My main concern is avoiding DRM and proprietary book stores - Page 4

Sirtel · 12-30-2019, 02:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Part of his post says that he uses Google to find and download eBooks for his Reader. That to me raises red flags that he's pirating eBooks.

Well, even if he is pirating (and I'm not saying he is), someone had to remove the DRM from the pirated book in the first place. And that someone probably did it with Calibre and Alf's plugins. So it's very hypocritical to pirate ebooks and say Calibre is a nuisance at the same time.

BookCat · 12-30-2019, 03:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Part of his post says that he uses Google to find and download eBooks for his Reader. That to me raises red flags that he's pirating eBooks.

Yes, I did pick up on that.

JSWolf · 12-30-2019, 03:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Well, even if he is pirating (and I'm not saying he is), someone had to remove the DRM from the pirated book in the first place. And that someone probably did it with Calibre and Alf's plugins. So it's very hypocritical to pirate ebooks and say Calibre is a nuisance at the same time.

Well said!

mobama · 12-31-2019, 08:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Reading a Kindle eBook online does get you tracked by Amazon. I thought you didn't want to be tracked.

I never bought Kindle eBooks, so I geuss I was never tracked. Not by them, at least.

Everything you write is completely inapplicable to me. This thread is not about me in the first place. The way I see it, every thread is about the first poster in the thread.

JSWolf · 12-31-2019, 08:28 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mobama

I never bought Kindle eBooks, so I geuss I was never tracked. Not by them, at least.

Everything you write is completely inapplicable to me. This thread is not about me in the first place. The way I see it, every thread is about the first poster in the thread.

I replied to what you wrote. You said conflicting things. Can you please clarify?

mobama · 12-31-2019, 08:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I replied to what you wrote. You said conflicting things. Can you please clarify?

Sure, as soon as you point out the conflicting things. The way your post is now, I cannot make head or tails of it.

I am against overly warm recommendations of Calibre. You claim it solves problems, specifically problems you think I have with my ereading habits. Well, I used to have an urge once upon a time to convert some pdf files to html or hopefully epub, and I heard Calibre was awesome at it. I tried it and it failed just like every other tool. There's no way to convert a pdf safely without arduous post-processing. So I have learned to live without converting pdf files. I just read them.

Calibre may come handy when removing DRM, but I seriously do not see any point at converting files. And I never needed to remove DRm, so I am living a happy life without Calibre.

Anything conflicting in this?

Deskisamess · 12-31-2019, 09:28 AM

Quote:

Calibre may come handy when removing DRM, but I seriously do not see any point at converting files.

Many of use get books from various sources. I use e-ink Kindles for most of my reading. Books in ePub format can't be read on an e-ink Kindle, so the format must be converted. You generally can't do that without first removing the DRM.

I also like being able to back up all of my books, so I don't have to depend on internet access to download a book. I do happily use the Amazon system 95% of the time. But if something happens, and I can't access Amazon, my books are all stored on my desktop AIO.

JSWolf · 12-31-2019, 09:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mobama

Sure, as soon as you point out the conflicting things. The way your post is now, I cannot make head or tails of it.

I am against overly warm recommendations of Calibre. You claim it solves problems, specifically problems you think I have with my ereading habits. Well, I used to have an urge once upon a time to convert some pdf files to html or hopefully epub, and I heard Calibre was awesome at it. I tried it and it failed just like every other tool. There's no way to convert a pdf safely without arduous post-processing. So I have learned to live without converting pdf files. I just read them.

Whoever said that Calibre was awesome at converting PDF was just so very wrong. It's good at other conversions but nothing is good at converting PDF.

[quote]Calibre may come handy when removing DRM, but I seriously do not see any point at converting files. And I never needed to remove DRm, so I am living a happy life without Calibre.[/uote]

Calibre comes in very handy for managing eBooks. It makes doing so very easy. And then when you want to plug in your Reader to the computer to copy eBooks to it, Calibre is again very handy.

BookCat · 12-31-2019, 11:30 AM

Personally, I love the way I can add 'blurb' to the beginning of books using Calibre, and change the cover if I don't like it. Also, Calibre enables me to convert to a format which will use custom fonts.

And I'm one of those odd people who enjoys doing this. Yes, Calibre is fun to play with, to see all my books on, and to roll around that carousel which is my library. Whoever said Calibre wasn't fun? They must've been getting too technical with it.

Sirtel · 12-31-2019, 12:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mobama

Sure, as soon as you point out the conflicting things. The way your post is now, I cannot make head or tails of it.

I am against overly warm recommendations of Calibre. You claim it solves problems, specifically problems you think I have with my ereading habits. Well, I used to have an urge once upon a time to convert some pdf files to html or hopefully epub, and I heard Calibre was awesome at it. I tried it and it failed just like every other tool. There's no way to convert a pdf safely without arduous post-processing. So I have learned to live without converting pdf files. I just read them.

Calibre may come handy when removing DRM, but I seriously do not see any point at converting files. And I never needed to remove DRm, so I am living a happy life without Calibre.

Anything conflicting in this?

Obviously your reading habits differ from the majority here, if most of your reading material is in pdf format and you never read any ebooks from major publishers. I guess Calibre is not necessary for you, but it's necessary for anyone who buys from Kobo, Google, Amazon etc and wants to back up their purchases, even if they never convert them. Most people do read books from the big publishers, even if you never do.

Personally, I read pdfs rarely and certainly not on any of my eink readers. That's a lousy experience, to put it mildly. And as most of my reading material consists of books by modern authors, most of my books had DRM originally. So Calibre is pretty important to me.

Richwood · 12-31-2019, 01:01 PM

If you are a science fiction reader both Baen and Tor do not use DRM on their ebooks I have read, including Baen books sold by Amazon. I believe that both publishers sell ebooks direct too. I know Baen does. Baen also has some freebies.

JSWolf · 12-31-2019, 01:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BookCat

Personally, I love the way I can add 'blurb' to the beginning of books using Calibre, and change the cover if I don't like it. Also, Calibre enables me to convert to a format which will use custom fonts.

And I'm one of those odd people who enjoys doing this. Yes, Calibre is fun to play with, to see all my books on, and to roll around that carousel which is my library. Whoever said Calibre wasn't fun? They must've been getting too technical with it.

I do like some of the things I can do with Calibre. I like being able to download a hi-res cover when the eBook has a low-res cover or a generic cover. I like being able to edit the eBook in place. I like being able to select which books I want on my Reader without having to plug in my Reader so when I do plug in my H2O, the books are automatically sent to the H2O. I like the ease of collection and series management. I like being able to see what books I have. There's a lot to like about Calibre. More to like then mentioned by both of us.

Sirtel · 12-31-2019, 01:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BookCat

Personally, I love the way I can add 'blurb' to the beginning of books using Calibre, and change the cover if I don't like it. Also, Calibre enables me to convert to a format which will use custom fonts.

And I'm one of those odd people who enjoys doing this. Yes, Calibre is fun to play with, to see all my books on, and to roll around that carousel which is my library. Whoever said Calibre wasn't fun? They must've been getting too technical with it.

I think Calibre is fun too. I like to tinker with my library, change the metadata to my liking, experiment with various options and so on. It's a hobby, not only necessity.

Sirtel · 12-31-2019, 01:06 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Richwood

If you are a science fiction reader both Baen and Tor do not use DRM on their ebooks I have read, including Baen books sold by Amazon. I believe that both publishers sell ebooks direct too. I know Baen does. Baen also has some freebies.

Angry Robot (a UK SF/fantasy publisher) does this too.

Pajamaman · 12-31-2019, 02:01 PM

I have to disagree about pdf being unsuitable for e-readers. The other day I opened up pdf with koreader. It is a very good experience. It seems that koreader has integrated k2pdfopt, and it crops all the margins out dynamically. Also, it works in landscape, making smaller fonts readable. Until I tried koreader with pdf, I though only the Onyx software handled pdf well. Very impressed.

There are excellent options to read pdf on ereaders, but one must venture beyond the almost always very limited out-of-the-box UI.

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12-31-2019, 11:30 AM	#54
BookCat C L J Posts: 2,911 Karma: 21115458 Join Date: Dec 2008 Location: Birmingham UK Device: Sony e-reader 505, Kindle PW2, Kindle PW3, Kobo Libra2	Personally, I love the way I can add 'blurb' to the beginning of books using Calibre, and change the cover if I don't like it. Also, Calibre enables me to convert to a format which will use custom fonts. And I'm one of those odd people who enjoys doing this. Yes, Calibre is fun to play with, to see all my books on, and to roll around that carousel which is my library. Whoever said Calibre wasn't fun? They must've been getting too technical with it.

12-31-2019, 01:01 PM	#56
Richwood Astronomy Nut Posts: 531 Karma: 4000000 Join Date: Oct 2017 Location: Reno, NV Device: Kindle (All), Kobo (Multiple), Sony (most) and Nook Glowlight Plus	If you are a science fiction reader both Baen and Tor do not use DRM on their ebooks I have read, including Baen books sold by Amazon. I believe that both publishers sell ebooks direct too. I know Baen does. Baen also has some freebies.

12-31-2019, 02:01 PM	#60
Pajamaman Wizard Posts: 2,874 Karma: 10700629 Join Date: May 2016 Location: Canada Device: Onyx Nova	I have to disagree about pdf being unsuitable for e-readers. The other day I opened up pdf with koreader. It is a very good experience. It seems that koreader has integrated k2pdfopt, and it crops all the margins out dynamically. Also, it works in landscape, making smaller fonts readable. Until I tried koreader with pdf, I though only the Onyx software handled pdf well. Very impressed. There are excellent options to read pdf on ereaders, but one must venture beyond the almost always very limited out-of-the-box UI.

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