody is interested in the book. Likewise, selling DRMed ebooks will never work either.

This completely ignores the fact that all current DRM schemes are insecure.

Well - I guess a number of people won't buy books (or music, films, etc) because they can download them for free. But most people (and yes, there are studies proving this) use the darknet to "test" new books, music, etc - stuff they wouldn't have bought - and buy them if they are good. It is quite possible, that the darknet will kill libraries - but not the book-sales...

A lot of times, there is no distinction made between people willing to pay and people unwilling to pay. The later should be ignored if countermeasures have any negative effect on the former group.
If someone wants me to buy a ebook, they should make the decision as easy as possible: free chapters, even free first book in a series (BAEN style), no DRM, multiple formats, good price.

People that are looking to buy a book will do so if the deal is right and they can be more or less sure they'll like the book. Focus on selling books.

Since there is a huge amount of books and the book shops don't offer sufficient sample chapters and the like, the darknet is the only alternative. Some people will buy subsequent books in a series or even buy the book they've read for free. However, this situation only exists because ebook sites are unwilling to provide the customer with sufficient info and proper formats.
People that wouldn't buy the books anyhow need to be ignored: they will never buy a book anyhow and are therefore not a lost sale. They are only noise. Perhaps some of them will start buying books but that is really irrelevant.

Fictionwise, amongst others, provide a sample chapter from their book lists.

Fictionwise, amongst others, provide a sample chapter from their book lists.

Yes but a single chapter or two isn't enough for almost all books.

Not releasing ebooks will never stop this unless nobody is interested in the book. Likewise, selling DRMed ebooks will never work either.

This completely ignores the fact that all current DRM schemes are insecure.

People that are looking to buy a book will do so if the deal is right and they can be more or less sure they'll like the book. Focus on selling books.

Actually, the last statement demonstrates why the first statement is inaccurate. If "the deal is right," people will buy DRM'd books. As for the second statement: DRM'd books don't have to be 100% secure, as long as the purchase process is not too upsetting to the public who wants the books, as iTunes illustrates.

Yes but a single chapter or two isn't enough for almost all books.

So you want to read a book, before you decide to buy it?

So you want to read a book, before you decide to buy it?

There's a lot of space between one chapter and the whole book.

For a book, the ending is absolutely necessary. Therefore, you could offer 2/3 (arbitrary ratio) of the ebook for free and charge the ebook price for the last third. Anyone who likes the book and therefore wants to finish reading it will buy the last third.
The customer has all the reading info he wants and the publisher/author gets paid. Negative effects would be:

Books that suck will be seen as thus before you buy them (good for the customer, though)
Digitizing pbooks will be reduced to 1/3 the work, though again, this is irrelevant (will be done anyhow; ebooks are insecure anyhow; focus on selling).


BAEN offers ~7 chapters for free for the webscription books (non-free ebooks).

On that basis,
you'll "see" how a car travels without its wheels, before you'll buy it?

The amount of a book that is up for preview is pretty arbitrary. You can know in one chapter how some novels are going to go. In other books, the first half of the book can be heading a completely different direction from the second half. And are any number of chapters going to clue you into the "surprise ending"?

Therefore, the first chapters are only effective to give the reader a feel for the style of the writing, and introduce them to some of the characters. For the rest, you need a "tease," a blurb or photo that act as the commercial for the book.

Hmm...

I could've sworn there was a topic around here somewhere...

I think you're right. Something about giving away some PDF's that got posted to the darknet, I think.......;)

I appologize for the long post.


Not releasing ebooks will never stop this unless nobody is interested in the book. Likewise, selling DRMed ebooks will never work either.
...
People that are looking to buy a book will do so if the deal is right and they can be more or less sure they'll like the book. Focus on selling books.

Actually, the last statement demonstrates why the first statement is inaccurate. If "the deal is right," people will buy DRM'd books. As for the second statement: DRM'd books don't have to be 100% secure, as long as the purchase process is not too upsetting to the public who wants the books, as iTunes illustrates.
No - it does not. DRM is no fair deal. When I buy a book, I want to read this book on whatever device I want. I do NOT want to even think about stuff like compatibility - I do this more than enough at work. I have little enough freetime as it is (and reading is fun - but still a hobby). I really dont want to throw any freetime away for issues like compatibility. And I want to be able to read this book in 5 years - but perhaps my Sony has died and I bought a new device, ntl I really dont want to rebuy every single book just because of this.
And no - breaking a DRM is not an option. I know how to do it, but I still try not to break any law.

So - no DRM'd deal could ever be even remotely fair. Not with music (neither my car-hifi nor my mp3-player play drm'd mp3) and certainly not with books.

DRM gives you NO security - none whatsoever. Thus it will only lead to people breaking DRM (because they want to read their books on their iLiad, after their Sony broke). Over the darknet books will continue to be available. There really is nothing you can do about this. And as there is no fair deal - people will continue to ignore drm'd ebooks and continue to download their books (or stick to p-books, thus loosing everyone money because p-books are more expensive to produce).

One remark to iTunes - it is not as successfull as you believe. And even Apple starts selling non-drmd music. They really wouldn't if there would be any point to DRM. And they would continue selling drm'd music even so knowing that it is insecure if it wouldnt piss customers off ... But it IS insecure and it DOES annoy customers - so they loose sales through DRM.

Publishers, license-holders, and a surprisingly large number of creatives (spured on by said license holders I guess) are just trying to stick to an old market like .. whatever. I guess there are three reasons:

1. Fear - they are afraid of loosing that golden calve. It was so easy to be molken for a very large number of years. They are afraid that the new market will be smaller than the old one. It is not - it is larger.
2. Ignorance - creating new business models is difficult, understanding new techniques is difficult, .. - creatives shouldn't have to wonder about those new techniques, it should be the part of the publishers.
3. Publishers are afraid of loosing money. Not because they would sell less books - but because creatives could arrogate higher profit margins (and with quite some reason).
4. (yes, I know I said three) Publishers like to sell books twice. Once as p-book and some years later (after the new technique has come - they cant change this) as e-book. It is quite possible, that they could sell their books thrice or more often - DRM-format 1, DRM-format 2, DRM-format 3, ...

One additional point should be a warning to creatives - publishers are trying to enforce the old business model to a new market. New business models would be more friendly to creatives - so why choose new business models? If the publishers continue to go this road, the following will happen:

a) Creatives will continue to get paid as lousy as they are now (and they are paid lousy, no matter what JK Rowling earns)
b) more and more people will drift from the legal market to the darknet (and in criminality) - thus you will loose money twice. Once from sticking to an old unfair business model, second from loosing sales.

The music industrie is (very, very slowing and only with much defense against it) starting to see some light - more and more music is sold via download portals, new business models (e.g. music flatrate) are evolving, and more and more people are crying for non-drm'd music. The book-industrie is screaming and kicking to stay in the dark ...

There is - in my opinion - really only one thing you can do: Start to embrace the new market and its chances. Start releasing eBooks - not just one or two, but EVERY SINGLE BOOK. Give fair deals - NO DRM, no arbitrary restrictions to specific devices or sellers (do you really believe that Amazon will continue to pay you as much as before, as soon as they have a real monopol? May I sell you some area on Mars? It has a nice view of the sun. I mean - they are enforcing lower prices for p-books and they have no monopol on them. Really try to imagine what would happen, if they had a monopol).
People will buy your e-books. You will not loose sales to the darknet - or at least not a single sale you wouldnt have thrice lost otherwise. It does not mean, that you should stop selling p-books (as long as they sell) - but e-books give you a new market. An example why? Nowadays you reduce your market to a certain geografical region. With e-books this wont happen. Via Internet I can buy your e-book from a server in Ohio, though I live in Germany. I wouldn't buy a p-book (had a look at the transportation fees).

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BTT: Yes. eBooks can overcome copyright concerns - there really aren't any real concerns. Some years ago people predicted, that not a single piece of software will get soled nowadays (because of the darknet). What has happened? Yes, the market has changed - this is just normal behaviour. Some companys managed to adapt (and are flourishing), others tried to enforce the old models (and are mostly bancrupt). But software still has its market - and it has grown.
The same will happen to books. The question is: Will you have a share of that market?
The old models cant just be taken over, new will have to be created. This does not mean, that you should give away your products for free - in fact, I believe that creatives could earn a higher profit margin with e-books than they could with p-books. It just means, that some things will change. But hey - it has happened before and it will continue to happen. Use your chances. There is a whole new market to be conquered. Try not to leave it to a single company - it wont be good for anyone.

DRM is no fair deal.

That doesn't matter. What matters is, if a consumer wants a DRM'd product, and the DRM does not upset them as much as not having the product, they buy the product. Examples: iTunes; Adobe; Kindle; Electricity; Gasoline. Example of DRM'd product that does not satisfy most users: Microsoft... witness the drive to Macs and Linux.

DRM gives you NO security - none whatsoever.

Again, doesn't matter, for the same reasons described above.

Thus it will only lead to people breaking DRM (because they want to read their books on their iLiad, after their Sony broke).

I expect this fact to lead to either all e-book creators switching to ePub (or an equivalent), and allowing owners to freely convert into whatever reader they have... OR for conversion SW to be available, legally or otherwise, and used regularly. The publishers can decide which they think will be a better solution...

That doesn't matter. What matters is, if a consumer wants a DRM'd product, and the DRM does not upset them as much as not having the product, they buy the product. Examples: iTunes; Adobe; Kindle; Electricity; Gasoline. Example of DRM'd product that does not satisfy most users: Microsoft... witness the drive to Macs and Linux.
That is correct so far - but with e-books (at least nowadays) DRM DOES upset customers - it restricts them to a single POS and a single device. And that will annoy customers.
Where is the difference to iTunes? The iPod is a very nice Player, with its sister products it fullfills every need. The Kindle e.g. does not. Neither does Sony or any other single device. So - you would have to decide for a subset of functionality, and noone likes to do that.
And btw: iTunes again is switching.


I expect this fact to lead to either all e-book creators switching to ePub (or an equivalent), and allowing owners to freely convert into whatever reader they have... OR for conversion SW to be available, legally or otherwise, and used regularly. The publishers can decide which they think will be a better solution...
Í agree.
ePub (or similar) would be the only solution giving a certain market share - if I already have to break a law why not get the book for free? After all a) I am already upset (no service, etc) and b) the punishment will be the same (at least under German law. And no, I am not kidding).

That is correct so far - but with e-books (at least nowadays) DRM DOES upset customers - it restricts them to a single POS and a single device. And that will annoy customers.
Where is the difference to iTunes? The iPod is a very nice Player, with its sister products it fullfills every need. The Kindle e.g. does not. Neither does Sony or any other single device. So - you would have to decide for a subset of functionality, and noone likes to do that.
And btw: iTunes again is switching.



Í agree.
ePub (or similar) would be the only solution giving a certain market share - if I already have to break a law why not get the book for free? After all a) I am already up