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#61 | ||
Liseuse Lover
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As for Amazon, just wait until first time the Amazon DRM servers go down and refuse to authenticate your reader. Remember the outcry when the same happened to the MobiPocket DRM servers? People who accept DRM that needs to talk to a third-party server are insane. By my utopian standards, of course. And regarding "exclusive" (are you really saying that being able to buy some books only on the Kindle is a good thing? Vendor lock-in sound like fun to you?), as far as I know their content is also available in other legal formats like mobi (easily cracked and done habitually on this forum and elsewhere in the interest of format-shifting) or on the p2p networks. As long as there are alternatives available, the whole system might chug along for a while. It is when there are no other alternatives available that hacking DRM becomes an interesting proposition, and it is when there are no other alternatives available that consumers lose big time. Last edited by acidzebra; 09-15-2008 at 04:06 AM. |
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#62 | |
Guru
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Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: The Third World
Device: iLiad + PRS-505 + Kindle 3
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They're far worse than actual thieves. In analogy, the one who break copyright laws is not a "thief", the latter being far worse. No space for discussion in it. At least in my country, where the code of laws give a clear definition of "thief". ![]() About the "right to set a value": imagine that one day baby sitters start to lobby with the same power of oil companies. Suddenly laws and bills are promulgated to forbid granmas to sit children, and to grant the BabySitter's Association a monopoly. So they set a 1000$/hour price for their work. Do they have that right? I'm not sure. In another case, Mercedes Benz sets a very high price for its cars, and lot of people pay for it, without any enforcement, and without any special law. And every car producer in the world is using Mr Benz's ideas... Why does this happen? It's because every "copy" of a Mercedes SLK has an intrinsic value, and nobody can actually "copy" it without effort and cost. So, Mercedes are sold "per-copy" and it actually works. It has worked - even not without flaws - for artistic content also, as long the hardcopies had intrinsic value and added value. But now, digital copies of art (or entertainment) have no intrinsic value (the real value is in the original content, not in the copy itself), and have less added value than illegal competitors. To stick to a per-copy model, having the brute force of law as the only mean to compete and to grant "fair compensation" will just lead to a "war" between publishers and general public. And authors will be crushed in between. The sooner a new and better model will be proposed and accepted the better for everyone. |
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#63 | |
Enthusiast
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Location: UK
Device: LBook V3
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DRM - just say no, in every possible way. Regards Fake |
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#64 | ||
Guru
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Location: The Third World
Device: iLiad + PRS-505 + Kindle 3
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If I buy one single copy of your book and I install it on my iLiad AND on my wife's cybook, is she a thief? If I learn it by heart and I repeat it to 50 of my relatives, am I stealing? If I read it 12 times, am I taking something from you? You don't have to stop people from taking your books! You have to be paid for your work. After you're paid, the more people take the book, the better for them and for you. You can get more money from paper, from audio cassettes, from movie theaters. But nor from every single copy of a file. That's unfair. Unless you actually go at reader's home and copy that file typing it in a word processor.... Quote:
Is it possible? Yes. Will it stop piracy? No, it will reduce it at a small fraction of what it is now. Will publishers increase their income? Definitely not. Will authors be billionaires? Not at all. The last two points are where the system will fail in the real world. Authors and Publisher actually prefer to point a gun at the customers head rather than reduce their income to a fair amount. ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
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#65 | |
Guru
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Location: The Third World
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Put at the END of the book a set of buttons linked to a payment system, querying "how much this book is worth for you" with a 0$/5$/8$/10$/15$ option, and wait. I can bet on the total amount over 100 copies.... ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
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#66 | |
Guru
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IMHO Steve deserves to be paid (not too much) just for the work he put in that novel, even if you don't read it. And, after that, he deserves to be paid more (not too much, and in any case not infinite) for his next work if the previous one was a success. Like any other working man in the world, Steve deserves to be paid, and he deserves raises if his work is good enough. ![]() ![]() ![]() |
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#67 | |
fruminous edugeek
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Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: Northeast US
Device: iPad, eBw 1150
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Alternatively, let's suppose "the government" provides a grant to an author for books completed that are "worthy." First, who gets to decide which books get paid for, and which don't? Second, the largest government we really have is at the country level, but electronic distribution is worldwide. Do we need a world government (and taxation) to make this work? These are not rhetorical questions. I disagree with you that people will be willing to pay for ebooks, because I think they will effectively pay for the service value of being able to find the ebook they want, in the format they want, quickly, easily, and with minimal risk (e.g. malware). But if you really think paying authors for work completed is the best way to go, I'd like to hear your ideas of where you expect that money to come from, and how a fair system of determining the "value" of the book--and the author's payment-- would work. |
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#68 |
Grand Sorcerer
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Okay, my only comment: Who said anything about "infinite"? And what's with the "not too much" $#!+?
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#69 | |
fruminous edugeek
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But that's just my interpretation. ![]() |
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#70 |
eReader
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Device: Note 5; PW3; Nook HD+; ChuWi Hi12; iPad
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Format C: it just so happens that I've written 3 novels myself, and only been paid for one of them. Are you suggesting that I send you a bill for the other two?
![]() I wasn't necessarily meaning the pay per copy method-- though I wasn't ruling it out either. Anything from a subscription based method through patronage would work too. I was however working on the principle that given that the audience gains the most benefit from a creator's work, they are the ones who should bear the burden of supporting the creator. Steve you made an interesting point about DRM when you said the key was to get people to accept it and refuse to cooperate with those who break it. Once that happens you no longer need DRM. The key is always in the mind of the user. That's why the best system is one that gives people an incentive to pay which generally means getting rid of DRM. Look at the Spore fiasco for a good view of most people's opinion of DRM. DRM works best when it gets in the way the least. For everything except vendor lock-in you get more benefits from building a relationship with your customers so they don't want to rip you off than from DRM. |
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#71 | |
Grand Sorcerer
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But that's just my interpretation. I'm not sure when this discussion about a possible DRM system turned into a "Steve Jordan doesn't deserve to make a living, 'cos he's such a jerk," but I'm all for accepting that some people around here just think I'm a jerk, and go back to the DRM discussion. So: There are always going to be people who want to take what other people have, and not pay for it. And very often, the way they get it is by taking it from legitimate customers. That's why you would continue to need DRM, until you reached the point that the amount of loss from violators is not considered significant enough to bother. |
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#72 |
Liseuse Lover
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...because DRM has been such a smashing success up till now and has stopped pirates dead in their tracks without bothering legitimate customers, right?
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#73 |
Grand Sorcerer
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#74 |
fruminous edugeek
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Well, but the thing is, Steve, many of us do feel that DRM is more of a hindrance to legitimate customers than it is to pirates, and that the hoped for advantages are grossly outweighed by the disadvantages. Even those of us who do think that authors should be remunerated for every copy of their book that a customer actually reads (or downloads, or whatever the author has specified as the criterion) can reasonably disagree that DRM is a good way of guaranteeing that. I don't think if someone posts that they think DRM is disadvantageous, or even that they think that authors should be paid a flat rate per book rather than a royalty, that it is necessarily a personal attack on you.
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#75 |
eReader
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Actually, I don't know if we're going to reach the point where the loss from violators is not enough to bother or the point where the loss due to DRM is too great to ignore first.
DRM costs money to implement, which means it reduces profitability and leads to increased prices. This reduces sales in two ways: some people refuse to buy because of the DRM, others refuse to buy because the price is too high. There is also at least anecdotal evidence that the presence of DRM actually promotes piracy with people choosing to pirate games rather than buy them purely because of DRM. Right now the biggest challenge facing PC game makers is to turn players into customers. Anyone can find an illegal copy to download of almost any game in a matter of minutes, regardless of DRM, so it's not preventing piracy. The only thing that really works is getting people to want to pay for things rather than pirate them; and the first step toward that is making them feel that the creator is not the enemy. The presence of DRM makes the statement that the creator/publisher considers you part of their out-group not their in-group. That means they are setting up an adversarial (one might even say enemy) relationship. One of the basic fundamentals of human socialization is that it's okay to cheat the enemy. This is why it's so important to make people want to pay, because it will reduce (nothing can eliminate it) piracy and render DRM irrelevant. |
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