Amazon Kindle and Sony Reader Locked Up: Why Your Books Are No Longer Yours

[revmike]

Originally Posted by tompe
How does that work when you get a new number on your credit card? Do you still use your old invalid card for old books? If so there is no problem distributing the number.

You can go into your account and change the number to a new card. I had to do that when I was a victim of idenity theft a few years ago and had to cancel the card that the books I had purchased were linked.

[Xenophon]

Originally Posted by Kajti

Not a thing. DRM-free texts in open formats like HTML, bundling that makes unknown authors less of a risk to check out, more: Baen is doing stuff more right than anybody. But the books are out there, easily gotten, at vanishingly small risk on p2p and zero risk on usenet. The point of paying for an expensive reading device for me was that books then became free. Same with buying a divx-capable TV player, so I could watch shows I download, like jPod from Canada or Ashes to Ashes from the UK, or watch movies others have ripped and made available. And even if copyright fetishists use dark magic to shut down the internet, I've enough books on DVD that I could read a novel a day for decades to come with no problem....

I could plead that I live on a fixed income, or that I require a small fortune in meds every month to stay alive, but why bother? Files are available, so I avail myself of them. QED. If your morality says I'll burn in hell, I can live with that.

Sigh. Nope, my morality doesn't say you'll "burn in hell"... But you are clearly ignoring the externalities of your behavior. If content creators get paid, they can continue creating good content. If they don't get paid, they can't. Plain and simple.

Do you enjoy reading the content? If so, I believe that you have a moral obligation to support the producers of that content (in a reasonable fashion, to a reasonable degree). In the case of Baen, they actually have a procedure getting reduced-price or even free copies of their stuff. Certainly they're eager to have you download anything they've put out on one of their various "free-in-the-book" CDs -- no cost, no obligation. And that's not "piracy" either (what a bogusly mis-named and mis-used term -- yuck!). If these are the free things you've been downloading, good on ya'.

For the other content, if you have a legitimate case for free or reduced prices, you can get it that way. Visit www.readassist.org for details. Go that route and you're squeaky-clean legal, and totally moral too.

If either of the above two cases hold, please ignore the final paragraph...

If, on the other hand, you don't have such a case, shame on you! I don't think you'll burn in hell, but I DO think you've laid yourself open to the well-deserved scorn of the wider community. If this is the case, I would say that "Kajti is a cheap-a^$%^%* *&^%*&^%% #@)(*^&!!!!" and would encourage all and sundry to join in on the public shaming, -ing, and -ing.

Xenophon

P.S. I tend to be rather more flexible about "unavailable-ware" and "abandon-ware." The stuff from Baen is neither. They're the best of the good-guys in this picture; support them so that others will follow!

[sebastien]

So in order to make sure that a small fraction of the population can make a living as artist, we will ask ISP, law maker, police, the whole judiciary system and the train company from a few threads up, to spend millions of dollars in technologies and staff (with pension mind you) to make sure that the content created by a few is not illegally copied and to collect a few extra cent that the artist will probably never see in the end...

I'm sorry, but the energy/money invested in this would not justified the result. World hunger would be higher on my list of social problem to address.

If the current creative business model does not work with the introduction of new technology, then Darwinism to them.

I would love to quit my job and be a captain in the Caribbean in the winter and be an 'ébéniste' in the summer. But I wouldn't be able to pay my bills and raise my kids the way I want (ok, the way wife wife want). So until the day I can afford to give myself up to my dream, I work as a sysadmin. That's my reality, and probably a good lot of other repressed creator on this forum and around the world.

So before we spent all our effort on putting DRM, tracking device, and other magical technologies, which btw would not solve the issue at hand since most pirated book are OCRed, why not spend our effort on this forum in finding a new business model that would make sure that the writer/artist can still make a decent living out of their art and continue to benefit society as a whole?

[nekokami]

I'm not going to sink to name-calling (even with asterisks), and I don't even believe in hell, but I will say that I think the attitude Kajti displays is a) atypical, b) immature and c) morally indefensible. I don't personally have a problem with people downloading things they've paid for in another format, or things that are out of circulation in any authorized format, but this is beyond the pale. If an author's stuff is worth reading, it's worth paying for, unless that author chooses to give their work away. The author gets nothing from the sale of the ebook reader. You might as well say "I paid for an expensive lighting system in my house so I can read at night-- I don't want to have to pay for books, too!"

Happily, I think most people outgrow this attitude after a while. Perhaps after they start having bills of their own to pay and need to seek regular employment. That's why I don't think we need DRM or traffic monitoring -- I think this extreme attitude is rare.

That being said, we may be headed for advertising in books if I'm wrong and this attitude becomes widespread.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by nekokami

if an author's stuff is worth reading, it's worth paying for, unless that author chooses to give their work away.

I do not think that is trivially true or true att all. I read a news paper at my work and it is worth reading but it is not worth it for me to pay for it.

[Xenophon]

Originally Posted by sebastien

So in order to make sure that a small fraction of the population can make a living as artist, we will ask ISP, law maker, police, the whole judiciary system and the train company from a few threads up, to spend millions of dollars in technologies and staff (with pension mind you) to make sure that the content created by a few is not illegally copied and to collect a few extra cent that the artist will probably never see in the end...

SNIP

So before we spent all our effort on putting DRM, tracking device, and other magical technologies, which btw would not solve the issue at hand since most pirated book are OCRed, why not spend our effort on this forum in finding a new business model that would make sure that the writer/artist can still make a decent living out of their art and continue to benefit society as a whole?

Not sure who you are responding to here, sebastien. My goal in my previous post is to use public social pressure to reinforce one of the few business models that is working (so far) at producing ebooks for us to read. I really believe that social pressure works well enough, if we actually apply it.

Nekokami: I usually don't sink to name calling either, but really... Baen has bent over backwards to make it easy to get their stuff without "stealing" or copyright violation. What other publisher have you heard of who will offer a reduced price to the less-well-advantaged? Quite aside from free e-copies of the Grantville Gazettes and JBU electronic magazines for any library or school. And the free CDs. And...

Also, please note, the name calling and disapproval are conditional. Kajti might be downloading entirely legally (see the free CDs, etc.), in which case no complaint. It's only in the "not the free stuff" case that I would think public disapproval is in order.

Kajti: So which is it? The legitimately free stuff? Or the non-free stuff? Have you earned my harsh words, or were you just careless in your description?

Xenophon

[Xenophon]

Originally Posted by tompe

I do not think that is trivially true or true att all. I read a news paper at my work and it is worth reading but it is not worth it for me to pay for it.

Ah, but someone paid for it. That's no different than loaning a book out is.

Xenophon

[Alisa]

Originally Posted by nekokami

That being said, we may be headed for advertising in books if I'm wrong and this attitude becomes widespread.

I really hope not. Sadly, I do think this attitude is widespread. Even though I'm in my 30s, most of my friends seem to steal way more music and video than they buy and it's my understanding that the generations younger than me are even worse. We'll see if ebooks go down the same path. The market isn't big enough and they say it's mostly us old folk that are reading.

I still think DRM-free is the way to go, though. I just want uploaders to be thunked with a big stick. Punish criminals, not consumers.

[Taylor514ce]

The advertising model is worthy of consideration. It's how this forum operates. Everyone who posts is a content author, the site publishes that content, and makes money by running ads. Forum members are not paid, per se, but we're both content authors and content consumers, so there is an implicit quid pro quo.

There are extremes, to be sure. I refuse to participate in any site that uses Vibrant Media's IntelliTXT, for example, since it goes beyond advertising and actually turns my words into ads, for products and/or services I don't necessarily endorse. It's ad intrusiveness to the utmost degree. I also Adblock Google's ads, because I cannot stand Google (if you want an example of rampant, unpunished piracy, look no further).

But the normal banner ads I leave intact and occasionally click-through. They don't interfere with the content or operation of the site and allow it to function and presumably even make money for the site owners.

I think advertiser and/or sponsor supported ebook publication could actually be done right and is certainly more appealing to me than DRM.

[kovidgoyal]

@Taylor51ce

You can actually make money of your posts in mobileread directly, if you have a google adsense channel (I've actually made $50 in the last year )

[nekokami]

Originally Posted by tompe

I do not think that is trivially true or true att all. I read a news paper at my work and it is worth reading but it is not worth it for me to pay for it.

Newspapers are paid for principally by advertising. Subscription fees cover delivery costs only.

[Taylor514ce]

Originally Posted by Taylor514ce

I also Adblock Google's ads, because I cannot stand Google (if you want an example of rampant, unpunished piracy, look no further).

Sorry - I wouldn't touch a dime from Google. In fact, the way I see it, they already owe me for the complete contents of my various web sites that they've taken, without my permission, and stored on their servers. They then serve up portions of my site (even allowing their users to see complete pages without visiting my site), and monetize my content to drive their own advertising engine. I never gave them permission, never received payment, and don't see a dime of the advertising revenue driven by my content.

Google's operations strike a very interesting counterpoint to the main conversation here, which is who owns and controls content. According to Google, if you can take it and monetize it, all in the guise of "adding value", then it's free for the taking, the rights and intentions of the author be damned.

And yes, they're doing it to copyrighted books, too.

With Google leading the way, it's no wonder the internet has bred a culture of piracy.

P.S. Do I get any special Karma points for quoting myself?

P.P.S. Taylor514ce. It's a make/model of guitar.

[kovidgoyal]

As a content creator, I agree, monetized search engines are evil. It's absolutely ridiculous the amount of money Google makes for being a glorified card index.

But not being as principled as you (or poorer than you), I still take money from them

[bwaldron]

Originally Posted by Taylor514ce

I think advertiser and/or sponsor supported ebook publication could actually be done right and is certainly more appealing to me than DRM.

Wowio is doing that now, although unfortunately currently only for U.S. residents and only in PDF.

[nekokami]

I remember trying to find things online before Google, using Archie, Fetch, etc. I'm not so sure they haven't earned what they make. One can exclude one's content from Google Search, after all. More people seem to be trying to draw added Google attention to their content than the other way around, it seems to me. And indexing and searching content has costs, and involves work. Arguing that Google shouldn't get paid if they help someone find your content seems a lot like arguing against paying book publishers for the work they do. But perhaps there are issues here I'm not aware of... I'm always willing to learn something new.