[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by bhartman36

But there were other outfits using DRM-free MP3s for years before iTunes. And Amazon was the first to sell DRM-free music from all major labels. At the time they did this, Apple was still selling DRM'd music.

This is true. But it is true because the publishers were concerned about Apple's power and so permitted Amazon to sell DRM'd music and did not permit Apple to do the same thing. It's not the case of Amazon deciding it was going to sell DRM'd music and Apple deciding it would rather not. And Apple was only permitted to sell DRM'd music if it abandoned its 99c-only pricing model and charged $1.29 for more popular music.

But AAC isn't the standard (as in mainstream, not technical standard) that MP3 is. You can't necessarily take your AAC files and use them on another device as easily.

No, it isn't as popular as mp3s, although it is fairly widespread. But it is a standard that anyone can use, and it was adopted because it had better sound quality at lower bitrates. I.e., music recorded at 128kbps in AAC sounded better than music recorded at the same bitrate in mp3. (This seemed significant at the time when the iPod only had 5G of space; but small hard drives ended up dropping so much in price (4-5 years later, iPods had 120-160 G of space) that people ripped mp3s at higher bitrates where the difference between it and mp3s was much less.)

Apple decided to use aac in 2001; it's not like there were really any other stores out there. And of course any store can sell music in aac format; it's not proprietary to Apple. And iTunes has a function to convert aac to mp3, which is trivial in any case.

And being tied to software puts limitations on functionality if you're using a non-iDevice. Back a few years ago, when Palm still existed, there was a major kerfluffle because Palm engineered the Palm Pre to be able to sync to iTunes, and Apple cried foul.

This is true, although it didn't prevent you from putting music from iTunes on the Palm Pre.

If I can put a book I bought from iTunes on any device, why in the world would I want to pay iPad mini or iPad prices to read an e-book?

I don't think that's the right question. The right question is why in the world would you buy a book in iTunes if you didn't already have an iPad? I don't think *anyone* buys an iBook who doesn't already have an iPad.

I don't think that anyone would pay iPad mini prices just to read an e-book, nor do I think that many people buy iPads (even iPad minis) primarily for that reason. They aren't really marketed as e-book readers, and of course they do a lot more. (I'm also skeptical that many people who did buy the mini as a book reader would use iBooks over Kindle or another e-pub format.)

Because of course you can read any format on the iPad with the right app, just as with any other tablet. I don't read much on my large iPad, but all of my Amazon books are there, waiting.

I don't think e-books are a major draw for the 9" iPad (although I do know people who read on one), but the iPad mini is a different story. The iPad mini is more closely designed to compete with e-readers such as the Kindle, Kindle Fire, and Nook. In fact, the major draw of the iPad mini is the reading form factor, as far as I can tell. For almost anything else, you're better off with a full-sized iPad, since the price difference isn't gigantic.

I think the major draw is just compactness, generally; I think this is true of other non-bookseller branded tablets like the nexus as well. If you read non-book focused tech sites, people never talk about reading on their tablet. It's always about apps and video.

The difference is that Amazon has software for almost every platform: PC, Mac, iOS, Android, Windows 8, etc. Amazon literally doesn't care what hardware you read on, as long as you're reading an Amazon book.

Yes, this is true, and very smart on Amazon's part. Amazon is also primarily in the bookselling business and doesn't make much money on its devices.

I think DRM-free e-books would have the biggest impact on Amazon's hardware division. If non-Kindle users could buy any e-book from Amazon, I think the e-Ink reader market would become a lot more diverse than it currently is. That would be an interesting thing to see.

I would like for Amazon to have DRM-free books, but I think it would lead to less diversity in the e-book hardware market. Companies that sell books and make devices (such as Amazon and B&N; I don't know about Kobo) are able to charge a low price for their devices because they are subsidized by their e-books. If more people are buying from Amazon - and fewer from B&N (or whoever), B&N (or whoever) will be less able to match Amazon's device prices.

Agreed. I think the publishers are crapping themselves in fear at the thought. When you look at what's happened to the music industry since DRM-free music, it's enough to give one pause. Of course, there's a major difference between the two: The music industry has singles. Books don't (generally) work that way, so you don't have an analogous situation to the music industry, where a consumer can buy one song and leave the album on the virtual shelf. (It should be noted, though, that that's not an impossible model for the publishers to adapt, in some cases. I sell individual stories out of my anthology, and major publishers could decide to break up their anthologies that way, if they thought it would make them money.)