[OtterBooks]

The level of time commitment to consume the product combined with the fairly low cost of alternatives suggests to me that someone who targets a specific book for download is much more likely to be willing to pay for it otherwise.

After getting my Kindle I discovered ebooks were torrented. I wasn't surprised; I just never really thought about it. I was well acquainted with torrents in my college days, so I'm no saint and certainly not one to judge. But even then, when I really wanted a movie or album I preferred the retail copy for my collection. Sits on a shelf, looks nice, whatever.

Ah, but there I sat with a new e-ink toy and was curious. In moments I had windows open showing two products utterly identical in even the most superficial ways, sans DRM. One was $7, which is well worth the time I spend reading a novel I enjoy, paper or not. Literally the only difference was I could click one button and spend $7, or click the other and spend $0; both delivered to me in seconds. It almost made that $7 seem like a donation to corporate charity. I didn't want to add to my lovely collection of text files to put on Shuffle; I wanted to read that book. It's of little use to me otherwise. I spent $4 on a used trade paperback instead (still easing into the transition), my age-inspired ethics intact.

That said, I don't think publishers see organized torrent sites as the real problem, against which DRM is ineffective. IMO they're worried about copying and trading between friends and so forth who otherwise are not the 'pirate' type (Grandma sending copies to her book discussion club, etc), and I think DRM does have a significant impact on that. However I can only guess.