Kindle Unlimited 2.0 - early assessments

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

You cannot read a Kobo book in iBooks, Kindle, or any of the numerous third-party apps that don't support DRM.

If there is no DRM, you CAN read ePub eBooks in iBooks. It may not display properly in places because iBooks is Apple's take on ePub. For example, Baen & Tor are two publishers with no DRM and their ePub can be viewed in any software that handles ePub with no conversion needed. Amazon's KF8 (DRM free) needs to be converted to read in third party programs except for Calibre.

Adobe's tech would be meaningful if it was encoded in a standard, and everyone could use it merely by implementing it. Since it requires licensing proprietary tech from Adobe, the oft-spoken-of, mythical, delusional "openness" of Adobe DRM amounts to nothing more than cheap hypocritical sniping at Amazon. (But not at iBooks, simply because no one cares about them.)[/QUOTE]

How much is is to license RMDSK? The thing is, you can do it if you want. You cannot license software to handle KF8 with DRM. That's why it's only Amazon that has such software because they don't let it out in the wild.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by Fbone

That's why authors are quickly reformatting now for August. Amazon is currently very generous with the KENPC calculation. A 280 page hardcover can have a KENPC of 700.

That is about where they started in july.
I'll have to go check the early reports I saw but I think it was about a 2.5 ratio...

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

If there is no DRM, you CAN read ePub eBooks in iBooks. It may not display properly in places because iBooks is Apple's take on ePub. For example, Baen & Tor are two publishers with no DRM and their ePub can be viewed in any software that handles ePub with no conversion needed. Amazon's KF8 (DRM free) needs to be converted to read in third party programs except for Calibre.

Stop nitpicking. You know perfectly well that we were discussing DRMed books.
I absolutely refuse to start writing lengthy disclaimers on every one of my posts just because you want to willfully misunderstand everything you think you can get away with.

Pointing out that Amazon books require conversion (using free and open-source software!!!) separate from their DRM status is exactly the kind of pointless hobby horse I have come to expect from only one person on all of MobileRead... and you are still the only person who cares with such religious devotion. (Yes, this qualifies as a minor religion.)

How much is is to license RMDSK? The thing is, you can do it if you want. You cannot license software to handle KF8 with DRM. That's why it's only Amazon that has such software because they don't let it out in the wild.

It doesn't matter how much it costs, the fact that there is a cost is a definitive barrier to adoption. And... Amazon has offered to license out MOBI/AZW3 and their homegrown DRM.

But just for the sake of argument, this stackoverflow question claims that the cost to license RMSDK is $75,000
(One answer says you can get it cheaper, but apparently in order to find the actual price I have to obtain an evaluation trial first.)

I never doubted it would be to the tune of multiple tens of thousands of dollars.
I can just see all those free ereader apps paying tens of thousands of dollars to make an app that works with your DRMed books.

---

I reserve the right to completely ignore any response you make, if I feel you are just nitpicking and riding your hobby horse again.

[ottdmk]

For clarification, my order of preference when it comes to DRM schemes, from 1 to 100:

1) No DRM. DRM doesn't work, never has.
20) Social DRM like Pottermore's or DriveThruRPG's watermarking. While annoying, at least it doesn't actively interfere with how I use my purchase.
80) Adobe DRM. Still lousy for all the usual reasons, but at least if a great device comes out and licenses it, my library can transfer with a minimum of fuss.
100) Single vendor DRM such as Amazon's.

Adobe DRM at least allows for other companies to compete with Kobo directly with library compatibility. Still not good, but it's better then the Amazon situation where no company can advertise "Read your Amazon library on this device!" without being Amazon.

Now as for Amazon and the Voyage: never heard of the Canadian patent issue before. The goodereader article was interesting, and I thank Michael for the link to the actual patent. Pity his conclusions were wrong.

Amazon started the patent process in 2010 and finished the preliminary steps in 2011. However, as shown in this CIPO tutorial, you have to kick off the approval of your application by applying for examination. You have to do this within five years of filing. Amazon waited three years, four months and eleven days from the last step they completed, or, put another way, five years minus 20 days of their original filing. Yeah, the Canadian market is a *real* priority for Amazon.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by ottdmk

For clarification, my order of preference when it comes to DRM schemes, from 1 to 100:

1) No DRM. DRM doesn't work, never has.
20) Social DRM like Pottermore's or DriveThruRPG's watermarking. While annoying, at least it doesn't actively interfere with how I use my purchase.
80) Adobe DRM. Still lousy for all the usual reasons, but at least if a great device comes out and licenses it, my library can transfer with a minimum of fuss.
100) Single vendor DRM such as Amazon's.

Adobe DRM at least allows for other companies to compete with Kobo directly with library compatibility. Still not good, but it's better then the Amazon situation where no company can advertise "Read your Amazon library on this device!" without being Amazon.

And I have already corrected your misapprehension about Amazon in my reply to JSWolf, but it bears repeating:

Amazon has offered to license out their DRM scheme. No one decided to take them up on that offer.

Having it in for AmazonBooks because, through no fault of their own, you can only read the books-for-which-publishers-demand-DRM on one brand of devices, whereas KoboBooks can be read on two or three brands of devices, again through no fault of their own, is ridiculous.

And you are assuming a "great device" will license Adobe DRM, rather than nothing at all. Or even (gasp) Amazon DRM! (I will concede that the odds are against Amazon DRM.)



Myself, I don't consider Adobe DRM to be one iota better than Amazon DRM. In order for my books to be properly accessible, they cannot have an DRM at all, and at that point it doesn't really matter what DRM scheme, if any, a specific device uses.

Now as for Amazon and the Voyage: never heard of the Canadian patent issue before. The goodereader article was interesting, and I thank Michael for the link to the actual patent. Pity his conclusions were wrong.

Amazon started the patent process in 2010 and finished the preliminary steps in 2011. However, as shown in this CIPO tutorial, you have to kick off the approval of your application by applying for examination. You have to do this within five years of filing. Amazon waited three years, four months and eleven days from the last step they completed, or, put another way, five years minus 20 days of their original filing. Yeah, the Canadian market is a *real* priority for Amazon.

I am completely, utterly, totally shocked that Amazon does not consider Canada to be of exactly equal importance to the US!!!




...

I am still wondering why the Canadian government has taken the better part of a year and still not approved it, after Amazon did everything necessary on your end.

You are acting as though there were anyone not aware that Amazon requested approval on Jan 2015, rather than in 2010.

Yes, we know Amazon waited 3 months after the successful US launch to jumpstart the approval for a Canada launch. We know Canada is of lesser priority to Amazon than the US. We know Amazon is entirely totally responsible for the Voyage not being available back in October, or even January.

The only point anyone (other than you, I guess) was trying to make is... if you are wondering why it still isn't available halfway through August of next year, it's because Amazon finished their patent application 8 months ago and still hasn't gotten an answer.


I think I know why you are so confused. You didn't read the article.
If you had read the article, you would know it wasn't from Michael at Goodereader, it was from Nathan at The Ebook Reader.

[ottdmk]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

And I have already corrected your misapprehension about Amazon in my reply to JSWolf, but it bears repeating:

Amazon has offered to license out their DRM scheme. No one decided to take them up on that offer.

Really? Could you cite a source for that? I find that fascinating. I'd love to research their terms. Having access to their DRM would be a huge boost to a competitor. I wonder why nobody's taken them up on it?

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Having it in for AmazonBooks because, through no fault of their own, you can only read the books-for-which-publishers-demand-DRM on one brand of devices, whereas KoboBooks can be read on two or three brands of devices, again through no fault of their own, is ridiculous.

In your opinion. I choose to consider it as choosing the lesser of evils; as illustrated by my list. I prefer more choice as opposed to lesser choice. No DRM is the most choice. Hence my love for Baen, Tor, and folks who choose to put their works in Humble Bundles, for example. Amazon DRM is the least amount of choice at the current time. I really do hope you list that source. I'd like to learn more, and google is not my friend in this. (Try googling amazon licence drm and all you get is a ton of links on how to strip the DRM from Amazon content.)

Originally Posted by eschwartz

And you are assuming a "great device" will license Adobe DRM, rather than nothing at all. Or even (gasp) Amazon DRM! (I will concede that the odds are against Amazon DRM.)

I dislike the realities of DRM in the e-book marketplace. However, as far as I can tell, it's not going anyplace right now. Hence, I consider it highly unlikely that a new e-reader competitor will not handle any DRM, and I consider it more likely that they will handle Adobe DRM rather then Kindle. (As you yourself mention.)

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Myself, I don't consider Adobe DRM to be one iota better than Amazon DRM. In order for my books to be properly accessible, they cannot have an DRM at all, and at that point it doesn't really matter what DRM scheme, if any, a specific device uses.

I'm not quite as hardline as you are. Once again, lesser of several evils. At least Adobe will licence to anyone. Really wondering as to why nobody wants Amazon's DRM if they're willing to part with it... (is it possible that they have a way to part with the DRM scheme without actually giving the licensee the capability to decrypt their books? I dunno, spitballing here. Source please!)

Originally Posted by eschwartz

I am completely, utterly, totally shocked that Amazon does not consider Canada to be of exactly equal importance to the US!!!




...

What? I'm a customer, like any other. I reserve the right to expect certain things of a company I do business with. Amazon has not shown that they are willing to go as far to get my business as they will elsewhere because I'm not in a primary market. Well, guess what? Not good enough for me. I'm not saying I'd buy a Voyage... it's really pricy. But I would at least like the option.

Originally Posted by eschwartz

I am still wondering why the Canadian government has taken the better part of a year and still not approved it, after Amazon did everything necessary on your end.

You are acting as though there were anyone not aware that Amazon requested approval on Jan 2015, rather than in 2010.

Yes, we know Amazon waited 3 months after the successful US launch to jumpstart the approval for a Canada launch. We know Canada is of lesser priority to Amazon than the US. We know Amazon is entirely totally responsible for the Voyage not being available back in October, or even January.

The only point anyone (other than you, I guess) was trying to make is... if you are wondering why it still isn't available halfway through August of next year, it's because Amazon finished their patent application 8 months ago and still hasn't gotten an answer.

You're kidding, right? You think a patent application should be finished in eight months after starting the approvals process? Do a search. It generally takes two to three years for an Office Action to be taken after a Request for Examination is filed, and an Office Action may not even be the last step in the process. If I can find that out in a search, you can be willing to bet that whatever legal expertise Amazon has for patent work knows it inside out, upside down and sideways.

There's a possible way around that. You can make a request for expedited prosecution. Can speed it up to a few months. Apparently, Amazon hasn't done that.

So in other words, if Amazon thought of the Canadian market as anything other then an afterthought, they should have at least filed for examination when they decided to launch in the US. Which would have been back in early 2014 sometime, most likely. Or, if they thought they really had something with haptic feedback, they could have filed anytime after July 2011. Given that their US patent was approved back in February of 2013, I think I can deduce that they believed haptic feedback was worth something.

Originally Posted by eschwartz

I think I know why you are so confused. You didn't read the article.
If you had read the article, you would know it wasn't from Michael at Goodereader, it was from Nathan at The Ebook Reader.

Umnn... this is the article I found on the subject. I wasn't going off of fjtorres' reply to me directly. I was on my tablet, remembered "amazon haptic patent canada" and googled it, finding the article I linked above. Just looked at Nathan's; largely the same. His is better written though; doesn't made Michael's mistake on the examination request.

The article still leaves the impression that CIPO should have approved the patent by now, which is completely outside the realm of standard process.

Edited to add one more thing: Since you brought it up, I'll go on the record as saying I'm really not a fan of iBooks either. On my list they'd be tied with Amazon. Least amount of choice.

[MikeB1972]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Amazon has offered to license out their DRM scheme. No one decided to take them up on that offer.

Do you have a linky, I know mobi DRM could be licensed (Although it required exclusivity) but I don't recall seeing anything about any Amazon DRM (Or in fact any released details on the formats used which would be required to implement). If it was available I'd have thought at least one independent manufacturer (Bookeen or Pocketbook probably) would have attempted to market one. If no one else then Waterstones who rather bizarrely sell ADE epubs and hardware kindles (But no epub readers) would surely be selling amazon compatible ebooks if they could.

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Myself, I don't consider Adobe DRM to be one iota better than Amazon DRM. In order for my books to be properly accessible, they cannot have an DRM at all, and at that point it doesn't really matter what DRM scheme, if any, a specific device uses.

I'm sort of in agreement with Jon here

I'll agree that social or no DRM would be better but as it stands your non-techie average user can buy from one of Amazon/Apple/B&N OR Pretty much anywhere else. I've already had WH Smith, Sony, BoB, Diesel (Really, I'm the kiss of death to ebook sellers, they should stop me having an account) close down and the transfers have been fairly seemless (even without counting Kobo taking on all the accounts) because they all used the same DRM, so even if google shuts down tomorrow and gives no provision to move the account I can still read all the already downloaded books on a newly purchased device, the same cannot be said for Amazon, B&N or Apple.

It's the difference between vendor lock in and format lock in, if they would let anyone else play in their back yard I wouldn't mind so much.

[darryl]

One observation I would make is that this whole discussion is taking place in a fantasy world. A fantasy world in which we are pretending that DRM is effective and that Apprentice Alf does not exist. I posted earlier about the wisdom of making a drm-free backup of your ebooks given the sorry history of ebook stores closing and making changes. This applies equally to all Vendors and to Adobe. The benefits that accrue by doing this are that it ensures that no matter what happens you will be affected only prospectively, not retrospectively, no matter how stupid a decision is made or who goes out of business.

Personally, if DRM does become totally effective and I have to be locked-in to an infrastructure, I would choose Amazon's without hesitation. It is Amazon that has the aggressive focus on customer service, a fact emphasised to me by the recent New York Times attempted hit piece. It is Amazon that keeps prices low. It is Amazon that has the largest range. It is Amazon which gives me access to good affordable ebooks through KU and KDP. It is Amazon which stands between us and $18 plus ebook pricing.

Another thing to remember is that Amazon allows you to read on Android and even IOS devices, including the increasing number of e-ink devices running Android.

To conclude this post, I'd like to be able to say that if DRM does become effective I would rather stop purchasing books than submit to lock-in. Sadly, I cannot say that. Reading to me is not as necessary as breathing, but it is very close. I would, reluctantly, choose Amazon.

[dickloraine]

I think it is pretty easy to see, why no one was interested in buying a drm license from amazon: Making money beyond the hardware sell. Of course there could be ways, if amazon would pay a affiliate fee, when a book is buyed through the device etc.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by darryl

One observation I would make is that this whole discussion is taking place in a fantasy world. A fantasy world in which we are pretending that DRM is effective and that Apprentice Alf does not exist.

And a fantasy world where mainsteam buyers care about things like DRM, content formats, and lock-in.

But since I have yet to see a single DRM pickett at Amazon, Apple, or Sony or a single occupy event over formats, I rather think that the people who vote their wallets simply don't care about those things. And haven't for 14 years. Longer, if you count WMV and Real Media.

Those are all good talking points to shoot the breeze and square the circle but push come to shove... Well, it never does get that far.

As a wise poster around here once said: "people buy ebooks, not epubs, not mobis, not anything else."

People buy the content, not the wrapper.

And authors go where the sales are.
Two days ago, I saw this snappy line from an author:
"Fishing in the seven seas is good, but fishing where you catch fish is better. "

http://www.thepassivevoice.com/08/20...comment-319671

Theory is one thing, earning a living is a different kettle. Of fish.
Until the epub vendors up their retail game it really doesn't matter if they're interoperable or not.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by dickloraine

I think it is pretty easy to see, why no one was interested in buying a drm license from amazon: Making money beyond the hardware sell. Of course there could be ways, if amazon would pay a affiliate fee, when a book is buyed through the device etc.

Which, oddly enough, they do offer.
So far it is only to independent bookstores (and Waterstones) but the offer is out there. It makes for nice antitrust insurance.

(The real hang-up, btw, isn't the store. It's that Kindle DRM is tied to WhisperNet so any DRM'ED books sold to kindles would have to be hosted on Amazon servers. For technical reasons. Look at the OVERDRIVE deal. What Amazon jealously guards is the "device" PIDs. Not the format or tbe encryption.)

[BearMountainBooks]

While the last page of this topic has degraded, erm, turned into a DRM discussion, I will say that, yes. It is getting harder to keep publishing on other retailers. I used to sell more on B&N, but in the past year, that has dried up. With no updated hardware and questionable CS practices, that ship is sinking.

I am convinced that had I gone exclusive two years ago, I would have made more money. I thought that at the time, but resisted. While I could withstand that in the short term the short term has now turned into a "too long" term. I'm still managing, but that is mainly because Kobo has helped with some promotional opportunities. But even with those, it's become a nearly impossible road to pedal. I had hoped at the time that B&N and Kobo and Google would be stepping up their game, but that has been very slow to happen. In the case of B&N, it went the wrong direction.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by fjtorres

People buy the content, not the wrapper.

You have a Kobo Reader, you buy DRM free content from Amazon. Your Kobo won't be able to handle it. You don't use Calibre and you don't convert formats. What do you do? Not a lot as your Kobo will not work with this eBook.

You have a Kindle. Same rules apply about Calibre and conversion. You buy an a DRM free ePub eBook. Again screwed as your Kindle won't have anything to do with it.

So yes, people do buy the wrapper or they cannot use the eBook because the wrapper is then incompatible. You cannot ignore the wrapper and buy just for the content as that just doesn't work for a lot of people.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

You have a Kobo Reader, you buy DRM free content from Amazon. Your Kobo won't be able to handle it. You don't use Calibre and you don't convert formats. What do you do? Not a lot as your Kobo will not work with this eBook.

You have a Kindle. Same rules apply about Calibre and conversion. You buy an a DRM free ePub eBook. Again screwed as your Kindle won't have anything to do with it.

So yes, people do buy the wrapper or they cannot use the eBook because the wrapper is then incompatible. You cannot ignore the wrapper and buy just for the content as that just doesn't work for a lot of people.

No, if you actually care enough to notice, you also care enough to google "read epub on Kindle"... and you find calibre, convert, live happily ever after, etc.

If you want to make arbitrary rules and restrictions, you can derive any conclusion you want. Doesn't mean anything.

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

You have a Kobo Reader, you buy DRM free content from Amazon. Your Kobo won't be able to handle it. You don't use Calibre and you don't convert formats. What do you do? Not a lot as your Kobo will not work with this eBook.

You have a Kindle. Same rules apply about Calibre and conversion. You buy an a DRM free ePub eBook. Again screwed as your Kindle won't have anything to do with it.

So yes, people do buy the wrapper or they cannot use the eBook because the wrapper is then incompatible. You cannot ignore the wrapper and buy just for the content as that just doesn't work for a lot of people.

YOU care intensely.
Others here, care: mildly...
(Not enough to bet their livelihoods or even their wallet.)

Mainstream buyers? Authors?
Nope.
Not a shred.

People in the real world are comfortable with walled gardens and their limits.
Nobody frets that their android apps don't run on iphone or XBOX games won't run on PlayStations. Life is too short to waste lifespan tilting at windmills.

Amazon's increasing dominance is due more to the retailing competence gap between them and their foes than the walled garden model and harping on that does nothing to bridge the incompetence gap limiting their sales. And that competence gap is what will determine the fate of the American ebook market.