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Alright.
I'm not going to descend to the level of slinging slurs and insults as some obviously have.
But for those that seem so convinced that B&N is some big evil monster destroying ebooks, here's the reality of it.
Barnes and Noble chose to adopt Adobe ePub solution for their conversion from ereader format.
As part of that process, Adobe executives decided they liked B&N's "social protection" built in to the existing ereader DRM scheme. So much so that they agreed to license it from B&N to incorporate it in to their ePub DRM, creating two authentication options; the pre-existing one and the username/password combination licensed from B&N.
Adobe could have required B&N to use only the existing authentication option at the time B&N decided to support the ePub standard as Adobe has backed it. It would've meant no lending options of course, so Adobe didn't insist on it.
The reality as it stands now is you have the exact same ePub standard, only with two authentication options (not DRM).
The newest one is supported by Adobe's newest version of the RMSDK as Adobe has publicly stated several times.
Any device manufacturer that has paid Adobe's licensing fee will be able to update his device (and quite possibly may be required to do so by Adobe's licensing terms).
As well, Adobe's already said that ADE support for the new "social" option is coming with the next release of ADE sometime in 2010.
In short, the reality of the situation as it stands is far from the fear and doubt being peddled by certain posters with their "B&N/nook is destroying ebooks" claims.
In fact, I'd take it a step further and tentatively say that such claims and accusations very well could be defamatory and (depending on the state) could reach the levels of libel per se.
Caution and circumspection would be well-advised all around.
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