Quote:
Originally Posted by Over
With digital pictures, the only real problem was the digital camera's price (but only at the beggining, and even so, there were much more expensive conventional cameras too) and the photo quality. Both things common sense says will be solved in time. There was a bonus: digital pictures = 0$ cost.
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Actually, it was your final point that was the real issue for camera sellers. With film or digital, you were still buying a cheap or expensive camera. But with digital, the existing film production and processing industry had no viable future... digital would potentially ruin an entire infrastructure (and its profits), and many camera makers (who had a vested interest in that infrastructure) tried to defend its imminent downsizing or demise.
This is essentially the same symbiotic relationship enjoyed by the literature and printing industries, and the angst involved with potentially ruining or removing one half of this partnership is the chief reason for the resistance to e-books.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Over
To read a pBook, you don't have to buy a device.
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That's true. On the other hand, you don't necessarily need to buy a dedicated reader to buy an e-book... and most of us in the industrialized world already have at least one device that can read e-books... a computer, a PDA, a cellphone.
"Buying a device" is, in a way, similar to the photo industry's attempt to keep digital camera users tied to paper prints: It's a way to continue to generate income for them, but it is not a necessary part of the process anymore... it is entirely optional. Because of this, the dedicated device market will probably remain a niche, though it can be a healthy one.
Note that I am hesitant to directly address the subject of the thread, in light of past history... as always, I do not support DRM as it is used by the print industry today, but I also believe that DRM
in some form is not necessarily evil and world-destroying... it just needs the proper design and implementation to be effective...