Amazon is Making it Difficult...

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by John F

Amazon does seem to handle this well vs ADE. Seems like with ADE a lot of people who use ADE for library borrowing are pirates, seeing as how there is a copy of the book on your computer after you have returned it.

A couple of items I find incorrect in your post.

• Unless you have removed the DRM, that copy on your computer can not be opened. An attempt to open it will result in a "This book is expired and cannot be opened" error with a checkbox to remove from library.
  
• The book will not in your ADE library if you returned the book. It will only be there if you let the loan period expire without returning the book.

Considering that Rellwood was rather specific that all borrowed books are still in a calibre library and previous discussions about pirated books, I'm pretty certain that Rellwood has deDRMmed KU books in their calibre library.

See this thread for some previous interactions: Split book records .

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by DNSB

A couple of items I find incorrect in your post.

• Unless you have removed the DRM, that copy on your computer can not be opened. An attempt to open it will result in a "This book is expired and cannot be opened" error with a checkbox to remove from library.
  
• The book will not in your ADE library if you returned the book. It will only be there if you let the loan period expire without returning the book.

With ADE 2.0.1 (i don't know if Adobe fixed this in the current version), if you return a loan early, it's still in the library directory. It's just no longer part of the library. Also, because Overdrive now allows you to easy early return something borrowed, the eBook will still be there in the library.

ADE is a mess when it comes to clearing out eBooks you've returned or deleted from the library as they stay. I have to go in to the ADE library directory and delete them.

[John F]

Originally Posted by DNSB

A couple of items I find incorrect in your post.

• Unless you have removed the DRM, that copy on your computer can not be opened. An attempt to open it will result in a "This book is expired and cannot be opened" error with a checkbox to remove from library.
  
• The book will not in your ADE library if you returned the book. It will only be there if you let the loan period expire without returning the book.

Considering that Rellwood was rather specific that all borrowed books are still in a calibre library and previous discussions about pirated books, I'm pretty certain that Rellwood has deDRMmed KU books in their calibre library.

See this thread for some previous interactions: Split book records .

A couple of things I find incorrect with your post, regarding ADE.

If you strip the DRM on one of those "expired/returned" loans, you will be able to open it.

I almost always return books before they expire, and all the books that I haven't explicitly deleted are still on the computer. Even when you delete them, they are probably around for some time until you empty the trash.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by John F

A couple of things I find incorrect with your post, regarding ADE.

If you strip the DRM on one of those "expired/returned" loans, you will be able to open it.

I almost always return books before they expire, and all the books that I haven't explicitly deleted are still on the computer. Even when you delete them, they are probably around for some time until you empty the trash.

When you delete them, they are still in your ADE library directory. It's just that you no longer see them with ADE.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by DNSB

A couple of items I find incorrect in your post.

Unless you have removed the DRM, that copy on your computer can not be opened. An attempt to open it will result in a "This book is expired and cannot be opened" error with a checkbox to remove from library.

Originally Posted by John F

A couple of things I find incorrect with your post, regarding ADE.

If you strip the DRM on one of those "expired/returned" loans, you will be able to open it.

I could have sworn that I stated that explicitly in my message. You know, the words that read Unless you have removed the DRM in the part I quoted above.

Originally Posted by DNSB

The book will not in your ADE library if you returned the book. It will only be there if you let the loan period expire without returning the book.

Originally Posted by John F

I almost always return books before they expire, and all the books that I haven't explicitly deleted are still on the computer. Even when you delete them, they are probably around for some time until you empty the trash.

And again, I did not mention a physical copy on computer. I was rather specific in what I said though I had forgotten that my procedure when returning from ADE was to return & remove.

Yes, if I return and remove, I could find the book in the trash or heck, I could even try using an undelete utility. That still won't let me place it back in the library as a readable book. If you try opening it, you should get the "No record for this loan is found on this machine. It may have been returned." message.

[John F]

Originally Posted by DNSB

I could have sworn that I stated that explicitly in my message. You know, the words that read Unless you have removed the DRM in the part I quoted above.

From your first post, all you said was a copy, nothing about DRM.

Originally Posted by DNSB

...

To me, keeping borrowed books past their return date or in the case of KU, past the date you returned the book on Amazon so you no longer have any rights to the book is, basically, just piracy.

To me, a copy of the book on your computer litteraly means keeping a borrowed book past their return date.

And again, I did not mention a physical copy on computer. I was rather specific in what I said though I had forgotten that my procedure when returning from ADE was to return & remove.

Again, refer back to your original post.

I would guess that a lot of people use the simple method of right clicking and picking return in ADE, or let it expire, or use the return in overdrive.

Did I not use the winky smiley face correctly in my OP.

[BionicGecko]

Originally Posted by John F

To me, a copy of the book on your computer litteraly means keeping a borrowed book past their return date.

Well I’d argue it’s not exactly quite the same, as if you keep a borrowed book, no one else can read it, while keeping a de-DRMed copy after expiry does not prevent someone else from borrowing the book.

But obviously this is a complex topic where we try to apply the logic of physical things to digital ones. Keeping a copy of a borrowed digital book is not the same as keeping an actual book, as there is no concrete “loss” down the line. One could argue that the copy represents a lost sale, but it’s not quite the case - the person who copied the book would probably not have bought it anyway. There is no scarcity in the digital world, and trying to force such a scarcity results in a model which breaks at the seams.

I obviously believe authors should be rewarded for their work; I just think that trying to apply physical constraints to the digital world is an endeavor bound to fail.

[DNSB]

Perhaps I should have said keeping a copy of a borrowed ebook with DRM removed so that the contents are accessible past the return date?

OTOH, I've made the point multiple times over the past decade that I consider removing DRM from borrowed ebooks to be an reprehensible act. Books that are not loans are fair game, IMHO. I learned that lesson when one vendor I purchased a few books from shut down and I had a mass of useless files and had it reinforced when I was removing DRM from my purchased .lit format ebooks before Microsoft shut down their DRM servers.

[Aleron Ives]

Originally Posted by DNSB

I've made the point multiple times over the past decade that I consider removing DRM from borrowed ebooks to be an reprehensible act.

It would seem to me that it matters why you're removing the DRM. If your library only offers e-books in a format that your e-reader doesn't support, then you have no choice but to remove the DRM in order to read the e-book. As long as you delete the file when your loan expires, I fail to see any problem with that. Yes, you could read the e-book on your computer without having to remove the DRM, but presumably people buy e-readers because they don't want to read on LCD monitors.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Aleron Ives

It would seem to me that it matters why you're removing the DRM. If your library only offers e-books in a format that your e-reader doesn't support, then you have no choice but to remove the DRM in order to read the e-book. As long as you delete the file when your loan expires, I fail to see any problem with that. Yes, you could read the e-book on your computer without having to remove the DRM, but presumably people buy e-readers because they don't want to read on LCD monitors.

For me since I don't need to remove DRM from an library epub to read it on my ereaders, it is a reprehensible act. For a friend of mine who proudly owns 3 Kindles, it is a necessity if they are going to read a library book since Canadian libraries are epub mostly with a few lonely pdfs creeping in. I helped set up calibre and the necessary plugins to allow importing and converting epubs to send to a Kindle.

The other issue is that I don't trust myself not to give into the temptation to keep a borrowed book just a while longer for whatever justification so I'd rather not put temptation in my path.

“I can resist anything except temptation.”―Oscar Wilde, Lady Windermere's Fan

"L'enfer est plein de bonnes volontés ou désirs."—St Bernard of Clairvaux. c. 1150

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Aleron Ives

It would seem to me that it matters why you're removing the DRM. If your library only offers e-books in a format that your e-reader doesn't support, then you have no choice but to remove the DRM in order to read the e-book. As long as you delete the file when your loan expires, I fail to see any problem with that. Yes, you could read the e-book on your computer without having to remove the DRM, but presumably people buy e-readers because they don't want to read on LCD monitors.

They buy Readers so they can be portable. A computer or laptop are not exactly all that portable when it comes to reading.

[JSWolf]

@DNSB would you have an issue removing the DRM, putting it on your Reader and then deleting every copy from the computer. Doing this so you have more time to read it knowing you will delete it from your Reader when you finish?

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

@DNSB would you have an issue removing the DRM, putting it on your Reader and then deleting every copy from the computer. Doing this so you have more time to read it knowing you will delete it from your Reader when you finish?

Jon, at heart, I'm a completist. I started down that road when I first started collecting science fiction and fantasy books more years ago than I care to think about. Deleting a book would be hard for me to do. So, vade retro satana.

As for taking time for reading? I'm pretty certain that given the 7 days I have my library loans defaulted to, I can find the few hours to read a book before it expires.