Seriously thoughtful DRM != Piracy

[kacir]

Originally Posted by p3aul

Well this msg is nt directed at any particular individule, but let be make another boring, simile. I go into a store and present them with a check. The say, "We can't accept checks, it's not our policy" I have two choices, I can pay cash or I can leave without my would-be purchases. What they are really saying is this. "It's our way or the highway!" I may be mad, I say " You ought to give it to me, but the bottom line is this. They own the merchandise and they have the right to distribute it as they see fit. Now the way I see it is this. They have a right to do what they want to with what is there own.

This is, I guess the point I was trying to make in another thread, when all I succeeded in doing was alienating everyone.

Let me make yet another simile.

You go to the bookstore and you purchase a book. Hardcover, no less.
You pay for it in cash.

You leave the store, sit on a park bench, open a book and all you find is empty pages with text "unapproved use" at the middle of each page.
You return to the shop. "Whiskey Tango Foxtrot???", you scream at the manager. "Why can't I read the book? I BOUGHT the book, I paid for it in cash and it is *MINE* to read."

The manager patiently explains: "Sir, you can only read the book when you are at home, You can not read it when there is somebody else in the room, and you have to wear our special glasses while you read it."

"But, but, but ...." you splutter. "I need *my* reading glasses, I can't see anything without them. And I thought I will be reading the book on a bench in a park, or in a hotel room, or at the bus."

"Sorry sir. This is our policy and you should have known this before paying for the book. You can apply for a special permission to read the book in a hotel room. We just cancel your permission to read at home. And, by the way, we can remotely disable your book any time we wish by shutting down permission service (understand DRM server). And don't even think about selling the book, or letting your wife to read it once you have finished it."

[iain_benson]

All these examples of buying paper books with silly DRM equated restrictions miss one major point in the comparison ... all the eBook websites (I have looked at) state quite clearly that the books are DRM protected, and will only work on certain readers, and thus all these book shops would have a sign in the window stating the terms and conditions under which you are allowed to read the book you buy from them. If those conditions didn't suit, you would either buy it anyway and google for a way round the restrictions, or you would find an alternative place from which to acquire the book which doesn't have restrictions.

I think phrase in point that is generally missing in discussions of DRM is caveat emptor: you know exactly what you are buying, if you don't like it, don't buy it!

[=X=]

@mtravellerh and any the mods who might have taken offensive with my previous post. I'd like to apologize for any grief I might have caused. My post was not meant as a personal attack nor imply existing mod behavior.
I was just trying to contrast the point that a clear definition of rules should be used when censoring a thread else the censorship seems questionable. Again I apologize it was not meant as a personal attack, nor did I have any mod in mind when I wrote that sentence.

=X=

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by iain_benson

All these examples of buying paper books with silly DRM equated restrictions miss one major point in the comparison ... all the eBook websites (I have looked at) state quite clearly that the books are DRM protected

Then you haven't looked at many.

• Baen does not use DRM.
• Fictionwise sells many, many ebooks without DRM
• The new Coolerbooks.com website doesn't mention anything about DRM, although it seems likely they use it, only without telling customers what they're buying.

Coolerbooks doesn't even tell you if you're getting ePub or PDF files; they only list the program they expect you to read the books with.

Many ebook stores that do use DRM, don't explain it--they say "you'll need X software to read these books," but they don't say, "and that means you can only read them on a limited number of devices, and even if you download them to a memory card/usb drive, you can't hand them off to a friend when you're done." They don't tell customers what they're buying.

Of course, the free ebook websites don't have DRM:

• Gutenberg.org
• Manybooks.net
• Feedbooks.com
• Munseys.com
• Dozens of small ebook sites

.

I think phrase in point that is generally missing in discussions of DRM is caveat emptor: you know exactly what you are buying, if you don't like it, don't buy it!

A lot of ebookstores have carefully arranged their site info to not tell customers either that they have DRM, or how it works.

In my mind, there's a great deal of difference between "you need this software to read this document" (which often includes in it, "or you need an alternate, nonsponsored software"--you don't need Acrobat Reader to read PDFs, and you don't need Microsoft Word to read .doc files) and "you need this software, plus give us your name, email address, and computer ID info, plus a high-speed connection for verification of same, plus automatic update permissions, plus we keep the ability to disable your book if we like."

Can you name any ebook websites that spell out in detail what's required for their DRM'd books, beyond "install this software?" Any that say what information is exchanged, or what the special software requires?