Quote:
Originally Posted by l_macd
That seems a bit extreme!
Obviously if there had been a way for publishers/sellers to restrict people from swapping, lending, giving away or reselling their paperbacks and hardbacks, they would have done so. They obviously want to maximise their income. E-books just means they now can do so.
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The thing that prevents publishers/sellers from restricting people from swapping or reselling their paperbacks is... the law. In Commonlaw jurisdictions, the first-sale doctrine allows the reselling of copyrighted works that have been previously purchased.
How the gov't is letting the e-publishers get away with violating this is beyond me. Instead of setting up DRM to prevent lending/selling/giving away, it would be much more in compliance with the doctrine if the DRM was set to ensure that if you did lend or sell your copy, you no longer had access to it - if the libraries can manage that, I don't see why the publishers cannot.