New poll: What do you think of DRM

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

I can buy an ebook. Depending upon DRM or lack of, I can copy and share it with others.

I suppose I could theoretically sell it, if I could find someone willing to buy, but I've never heard of it being done.

I believe you're making our point. No, you don't really hear of it being done. Why? Because the DRM won't allow it.

Publishers have used DRM to prevent the reselling of commercial eBooks.

[dmaul1114]

Originally Posted by Shaggy

I believe you're making our point. No, you don't really hear of it being done. Why? Because the DRM won't allow it.

Publishers have used DRM to prevent the reselling of commercial eBooks.

To be fair, even without DRM there wouldn't be much reselling. People would just give it away. Not much incentive for the average person to sell an e-book when they can keep a copy. Unlike paperbooks where they're getting rid of their only copy and thus there are more people that would like to at least get a couple bucks for it etc.

The only way well see a lot of sales of e-books is if there's DRM systems that allow sells/trades by transferring licenses. i.e. can sell or trade to someone else, and the book is deleted from your account and can't be re-downloaded unless you purchase a new one.

I doubt they'll go that route, so we'll eventually just have no DRM on books and there won't be any real sales of used e-books. People will either just keep their copy and not give it away, or keep their copy and give it to others as it common with MP3s with music.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by dmaul1114

The only way well see a lot of sales of e-books is if there's DRM systems that allow sells/trades by transferring licenses. i.e. can sell or trade to someone else, and the book is deleted from your account and can't be re-downloaded unless you purchase a new one.

I doubt they'll go that route

I doubt they ever will either, that's the point. Could DRM allow for selling eBooks, sure. Does it, nope. Whose decision is it... the publishers.

It's not surprising that the publishers are using DRM to eliminate the "used" market. The real question is, why was the system allowed to get to a state where it is the publishers decision whether or not consumers are allowed to exercise their legal right of "first sale".

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by dmaul1114

To be fair, even without DRM there wouldn't be much reselling. People would just give it away. Not much incentive for the average person to sell an e-book when they can keep a copy. Unlike paperbooks where they're getting rid of their only copy and thus there are more people that would like to at least get a couple bucks for it etc.

So you're saying that there's no point in designing a system where people are allowed to exercise their legal rights, because everyone is a criminal.

Sounds like a self fulfilling prophecy to me.

[dmaul1114]

Originally Posted by Shaggy

So you're saying that there's no point in designing a system where people are allowed to exercise their legal rights, because everyone is a criminal.

Sounds like a self fulfilling prophecy to me.

That's not what I meant.

I meant that I don't think the system will come around as the publishers don't want second hand sales. The biggest boon of digital content for them is the death of the 2nd hand stores when decades down the road all content is digital only.

They'll stick with DRM as long as they can, and eventually drop it and just deal with piracy like the Music industry has. And at least be happy that used book stores are a thing of the past once paper books are largely gone (again, decades away).

I do think that such a system wouldn't be widely used if they did design it as people don't have much incentive to sell digital goods as there's no tangible product involved. But I don't think that's the reason we won't get a system for selling e-book legally. The reason is publishers don't want fair use and used sales, so they aren't going to build such a system.

[forcheville]

I interpreted "I will not buy a book with DRM" as "I will not buy a book with DRM that I can't remove."
I have no objection to DRM otherwise, but this is my rule - even if on some occasions I need to buy one book from a site before finding out that I can't remove the DRM.

The motive for this is that I buy books to build a library, and therefore the ebooks must be device independent.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by forcheville

I interpreted "I will not buy a book with DRM" as "I will not buy a book with DRM that I can't remove."

That was not my interpretation. I do not want to support the system with DRM so I do not buy books with DRM. If everybody stopped buying DRM:ed books and then removing the DRM we might get rid of DRM faster.

[WT Sharpe]

As of late, I have made it a point to visit Amazon every day and type into their search engine some variation on the theme, "DRM sucks."

I don't know if complaining does any good, but I'm sure they pay attention to what people are looking to buy, and maybe, just maybe, if enough people do that and they began to realize the lengths to which people will go to avoid buying DRM encrypted books, something will change.

[pepak]

I find the system of "never buy anything that contains DRM, no matter what" a lot more reliable in driving the point home.

[GeoffC]

not too convinced the "powers that decide" are caring !

[mr ploppy]

Originally Posted by pepak

I find the system of "never buy anything that contains DRM, no matter what" a lot more reliable in driving the point home.

Only if they knew you existed and knew your reason for not buying.

[Lemurion]

Originally Posted by mr ploppy

Only if they knew you existed and knew your reason for not buying.

This is the reason for my sig: it's not enough to refuse to buy DRM content, one has to also buy non-DRM content.

[WT Sharpe]

I would assume Amazon monitors those requests. It only makes sense that they would wish to stock what people are asking for.

[Worldwalker]

I've noticed people -- even here -- using the publishers' terminology, namely saying that books are "protected" by DRM. Changing perceptions starts with language: be sure to say they're "restricted" by DRM.

It's a calculated, cynical choice of words on the publishers' part. People are used to having things that are protected in some way being to the buyer's advantage: a carpet "protected by Scotchgard", for instance, is more stain-resistant then one that isn't. So "protected" sounds good to the uninformed, disguising the fact it's massively to the buyer's disadvantage. Plus it portrays all us customers as scum from whom books need to be protected. If the publishers won't tell the truth and say "restricted", we have to.

[hokie]

Are you assuming everyone knows what "trade paperback" means? Not sure this is common knowledge.