Quote:
Originally Posted by Psykhe
The point is that there is not an universal "DRM" like there is an universal "2". Their nature/efficiency can vary wildly, it can go from the "putting object in a cardbox" from "putting object in a nuclear-bomb-proof-safe".
If you handle it like there all are the same you get fallacies like "A DRM can be cracked at the same day as a product with it is release, therefore all DRMs can be cracked in that time.".
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DRM as it is commonly-understood presents no deterrent to the pirates. They either get the product before it is protected or they use any of a 100 methods to remove it after acquisition and then distribute. I did another thread here on this subject which got too detail-oriented for some so I let it go but the upshot is that for anything that is worth anything (in actual value, not money) it is going to be pirated and fast. Are some new books going to be slower than others to make it to the pirate scene ("darknet" as people here refer to it)? Sure but that is less of an issue than it is for games/movies. Put it this way: if you were to be (say) stranded on a deserted island and you had to make a choice of what to read for the rest of your life, which would it be:
A. All free books ever written (say public doman/creative commons) or
B. Every single book ever printed before 2007?
Note: For the purposes of this analogy, since you are on a deserted island with no hope of rescue, there is no danger of the police coming after you for your booty of purloined books).
That is what the situation is like out there and it will be each persons character, not DRM that halts the spread of books. DRM as a whole is easier to remove than most things of that nature for a lot of technical reasons I would be glad to discuss offline but at the end of the day, what DRM has done to me is antagonize me, the very person they need to "do the right thing". It hasn't stopped anything. I bought one book in a series and went through hell (8 hours of fiddling with stuff) just trying to get it viewable ("authorized") on my poor wifes ereader. Never again. For the next volume in the series, it took 60 seconds to find a good copy on the net, 15 seconds to convert it to our favorite format and drop it onto her reader where it works fine.
So I ask you: has DRM worked in this case or has it caused damage?