TM: An alternative to DRM? Let's discuss.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by pieter

iTunes and the iPod (or other mp3 players) would never have gotten as popular as they are now if file-sharing of copyrighted music wasn't popular. Do you really believe it would have become mainstream for 15 year old kids to have a device that holds up to 80gb of music if the only way to fill it up would be to pay for every song?

Since 15-year-old kids used to plonk down to the record store every weekend and pay for hundreds of albums and singles... frankly, Hells yes. And if every file-sharing site nuked itself tomorrow, they'd go right back to it.

iPod may have been popular because of the sheer volume of MP3s available to it, but iTunes became popular because it was good, fast, easy, and cheap.

Speaking for myself, I bought an MP3 player to listen to the few hundred albums I already had. 95% or more of my player's music was already in my collection, the rest includes downloaded content.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by Ralph Sir Edward

But you <are> in the same position as Baen. You are not just an author, but a publisher. A very small one, admittedly, but one just the same. As a publisher, studying what works to see what can be used to build a business is a useful business concept.

It's that fact that I'm a small publisher that precludes me from taking advantage of a subscription system. The whole point of a subscription is that you pay for an extended period of time to get whatever content you want from a site. With my small collection of books, that subscription could conceivably be used up (everything in my collection downloaded and read) in a month. Then wait another 3-4 months for my next book. That's not a workable model.

Selling individual books or collections is a better model, with other free content (short stories, commentary, etc) to keep people coming between book releases, is a better model for an author/publisher with a day job.

If I gave up the day job and dedicated myself to daily compelling content, or somehow got ahold of a wealth of refreshing content to offer, that would be a time to go subscription. But not before.

[Liviu_5]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Since 15-year-old kids used to plonk down to the record store every weekend and pay for hundreds of albums and singles... frankly, Hells yes. And if every file-sharing site nuked itself tomorrow, they'd go right back to it.

Well, iPod became popular due to the "Rip, Mix, Burn" slogan - the fast, easy way to rip your existing cd's - massive file sharing came after and was due precisely to this easy ripping.

No wonder the music studios hate it, but when they try to talk about it like in the last "misunderstanding" in that trial a while ago, the hullaboo from the press and people is too high even for them...

So, unless you ban cd ripping, you ain't going back to the old days...

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Take Photoshop for example...

Adobe and Microsoft used a specific sales model that involved willingly allowing their apps to fill the market, gaining as much market share as possible, before attaching compelling reasons to upgrade, and finally a serious DRM system that would force old and new users to all buy the upgrades. Once everyone was already attached to Adobe software by the nose, they ponied up as much as $1000 for new versions of that software because they felt they had no choice.

It's not quite the same as the e-book "1 piracy equals 1 lost sale" issue: Adobe and MS used free downloads to lock customers in of their own accord, then real them in later (an incredibly successful strategy, I might point out). With e-books, this would be more like putting out the free sample of 90% of a book, ending the sample at the cliffhanger, then charging $100 for the climax.

[tompe]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Take Photoshop for example. I know there are a lot of people out there who have downloaded, installed, and use Photoshop. But, these people would not be using Photoshop had they had to purchase it. So as far as profits for Adobe go, these people cost nothing to Adobe. But, the issue here is if these people did not get a free copy of Photoshop, what would they be using instead? Would they have purchased a lower cost alternative? So while Abode lost nothing, some other companies did lose something. They did not have their program stolen, but they did have their sales stolen. So while you can argue that the person would never have bought the program anyway, it means they don't need to buy one in that category of software now so someone loses the a sale.

People will use Gimp if they are not using Photoshop so there are no lost sale. I also think that people having used a pirated copy of Photoshop increase the sale of Photoshop since when it is decision time at the company people want to have Photoshop.

Personally I think that illegally downloading photoshop is bad because it hurts open source alternatives like Gimp. That holds for a lot of other things like Office and Windows operating systems. With less piracy the market for these programs will be smaller and we will faster get better open source alternatives.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by tompe

Personally I think that illegally downloading photoshop is bad because it hurts open source alternatives like Gimp. That holds for a lot of other things like Office and Windows operating systems. With less piracy the market for these programs will be smaller and we will faster get better open source alternatives.

You can say that about any popular piece of software available on the open market. Photoshop doesn't just hurt the market for open source programs, it also hurts the market for other paid programs, like Corel, and slows up the progress of all alternatives.

Well, since this discussion has all but run screaming from the original subject of traffic management, and into yet another piracy debate, where can we go from here? I'm thinking of a discussion of another alternative, for which I'd probably create another thread. Is there anything else we haven't covered here?

[Olympus]

PS A "live" performance of an author could be: an autographed paper copy :-)

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by Lucien21

While it is true that you can't say that number of downloads=number of lost sales I've always had a problem with this excuse.

I think you missed my point.

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by pieter

Do you really believe it would have become mainstream for 15 year old kids to have a device that holds up to 80gb of music if the only way to fill it up would be to pay for every song?

Yes, you can RIP CD's that you already own and put them on your iPod/PMP whatever. Many kids have a CD collection. Granted, many of them probably shared... but yes, it is possible.

BOb

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

Well, since this discussion has all but run screaming from the original subject of traffic management, and into yet another piracy debate, where can we go from here?

It's not possible to do what the OP suggests if encryption or SSL is used to pass the traffic. Anyone that says anything to the contrary is either lying maybe to get VC or doesn't know anything about crytography.

BOb

[Lucien21]

Ok back to the topic of Traffic Management.

The Uk has recently hinted at legislation to force ISP's to monitor the usage by their customers and Ban people from the internet for downloading piracted items.

The ISP's are saying that there are many legal as well as technical barriers to this and strongly impose any role other than "mere conduits".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7246403.stm

I can't see this position changing.

Most ISP's have some sort of traffic management programme that throttles the speed of torrent files etc, but encrypting the file and other measures ensure the downloaders are usually one step ahead of the ISP's.

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by Lucien21

Most ISP's have some sort of traffic management programme that throttles the speed of torrent files etc, but encrypting the file and other measures ensure the downloaders are usually one step ahead of the ISP's.

Right... and alot of Torrent clients are implementing tunnelling so you can't see what is in the packet. Also, if you use some type of VPN like hamachi or OpenVPN you can defeat this. Also, Torrent traffic does NOT mean piracy... I download a weekly screen cast using a Torrent feed provided by the publisher. Also, many Linux distributions use torrent.

BOb

[tompe]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

You can say that about any popular piece of software available on the open market. Photoshop doesn't just hurt the market for open source programs, it also hurts the market for other paid programs, like Corel, and slows up the progress of all alternatives.

Yes, but since the morally superior goal is to get open source programs than hurting commersial alternatives is not so bad.

[Steven Lyle Jordan]

Originally Posted by tompe

Yes, but since the morally superior goal is to get open source programs than hurting commersial alternatives is not so bad.

I'm not even gonna go there...

Originally Posted by Lucien21

Ok back to the topic of Traffic Management.

The Uk has recently hinted at legislation to force ISP's to monitor the usage by their customers and Ban people from the internet for downloading piracted items.

The ISP's are saying that there are many legal as well as technical barriers to this and strongly impose any role other than "mere conduits".

Most ISP's have some sort of traffic management programme that throttles the speed of torrent files etc, but encrypting the file and other measures ensure the downloaders are usually one step ahead of the ISP's.

I suggest we all look at what China is doing about these issues. If individual countries decide that sharing files like this is too counter-productive, even dangerous, there's little reason why more of those countries can't put into effect the "digital borders" and outlawing of encryption and other services that China practices.

The key is legality, a state that can always change. Just as laws had to be developed to rein in the automobile when it was first introduced (in the name of public safety), so laws can be rewritten to rein in digital file propagation if it is seen as counter to a country's safety and security.

Whether we like it or not, a sizable measure of traffic management is possible. And I suspect that if a better system isn't found at some point, TM is going to be a more attractive alternative to a lot of countries. The internet can conceivably find itself broken up into as many distinct pieces as there are countries. I'm not saying it would be easy, or preferable, just that it could happen.

[spooky69]

Originally Posted by Steve Jordan

As I said before, stealing the work just makes it popular among thieves, and there is no data that indicates pirated works equate to legitimate sales down the road.

You keep saying this despite people provide several examples to the contrary, and despite the fact that you're basically implying the very illogical supposition that no pirate ever buys anything that they've already pirated. I've heard numerous pirates say the opposite, and I just realized that I've even done it myself with a couple of musical albums where I downloaded a leaked copy and went in to buy it on the release day because I knew I was going to get my money's worth and wanted to support the artists. You seem to mistake people arguing for piracy (or the "give it away for free" model) as a factor in modern distribution of media for people telling you that you have to accept piracy or give your books away for free.

I'm not entirely clear on what your overall position is...you don't like pirates? You don't want people pirating your books? Pirating a copyrighted work can result in a loss of revenue? Despite the clear passion that you show for electronic books and how they represent a new dynamic in literature, you seem stuck in a mindset that the only way they could ever be personally profitable for you is in a model where piracy is minimalized and all sales pass through the standard website checkout system. I'll give you credit for implementing some of the incentives that are possible in a digital environment, but you also continue to remain willfully ignorant of the fact that many creators and publishers and finding methods of promoting and selling their product that are radically different from yours and challenge the traditions of sales, all while still turning a profit. Once again, nobody's asking you to create any drastic changes to your system, but ignoring the realities of how piracy and other forms of digital distribution have changed the world we live in will certainly not lessen their relevance to your business.