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Originally Posted by John F
Putting on my rose colored glasses for a possible way to eliminate Overdrive (and rearrange the quote from eschwartz for relative points) ...
Although a hurdle, it seems as coming up with an alternative lending DRM scheme doesn't seem insurmountable.
The scheme itself should be trivial, it doesn't have to be good, since most people don't know about DRM and don't care.
As for the software, start a kickstarter or some open project, endowment, ... or get government funding. Eink implementation may be a problem, but Android and IOS apps should be doable.
I'm not sure it would need to be "extremely expensive".
If the publishers/distributors don't want to provide the ebooks, have Congress pass a law that allows libraries (and their agents) to strip DRM and a law that allows libraries to lend ebooks; a library could than purchase the ebooks from Amazon, Kobo, ...
It all seems very doable to me... if we want it.
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True, it can be and has been done.
But that takes a lot of time, effort, and money. There is a reason the service industry exists -- because without it, everything would be harder, less eficient, more expensive, etc...
I believe the libraries that have done it, band together in the attempt, and it is usually provoked by the comparative expense of OverDrive (and other miscellaneous contract terms) -- not fear of privacy.
You can likely save a lot of money
in the long run by investing in a cooperative in-house system NOW -- and that is what they are gambling on.
And still most libraries consider it more expedient to outsource the work to OverDrive.
Quote:
Originally Posted by fjtorres
Note, too, that as part of their infrastructure contract operation, Overdrive lets libraries upload and distribute ebooks they own and can legally lend out:
http://the-digital-reader.com/2016/0...ebook-catalog/
...like the ebooks from Joe Konrath's Ebooks are Forever library ebook sales business...
Or public domain ebooks from Gutenberg and elsewhere. |
I was not aware of that.
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Sounds like the concern is more that, since Overdrive is so much more competent than its wannabe rivals, it might at some distant point in the future turn eee-vile... Not that they are actually doing anything terribly bad now but that someday they might.
Some people lose sleep over things like that, I hear.
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That's what I thought too.