Why are DRM ebooks evil and why should I avoid them like the plague?

[Greg Anos]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Whatever, dude. You have no statistical evidence whatsover that going without DRM would NOT result in lost sales through large scale casual sharing. Given the example of the music industry, there is every reason to believe that it WOULD result in a collapse in revenue. Based on those facts, for the publishing industry to go without DRM would be a leap of faith- a leap of faith based on the digerati's unsupported belief that "this won't the hurt the publishing industry-honest injun. And did you know that DRM is really annoying? "
I find the digerati's willingness to gamble the livelihood of authors and publishers on an unsupported theory just because it 's inconvenient to them quite callous and self centered, to be honest.
But then that's me . Apparently the digerati are quite willing to gamble on the livelihood of others.

How many times have you had your job outsource and/or offshored...without a look back by the decision makers?

You seem to think the publishers and authors aren't subject to the winds of creative destruction, unlike the rest of us in the OEDC...

I freely admit I don't have any numbers in DRM vs lost sales, particularly in the world of "best sellers". Neither do you. All I have is comments by several genre authors (particularly Eric Flint, who publicly gave out his numbers both p-book and e-book), which didn't show any drop in sales over time without DRM as compared to a title or two with DRM. But that's anecdotal, I agree. But you don't have anything but an opinion, backed by nothing more that other opinions of like-minded people. No numbers, no anecdotal evidence, no nothing. You mat get away with such sloppy thinking in your profession circle, but not here. We've been mulling this question on this site for at least 5 years.

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Whatever, dude. You have no statistical evidence whatsover that going without DRM would NOT result in lost sales through large scale casual sharing. Given the example of the music industry, there is every reason to believe that it WOULD result in a collapse in revenue. Based on those facts, for the publishing industry to go without DRM would be a leap of faith- a leap of faith based on the digerati's unsupported belief that "this won't the hurt the publishing industry-honest injun. And did you know that DRM is really annoying? "
I find the digerati's willingness to gamble the livelihood of authors and publishers on an unsupported theory just because it 's inconvenient to them quite callous and self centered, to be honest.
But then that's me . Apparently the digerati are quite willing to gamble on the livelihood of others.

Bolding mine.

Given what example of the music industry? There's clear evidence that piracy increased with the ready availability of digital copies - but digital sales and revenue ROSE when DRM was abandoned.

That example says removing DRM = increased sales.

Also, any analysis of the fall off in music industry revenue has to include both the shift from selling primarily albums for $10-15 each to primarily singles for $0.99 each - and the fact that consumers who had bought the same content two, three, and even four times (vinyl, 8-Track, cassette, CD) essentially revolted and refused to buy that same content yet again in digital format.

Yes, the music industry has suffered a massive drop in revenue over the last decade - but there's absolutely no evidence to support the idea that any of that drop was a result of their shift from various DRM formats to DRM-free MP3s.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by stonetools

I might add that the exact same argument can be made for copyright. Copyright does nothing for the customer, except limit their right to commercially exploit the book they bought. Indirectly, though it benefits the customers by prompting authors and publishers to produce work for sale that otherwise would not have been produced.

Okay, indirectly, how does DRM benefit me? It creates a huge pool of works I can't access without allowing third-party software with complex and possibly unenforceable EULAs on my computer--is this to my benefit?

I'm not sure how DRM directly benefits anyone except the people who sell it.

Soothing author and publisher paranoia is not a benefit. Allowing them to think that flawed technology is protecting them is not helping anyone except the stores that get customer lock-in out of it; allowing them to think that evasion of that tech is costing them income is not helping anyone except the people who promise they have new, better DRM tech.

[stonetools]

I freely admit I don't have any numbers in DRM vs lost sales, particularly in the world of "best sellers". Neither do you.

That's the point of course. You are asking authors and publishers to take a leap of faith based on NO CONCLUSIVE EVIDENCE. If you are asking authors and publishers to take such a leap, you don't need a pretty theory-you need CLEAR AND CONVINCING EVIDENCE .To urge such a step is immoral really,because you are toying with the livelihoods of authors and publishers based on what-theory? Based on the fact that it's inconvenient to a minority of users ?
Well, I am not convinced.
Going back to the OP, I would say that he should not be concerned with DRM, simply because in most cases, DRM would not affect him at all . He should simply focus on buying good books , enjoying his Kindle , and following my suggestions to work around whatever limitations the Kindle might place on casual sharing. That's my final answer. Have a good night.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by stonetools

(Shrug)

Apparently somebody discovered a logic website. Mind you don't hurt yourself.

Ad hominem argument.

[GA Russell]

Originally Posted by Lemurion

Also, any analysis of the fall off in music industry revenue has to include both the shift from selling primarily albums for $10-15 each to primarily singles for $0.99 each - and the fact that consumers who had bought the same content two, three, and even four times (vinyl, 8-Track, cassette, CD) essentially revolted and refused to buy that same content yet again in digital format.

We've discussed this a lot at a jazz forum I'm a member of called organissimo.org.

I think the music industry's biggest problem is that they make music mostly for kids, and the kids are now spending most of their money on video games.

Others think that the problem is that they are making records nobody wants to listen to!

[Worldwalker]

Originally Posted by stonetools

If you are asking authors and publishers to take such a leap, you don't need a pretty theory-you need CLEAR AND CONVINCING EVIDENCE .

What is the CLEAR AND CONVINCING EVIDENCE that the way they're going about it right now is effective?

Oh. You don't have any.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Whatever, dude. You have no statistical evidence whatsover that going without DRM would NOT result in lost sales through large scale casual sharing.

Sure we do: the existence of several thriving ebook publishers who don't use DRM. If removing DRM causes large-scale casual sharing to such an extent that it costs sales, why is Baen still in business? Samhain? BooksforaBuck? O'Reilly? Why did Harlequin, not known for its lack of market understanding, open Carina Press?

You keep saying that dropping DRM will cause large-scale casual sharing--why hasn't it, for those companies that don't use DRM?

Note that "distribute without DRM" is not the same as "give up copyright protection." Posting an ebook publicly on Facebook is still illegal.

I find the digerati's willingness to gamble the livelihood of authors and publishers on an unsupported theory just because it 's inconvenient to them quite callous and self centered, to be honest.
But then that's me . Apparently the digerati are quite willing to gamble on the livelihood of others.

What gambling? I don't buy DRM. Authors have the choice of selling me something in a format I might buy, or not doing so. I'm not demanding they take risks they think aren't safe--I'm telling them: DRM means lost sales. If they think no-DRM also means lost sales, they'll have to figure out which means more lost sales.

In the meantime, I've got no shortage of ebooks to read.

[Barty]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Er, no? I don't have a Kindle and I read Amazon books on both my Ipad and my smartphone. The whole "DRM is bad because if your device dies, you'll lose access to your library forever" argument is really kind of obsolete these days. In 2007 it had some force: now, not so much. I'm sure people will continue to make it, though.
A lot of people here do say that DRM is intrinsically evil. Where do you think the OP got that language? At least one person has said that he hates DRM so much that he opposes ebook library lending (which needs DRM.)

I don't think it's evil. However, you do realize kindle will work on iPad until amazon and apple decide to have a spat over subscription fee?

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by Caltsar

I don't think DRM is completely evil in itself, but the current implementations are pretty horrible... with ADE being the closest to sane DRM you can get (support by multiple manufactures built in being a major plus).

I find ADE the worst of all, personally. It requires a server, somewhere in the world, to be turned on, so you can "activate" your device and actually read your book. The one FW had was the best, I think. Just use a key. Your book is scrambled with that key, and you can unscramble it, on your device, without any internet connection at all.

Originally Posted by GeoffC

DRM doesn't, currently , bother me - though it's been a long while since I bought any books that were so infected.

My original reader is going strong.

DRM doesn't currently bother me, and I bought my latest DRM-infested books last week. And I can read those books on all my devices. (Kindle, Sony, WinCE, Windows)

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

So explain to me, why does DRM "please the customer"? What advantage does it offer to the customer? How does it improve the current and future experience of the customer?

These are fair questions to ask....

Sadly, some writers demand DRM. Even though it's a fake protection. If it makes a difference in whether they'll publish electronically (with DRM) or not at all, I'd say the DRM does help the customer.

I really think we will see the end of DRM. Once the ebook has gained so much momentum that you'd be crazy if you didn't publish electronically. That's the time when you can make demands, as customer, because you have power (again). You already can see it happening. There are a lot of English authors (writing in English, I mean), that don't have DRM on their books. But in the US, electronic reading is slowly moving up. Here, in the Netherlands, where electronic reading (in Dutch) is just over a year old (at least, they started selling seriously in september 2009) and the collection is still rather small. The amount without DRM can still be almost counted on one hand... Most publishers here still won't believe that the ebook will be the mass market paperback of the future...

[EowynCarter]

Originally Posted by stonetools

The real problem is that everyone here is always full of good intentions . They focus on the inconveniences (real and imagined) of DRM.

I bought some books, and because of a false step with ADE, i had to repay them again. Support would not help, so the only way to get the books was to buy them again. It's more than inconvenience, it's a total rip-off.

While music sold online had DRM, i bought the CD, and got the DRM free mp3 from it.
To bad, for books, it's too much work to turn pbook into ebook...

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by stonetools

I'm going to look into this, but I 'm betting that Amazon either offered a refund or offered to let the customer download the books again in the new format on proof of payment.
Stay tuned.

You can have fun looking into Adobe's withdrawal of Content Server 3 as well. In this case, they did offer a migration path to Content Server 4 (i.e. Adobe Digital Editions), but only if you noticed and did the manual migration for each individual DRMed PDF you owned in a nine-month window between the announcement and the switch-off of the DRM server.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by stonetools

Given the example of the music industry, there is every reason to believe that it WOULD result in a collapse in revenue.

Once again, you are mixing up two separate things. I have pulled you up on this several times before, so I can only think that this is deliberate obfuscation on your part.

To the extent that the Music Industry has lost revenue, it's due to the mere existence of the ability to create digital copies of music.

The available evidence is that digital music sales are not affected by the presence or absence of DRM.

As we went into extensively elsewhere, where I provided detailed figures backing my claims.

[GreenMonkey]

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

I find ADE the worst of all, personally. It requires a server, somewhere in the world, to be turned on, so you can "activate" your device and actually read your book. The one FW had was the best, I think. Just use a key. Your book is scrambled with that key, and you can unscramble it, on your device, without any internet connection at all.

That's how I feel. I hate, HATE DRM that requires a call home to some remote server. The main reason I've basically stopped buying PC games - they're all moving to this style of DRM.

At least with B&N's DRM, if you have your credit card number and name, you can basically access the book. Much less dependency on someone else's network, server, and tech support that way.

That said....I almost never buy DRM'd ebooks.

I warn my wife all of the time not to buy DRM'd anything...I know we had an itunes DRM nightmare years ago due to the DRM'd music. I redownloaded most of it after begging Apple tech support via email exchanges...be she lost some stuff that was no longer available. We had the files but there was no way to get them accessible...would not authenticate remotely...some sort of DRM bug.

I've warned her that anything DRM'd is basically a rental...she could lose it at any time. It happens to people all of the time.

I really don't think digital downloads are replacing anything...even CD sales. Only with the young who have yet to be burned by a company's DRM, I guess. Kids are being taught by companies in this new era...they seem to be willing to not be the owners of anything, but willing to accept this "you own a restricted license". I fear for the future as I see the younger generation being re-educated away from the idea of ownership of property...

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by GreenMonkey

....

At least with B&N's DRM, if you have your credit card number and name, you can basically access the book. Much less dependency on someone else's network, server, and tech support that way.
......

but they just moved to adobe ADE DRM.