People who want no DRM are impractical dreamers...

[stonetools]

Or so says the KindleReviewer here:
http://ireaderreview.com/2011/03/16/...y-10/#comments

I know there are a whole lot of people here who regard DRM as the spawn of Satan, but he does make forceful arguments. Money quote:

Again, we look at our 10% who have an overbearing sense of entitlement.

Their argument will be – We only want to pay for books after we know they are good. They will read 10 books and find only 1 that’s good enough to pay for.

They will find other arguments -

Just me, one single reader, not paying won’t make a difference.
Authors should be doing it for the art of it.
eBooks cost nothing – the incremental cost of producing the file that I read is zero.
Information wants to be free.
Most of the money goes to people who don’t deserve it anyways. All the author is losing is 5% of what I would have paid.
It’s very easy to find a rationalization to justify bad behavior if that behavior benefits you. You remove DRM and you make it really easy for the Naughty 10% to steal.

You also send a message to everyone else – While you good customers/readers are the ones paying for books, we are doing things for the freeloaders. We are rewarding them for stealing books by making it even easier to steal books.

HE also opposes unrestricted lending of books. He says both these impractical proposals are based on an unrealistic "perfect world full of perfect reader" scenarios. How right is he?

[Barty]

I'm okay with DRM because, for now at least, publishers would not release ebooks without it. They already seem to wish the whole e-thing didn't exist as it is.

Of course I strip DRM from any book that I buy.

Hypocritical? Yes. But failing love, hypocrisy makes the world go round.

[taustin]

He's completely full of crap, as the apologists always are. I won't buy books with DRM that I can't strip off, because we have already had DRM crippled stuff that became utterly useless when the seller closed up shop (yeah, Microsoft, I'm looking at you).

He is especially full of crap when ebooks cost as much, or very nearly as much, as paper books. If the price is substantially lower, I might considet renting it, but they're not, generally speaking.

And history tells us that he's full of crap, too. Online music sales took off more and more as DRM became less and less common. Book sellers like Baen that do not cripple their products with DRM do very, very well, and have a very loyal customer base. As opposed to the regular outrages against sellers like Amazon, who delete things remotely at the request of the publisher, or Apple, who are more of a cult than a business.

I'll buy used books, or stop reading, before I spend money on DRM crippled books that I can't fix so that I can back them up.

[taustin]

Originally Posted by Barty

I'm okay with DRM because, for now at least, publishers would not release ebooks without it. .

That just isn't true. Many of the big publishers, yes, but some have done so for years, with great commercial success.

[Hatgirl]

*sigh* But DRM doesn't impede this "10% who have an overbearing sense of entitlement", as he puts it They just strip the DRM.

eBook users can be divided into two categories - the Technically Proficient user and Technically Uninterested user (aka the My Mum user). DRM does not affect the technically proficient user. The "good" technically proficient users may choose not to strip DRM, but basically everyone who uses this board is capable of it. And when DRM screws up our systems, we can, with the help of the other marvelous people on this board, whack it with the proverbial hammer until it starts working again. But the My Mum category.... when the DRM monster eats their ebook, or they buy an ebook from Barnes & Noble and can't get it to work on their Sony Reader, or they can't remember what password they used when they set up their account "I think it was PASSWORD..." they don't roll up their sleeves and poke about the darknet for python scripts, they just feel cheated, shove the eReader in a drawer and pick up a paper book at the supermarket.

DRM does prevent casual sharing among Technically Uninterested users. But it doesn't prevent sharing among "evil" Technically Proficient Users and irritates both categories of users.

I don't campaign against DRM because I want to have access to every book for free for ever and a kitten too. I campaign against DRM for the rest of humanity, the ones who have no interest in cracking open their epub file and tweaking the css. I campaign against DRM for the people who just want to read the damn book that they paid for.

[Lemurion]

Since books that have never seen electronic release are readily available on the darknet, as are books released with or without DRM, it's fairly clear that DRM really does nothing to deter the so-called "Naughty 10%."

That's where his argument falls completely apart: He's saying "we need DRM because of this, this, and this..." But since it has no effect on any of those factors his entire argument is specious.

[stonetools]

*sigh* But DRM doesn't impede this "10% who have an overbearing sense of entitlement", as he puts it They just strip the DRM.

Againsty that, KR approved of the following comment:

There’s a saying among locksmiths that the average consumer lock is “good enough to keep an honest man out.” I.e., it’s not so easy to crack that an average person would be tempted to do it. Without that lock there’d be many more break-ins. Ditto for DRM.

IOW, with no DRM, many more honest users would be tempted to steal and would steal e books. You should understand that mobile read forum users are a tiny percentage of ebook users, so you can't generalize from them. DRM does stop the vast majority of casual ebook readers from just stealing ebooks.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by stonetools

DRM does stop the vast majority of casual ebook readers from just stealing ebooks.

It also stops them frm being able to move to a different device. It causes problem in cases where you change computers or just the system hard drive.

For example, my current computer as a different PID for Mobipocket then the previous computer. Paperback Digital and CyberRead both sold Mobipocket eBooks and both are out of business. If I was unable to strip the DRM, all of my purchases from either shop would be a total loss.

DRM gets in the way and can very easily cause people to lose what they have spent their money on.

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by stonetools

IOW, with no DRM, many more honest users would be tempted to steal and would steal e books. You should understand that mobile read forum users are a tiny percentage of ebook users, so you can't generalize from them. DRM does stop the vast majority of casual ebook readers from just stealing ebooks.

People who would steal if it wasn't for locks aren't honest. Honest users do what's right regardless of circumstance.

As for the casual ebook user, they generally only notice DRM when it gets in their way because they've run out of activations or the server's down or something. Many of them may not even know if it's there or not, so it certainly doesn't dissuade them from "stealing."

[JSWolf]

I have had trouble one night downloading library eBooks. If I didn't know about DRM and whatnot, I'd have been on the phone calling the library the next day asking what to do.

[Hatgirl]

Originally Posted by stonetools

IOW, with no DRM, many more honest users would be tempted to steal and would steal e books. You should understand that mobile read forum users are a tiny percentage of ebook users, so you can't generalize from them. DRM does stop the vast majority of casual ebook readers from just stealing ebooks.

Did you actually read the rest of my post? The entire premise of my argument is that MobileRead ≠ All eReader Users.

I shall condense it into one sentence for you: While DRM does prevent casual sharing among non-tech people, that lack of technical know-how means that the bizarre problems DRM can cause are very difficult for them to solve, thus resulting in them rejecting ebooks as a concept.

[MartinC]

The piracy argument is just for soundbites.

The real reason we do need DRM at the moment is because there has to be a rate of exchange for the market to work. Paper books were easy because they were physical objects and not may people carry photocopiers in their pockets. With an unprotected ebook you don't know whether you're selling to one reader or a thousand.

It's the concept of the market that has to change. Digital stuff isn't going to go away. But in the meantime, while we're working it out, DRM provides some temporary functionality.

[JSWolf]

People who know where to look will go and look for free eBooks. The people who serve up the eBooks know how to strip DRM or where to get them pre-stripped.

The people who do not know how to strip DRM or will serve them up are the ones being hurt by DRM.

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by stonetools

DRM does stop the vast majority of casual ebook readers from just stealing ebooks.

If by "stealing" you mean download an unauthorised copy, I can't see how it would stop anyone. None of the unauthorised copies you can download have any DRM.

The real purpose of DRM is to tie consumers to one particular hardware device and to make it inconvenient to switch to another (competing) device. The idea is that once you get a customer you will never lose them because the only way for them to switch to a competitor is to throw away all their software purchases.

Apple and Microsoft tried the same idea with mp3 but there was already too many competing manufacturers before they launched for it to work. Ebook reader manufacturers and ebook vendors don't really have that problem.

[JSWolf]

Music lost DRM because it was just too easy to buy the CD and rip it to a DRM free electronic version.