Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
Don't forget that ADE is proprietary software too.
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True, Harry, but there is a difference. Amazon's books have at least 2 layers of proprietary software -- the basic format and the DRM -- so even if one were dropped the other would remain. This is compounded by Amazon's unwillingness to broadly license its proprietary software.
OTOH, ADE is but one level of proprietary software and it could be dropped without rippling the marketplace because the underlying format is not proprietary and is universally available. Every ebooktailer (at least of the major ones) other than Amazon uses it. In addition, ADE is available to anyone who wants to use it.
The fact that ADE is proprietary is somewhat meaningless under the circumstances but that Amazon's 2 layers are does have meaning.