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Originally Posted by omk3
The question is, what about all those people who live in non english-speaking countries, but want to read books in english?
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Uh, dude. Amazon has sold English books internationally for what, a year now? Which means you can read them on a Kindle, a PC/Mac, iPhone, iPad or Android smartphone.
Not sure exactly what Apple and B&N are up to, but it's probably just a matter of time.
Quote:
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Originally Posted by omk3
Frankly I'm fed up with all these artificial restrictions in a supposedly global world. What's the use of the internet anyway?
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Yeah, well. Try traveling to another country without a passport, and let me know how that works out for you.
I hate to break this to you, but your desire to purchase an item, however much that copy of
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo may ennoble you, does not allow you to abolish decades of contracts, requirements to pay specific national taxes, or to ignore a variety of laws. You may believe that restrictions are "artificial," but the fact is that the UK has VAT and the US does not; and an author may have a very different contract with one publisher in one country and a different contract with a different publisher in another country.
Fortunately, the system is slowly starting to accommodate a variety of international ebook issues. However, making sure that the authors and taxes get paid, and that everything is done in accordance with a dizzying variety of local laws, does not happen overnight.