Quote:
Originally Posted by martys5150
This may be a silly idea but why doesnt a company create a program that reformats a file while keeping the DRM valid? This way the customers can reformat to there preferred format while the publishers keep the DRM valid.
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Different ebook formats use different types of DRM. The DRM is established at the server end of things--it puts a code into the file that your computer (or ereader, or whatever) has to be authorized to read.
Adobe can't put Mobipocket's code-sequence into their ebooks; they don't have access to Mobi's DRM servers. (And won't, unless they pay for it. DRM isn't cheap.) So Sony can't give you a way to convert their Adobe Digital Editions epubs to Mobi PRC files that could be read on a different ebook reader.
A lot of DRM has less to do with preventing copying/piracy than with forcing you to continue to use their software, buy from their store, use their hardware to read ebooks, because it's too much hassle to convert them to a different format. B&N has no interest in telling you which of their books are eReader and which are ePub, because they only want you to read them on their software, which will display both. They don't want you buying B&N ebooks for your Sony; they want you to have to buy a Nook.
Aside from greed, there's substantial coding problems in allowing the format to be changed without removing DRM. That's technically impossible--instead, you have "create a new ebook with different DRM registered to the same person."
And anything that lets you remove the DRM lets you have a freely-sharable version of the ebook. Even if the program is supposed to immediately apply another form of DRM, that could be circumvented with creative coding.