Thread: Re: Renting Ebooks
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Old 08-21-2007, 03:36 PM   #5
Nate the great
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I changed my mind. I do want a discussion.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Liviu_5 View Post
The technical term is licensing. That is true for all e-content, drm-ed or not by law. The difference is that for non-drm books if you are careful to back up in an open format and migrate, you license them in perpetuity. You still cannot resell them but that's ok with me.

For drm'ed books you just license them for a while. I also have 2 or 3 drm'ed pdf's from the time I did not know what an ebook or drm are, and while I could redownload them when I changed pc's, it's possible I cannot open them anymore with Adobe 8 and I think redownload is not an option anymore.

Similarly I have an embiid book that I migrated when I changed pc's but next time I change pc is very likely I won't be able to.

However I extracted the content at some expense of time and effort (not breaking the drm incidentally, just snag and ocr) and I could not care less...

For the 3 Sony books I got with my credit, I expect that they will be available for a while but when I have the time I will extract their content too, so I will not be at the mercy of Sony...Connect may close tomorrow after all if Sony decides it's more trouble than worth.
You are slightly wrong on the issue of license.

In this discussion, let's set aside copyright, and focus only on the topic of licensing. A software license is an agreement between the seller and the buyer. I'm sure everyone here is familiar with EULAs, correct? Well, what you may not know is that EULAs are not enforcible in most states in the USA because they fall into the category of "contract of adhesion". This is a type of contract without any negotiation that one party is forced to accept; that's why they are not enforcible.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Liviu_5 View Post
The technical term is licensing. That is true for all e-content, drm-ed or not by law.
I believe this is incorrect. I have checked VA state code, and I cannot find a part that says when I buy e-content, I am buying a license to use the e-content, not the e-content itself. If I am wrong, please cite the applicable law.
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