What is your dream e-device?

[Kris777]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It's not as if there are multiple sources for eBooks. Generally, a book is only available from a specific publisher, so for the honest person (and I'm ignoring people willing to download illegal material in this) there is no choice other than to download in whatever formats the publisher makes available - or buy the paper book, of course.

Yes, it means that publishers dictate the rules... they want get the same profit or even bigger (no printing paper expenses) for each eBook copy that they have from paper books.

[delphidb96]

Originally Posted by Kris777

I think that DRM-free ePub will be unexeptable for many big publishers because they can't distribute new books to end users and make profit on it in case if it has no DRM.

Which is complete bullshit. Baen has no problem distributing *non*-DRM-laden ebooks to their customers. But then, Baen has a tendency of showing the stupidity of the rest of the publishing industry.

Derek

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by Kris777

I think that DRM-free ePub will be unexeptable for many big publishers because they can't distribute new books to end users and make profit on it in case if it has no DRM.

This is a perception and not reality. If you follow the digital music industry you will see that most publishers now allow DRM free music files to be sold. Also, I think this is starting to happen with audio books also.

BOb

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by Kris777

What publishers will do if nobody will buy DRMed books?

There is no way that this would happen... most people find out about DRM after it bites them... not before they buy something.

However, I assume is NO ONE bought DRM ebooks... that ebooks would no longer be sold assuming that the market is a failure.

BOb

[Kris777]

Originally Posted by delphidb96

Which is complete bullshit. Baen has no problem distributing *non*-DRM-laden ebooks to their customers. But then, Baen has a tendency of showing the stupidity of the rest of the publishing industry.

Derek

It is not bullshit for publishers who trying to have the same profit from eBooks that they have from paper books.
Users can't buy new bestsellers on http://www.baen.com/ unfortunately
but these DRMed ebooks available on http://www.mobipocket.com or http://www.fictionwise.com/ websites...

[Kris777]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

There is no way that this would happen... most people find out about DRM after it bites them... not before they buy something.

However, I assume is NO ONE bought DRM ebooks... that ebooks would no longer be sold assuming that the market is a failure.

BOb

If publishers will have no profit from eBooks they will stop make it. For examples In Europe no DRM law yet and European publishers don't produce eBooks by this reason.

[shighfield]

What I think most publishers forget is that DRM free books that are illegal would still be harder to find!

Think about it... if I can just go to fictionwise and buy the book I want DRM free why would I bother to hunt around for a "pirate" copy?

I have purchased well over 200 books from FW in the Ereader format, and while I do need to break the law to read them on a device of my choice, if more were DRM free I could just convert to IMP and carry on.

[delphidb96]

Originally Posted by Kris777

It is not bullshit for publishers who trying to have the same profit from eBooks that they have from paper books.
Users can't buy new bestsellers on http://www.baen.com/ unfortunately
but these DRMed ebooks available on http://www.mobipocket.com or http://www.fictionwise.com/ websites...

Hunh?!? Try *again*! Just about *every* newly released hc and mmpb offered by Baen is offered *also* (same month of release) as an ebook through Webscriptions.

So if BAEN can do this, there is absolutely NO reason other publishers can't. And you're talking to a person who buys both dead-tree *and* ebook versions of the BAEN releases. Heck, on books from authors I *really* like, I've been known to buy the (tripled-price) Advanced Reader Copy (ARC) versions *before* the release of the dead-tree, and then turn around and buy both the dead-tree and ebook versions. Plenty of other BAEN customers do the same.

Given that this can and does work for BAEN, I seriously doubt it cannot be made to work for other publishers.

Derek

[Jadon]

If you let me get really dreamy, I want the device in Amy Thomson's The Color of Distance, which was essentially a blob of smart clay. You could stretch the blob out to make a huge screen, or compress it to a size convenient to pocket. It could handle audio and full-motion color video, it could communicate with other devices and servers, and to charge it you just flattened it out and let it sit in the sunlight.

If you confine me to the mundane realm, I'll take a Pixel Qi reader, which promises to be inexpensive, color- and video-capable, pretty good battery life, capable of self-lighting, sunlight-readable, and of decent size. I don't need weeks-long battery life, since I'm never away from power for that long; if a unit lasts 15-20 hours, it's fine. Self-lighting trumps e-ink with me. I'd like it capable of handling multiple formats and loading wirelessly, but I'm used to converting files and loading by USB cable, so I could live with that. And portability isn't much use to me, since I rarely get out, so a large screen that could easily display A4-sized PDFs would be useful, if the unit weren't too heavy.

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by Kris777

What publishers will do if nobody will buy DRMed books?

Kill eBooks and continue to sell paper books. It is us that want eBooks, not them.

Dale

[montsnmags]

Originally Posted by Jadon

If you let me get really dreamy
...

Oh, please do, Jadon. DRM's insidious pervasion into topicality on so many threads really does my head in sometimes, and for me it's nice to see this thread get back to a more inventive and individual presentation of personal desire.

Cheers,
Marc

[Xenophon]

Originally Posted by Kris777

It is not bullshit for publishers who trying to have the same profit from eBooks that they have from paper books.
Users can't buy new bestsellers on http://www.baen.com/ unfortunately
but these DRMed ebooks available on http://www.mobipocket.com or http://www.fictionwise.com/ websites...

Except, of course, when one of that month's books from Baen happens to be a bestseller. Which happens several times a year. New books from Weber, Flint, Bujold, and sometimes Ringo routinely make the bestseller lists. So, actually, readers can buy new best sellers from Baen.

It's just that Baen and WebScriptions aren't a general bookstore. They're a publisher and it's main web outlet. With deals with a number of other small publishers (like Subterranean and Night Shade Books). And a deal with Tor coming Real Soon Now (or so rumor has it). You're right, however, that they don't carry the entire NYT bestseller list (as B&N and Amazon do in paper and Amazon and Sony attempt to do in bits).

Xenophon

[Kris777]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

Kill eBooks and continue to sell paper books. It is us that want eBooks, not them.

Dale

I agree 100%. It was a rhetorical question.

[Kris777]

Originally Posted by Xenophon

Except, of course, when one of that month's books from Baen happens to be a bestseller. Which happens several times a year. New books from Weber, Flint, Bujold, and sometimes Ringo routinely make the bestseller lists. So, actually, readers can buy new best sellers from Baen.

It's just that Baen and WebScriptions aren't a general bookstore. They're a publisher and it's main web outlet. With deals with a number of other small publishers (like Subterranean and Night Shade Books). And a deal with Tor coming Real Soon Now (or so rumor has it). You're right, however, that they don't carry the entire NYT bestseller list (as B&N and Amazon do in paper and Amazon and Sony attempt to do in bits).

Xenophon

Ok, very simple question: What Baen will do if you purchase one most popular book for $5 from them and post it as a free download on this forum and after it 1000 visitors will dowload it for free? Can we say that they will loose some money on it or not?

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by Kris777

Ok, very simple question: What Baen will do if you purchase one most popular book for $5 from them and post it as a free download on this forum and after it 1000 visitors will dowload it for free? Can we say that they will loose some money on it or not?

My understanding is that the Baen CD's which are fairly easily found on the internet due to them being "freely" shareable do contain many of the books that you would need to buy at Bean's bookstore.

I assume they will send a cease and desist letter to this website to take the book down.

As far as will they loose or gain sales... there is no way to know. Unless you can split the universe in two at the point where it happens and follow the two outcomes and report back. But, we know this is only possible in Science Fiction.

BOb