Just to be clear, I'm not mindlessly supporting publishers or authors since I do believe that consumers should have some rights. But I do try to look at their side, whether I agree with it or not. Sometimes I disagree with them wholeheartedly for the games they play. Yet sometimes I look at the changes and can see how they are going to have trouble coping. After all, what's wrong with producing an inexpensive and a premium edition? And what's wrong with expecting revenues as products deteriorate? A MMPB will only survive so many reads after all. Libraries can only lend them so many times. They can only be resold so many times. You can improve their longevity through gentle care and mending, but they won't last forever. Files, however, can be copied endlessly through the 'magical' certainty of the digital world and error detecting codes. And that is assuming that everyone is honest, that noone pirates.

I also wouldn't be so quick to dismiss publishers. Publishers aren't printers. They offer a lot of services to authors, ranging from editing to distribution to marketing. They also offer a lot of services to readers, ranging from filtering out the crap to getting books to the places that you can buy them from to letting you know that the books exist in the first place. The other extreme is self-publishing. Yet how many authors want to self-publish (hint, few do)? How many of us regularly purchase self-published books (hint, few do)? It may seem like publishers overvalue themselves, but the fact remains that they are the sole reason why many authors can make a living.

There are many things that I don't like about the DRM/piracy/middleman debate, but most of it comes down to the extremes. Piracy is not theft. Piracy isn't standing up for consumer rights or cutting out the middle man either. It is not a black and white issue.