Microsoft is taking back ebooks

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by ilovejedd

The first consideration I had before first buying ebooks was can I remove DRM?

Yep, same here. I had to move from paper to digital because my apartment ran out of storage space. Before buying my first ebook and ereader I researched the topic of ebooks quite thoroughly and decided that I was never going to buy a single book I cannot remove the DRM from.

Originally Posted by haertig

Buying eBooks to build a collection is fun. Can get expensive, but it's fun. However, it's hardly necessary when you already own more than you could possibly read in your remaining lifetime. Super-DRM just might be my salvation, it would finally knock some sense into me so I'd quit buying more eBooks that I won't live long enough to read. Probably not the result the book sellers envision for their super-DRM, but that would be the effect on me.

Exactly.

[drjenkins]

Originally Posted by bob_obo

What about if you're honest about breaking the law?

Is that what the Pirate Party is for?

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by darryl

@fjtorres. It's a terrible concept. Unfortunately it can properly be described as a zombie concept, because despite repeated failures it just won't stay dead. Inevitably after a gap of varying length someone else thinks they can make it work.

It has its uses: a corporate document management system, for one. A commercial data repository, a la Lexis/Nexis. Even a public library. Scribd subscriptions don't get too much griping.

But for consumer *retail* applications? No. Consumers understand that if they buy something, it needs to be transposable. For all the hassles they bring, both Kindle and ADEPT DRM at least are transportable. It's the absolute minimum requirement.

Full backup capability, ala DRM-FREE, of course being the gold standard. eReader was good that way. Watermark DRM, ditto. If you can back it up and don't, that's on you.

[pwalker8]

In general for ebooks, DRM exists to keep people from simply trading books around within their circle of friends, like people do with paperback books. As long as it discourages the casual piracy, i.e. sending a copy to all your friends so you can talk about it next Friday night at your book club, it serves it's purpose for most publishers and authors.

From a book seller point of view, as long as it keeps most people in the ecosystem, a la the Kindle and Books ebook stores, it serves it's purpose. There are enough old kindles out there than trying to put put some super DRM would be more trouble than it's worth.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by ilovejedd

The first consideration I had before first buying ebooks was can I remove DRM?

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Before buying my first ebook and ereader I researched the topic of ebooks quite thoroughly and decided that I was never going to buy a single book I cannot remove the DRM from.

I went through the same process, which (ironically) led me to Barnes and Noble. At that time, when the Nook ST with Glowlight was the hot ereader and they were using their 'social DRM', B&N was at their peak. Sadly, things went downhill and then caught on fire on the way

[frahse]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

I honestly had no idea the Microsoft Store even had an "ebook" business to get out of. That probably has something to do with me having never been to the Microsoft Store, I suppose.

Wait; is that why Edge on Windows 10 annoyingly tries to open any ebooks I happen to click on?

Probably so. I don't use Edge so don't know specifically.

They will have to come to my house and pry my LIT ebooks from my "booby trapped IED" IDE hard drives.


Moderators,""booby trapped" is a JOKE.

Interestingly IED and IDE seem to be plays on the same letters.

[mrscoach]

Why would you trap a booby? What did it do to you?

[Apache]

Originally Posted by frahse

Probably so. I don't use Edge so don't know specifically.

They will have to come to my house and pry my LIT ebooks from my "booby trapped IED" IDE hard drives.


Moderators,""booby trapped" is a JOKE.

Interestingly IED and IDE seem to be plays on the same letters.

Originally Posted by mrscoach

Why would you trap a booby? What did it do to you?

Booby Trap

Booby

Apache

[Fiat_Lux]

Originally Posted by Sarmat89

Cory Doctorow is a clown. If you want to have a personal book, buy it in a store in paper. The cheap licenses to read the text of a book on your computing devices do not entitle you for a life-long ownership.

Cheap?
One of the ebooks on my wishlist is US$5,000. (Five thousand dollars, United States Currency.)
I don't remember how much the hardcopy is, but it isn't available through my local library as an interlibrary loan.

I've bought ebooks where the MSRP for the ebook was double the MSRP of the hardcopy. (IOW, the trade paperback is US$50, and the PDF is US$100.)
I'm paying for the convenience of having the book with me.

Amber

[Tony1988]

Originally Posted by Fiat_Lux

Cheap?
One of the ebooks on my wishlist is US$5,000. (Five thousand dollars, United States Currency.)
I don't remember how much the hardcopy is, but it isn't available through my local library as an interlibrary loan.

I've bought ebooks where the MSRP for the ebook was double the MSRP of the hardcopy. (IOW, the trade paperback is US$50, and the PDF is US$100.)
I'm paying for the convenience of having the book with me.

Amber

Lmao...what book cost $5000. Anyone asking $5000 for a book can keep it.

I agree with Sarmat. If you want a copy of the book...buy a hardcopy. Eventually one will lose all his ebooks, even if they are in a device somewhere. May take years and years. I personally only read most books once. The ones i would consider reading twice or maybe a beloved series, I will buy paper. The hassle of maintaining an electronic library of books is a waste of time imo. Especially if one has thousands of books. They will never, ever reread them all. The time, worry and money to maintain an electronic library one most likely will never re- read is a bit silly imo.

[darryl]

Originally Posted by Tony1988

Lmao...what book cost $5000. Anyone asking $5000 for a book can keep it.

I agree with Sarmat. If you want a copy of the book...buy a hardcopy. Eventually one will lose all his ebooks, even if they are in a device somewhere. May take years and years. I personally only read most books once. The ones i would consider reading twice or maybe a beloved series, I will buy paper. The hassle of maintaining an electronic library of books is a waste of time imo. Especially if one has thousands of books. They will never, ever reread them all. The time, worry and money to maintain an electronic library one most likely will never re- read is a bit silly imo.

You are of course entitled to your opinion. I have a very different one. I have no intention of buying any more print books. I like reading e-books, and am far more comfortable with an e-book than with a print book, since I have the option to change fonts and their attributes as my eyes age. I am paying for a book whether it be e-book or print book. I do re-read some books, and have no intention of paying again to do so. Storage of ebooks is easy and dirt cheap, even for multiple backups. I have no intention of losing all my e-books during my lifetime. I regard my e-book library as no more likely to be lost than a print book one. Probably less so. And far more accessible. Maintaining an e-book library in Calibre involves very little time or money, and is no worry.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by darryl

You are of course entitled to your opinion. I have a very different one. I have no intention of buying any more print books. I like reading e-books, and am far more comfortable with an e-book than with a print book, since I have the option to change fonts and their attributes as my eyes age. I am paying for a book whether it be e-book or print book. I do re-read some books, and have no intention of paying again to do so. Storage of ebooks is easy and dirt cheap, even for multiple backups. I have no intention of losing all my e-books during my lifetime. I regard my e-book library as no more likely to be lost than a print book one. Probably less so. And far more accessible. Maintaining an e-book library in Calibre involves very little time or money, and is no worry.

Yes, exactly. I should also mention that the hassle of maintaining an ebook library is nothing vs the hassle of maintaining a paper book library if one has to move or renovate. And in the case of fire you will lose all your paper books, but I can download all my ebooks again from Dropbox (if Dropbox should go out of business, I'll just use another cloud service). Of course I also keep local backups.

[haertig]

I can find something on my computer much faster than I can find an equivalent item in my house. I can remotely access it too. I lose physical things all the time, but electronic copies are "lost" only temporarily - until I can take a few minutes to do a search if I don't immediately recall where I put them in the file system (which is rare).

Also, the stuff on my computer is backed up to a second computer and also to an external hard disk. Additionally, it is backed up off site. And the really important stuff is additionally written to CD, DVD's and thumbdrives that are stored offsite in my bank safe deposit box.

My physical items are nowhere near as readily accessible or as safeguarded as my electronic copies. This is not a hassle, it's such a simple procedure when you know what you're doing. But then, my job is (was, I'm retired now) computers, networking, security, system administration, application development, programming, etc.

[ekbell]

Originally Posted by Tony1988

Lmao...what book cost $5000. Anyone asking $5000 for a book can keep it.

I agree with Sarmat. If you want a copy of the book...buy a hardcopy. Eventually one will lose all his ebooks, even if they are in a device somewhere. May take years and years. I personally only read most books once. The ones i would consider reading twice or maybe a beloved series, I will buy paper. The hassle of maintaining an electronic library of books is a waste of time imo. Especially if one has thousands of books. They will never, ever reread them all. The time, worry and money to maintain an electronic library one most likely will never re- read is a bit silly imo.

I or family members have lost or destroyed too many paper books through reading and carelessness for me to find this argument convincing. Unless you have the money to buy quality hardcovers, paper books actually start falling apart after a number of years of moderate use. I may lose my ebook library but so far it has survived computer failure and format shifting with minimal maintenance.

I do reread (or I'd never have noticed the paper books falling to pieces) and I also have a use for reference books (BTW search functions and having a library on a tablet has been very useful).

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by ekbell

I or family members have lost or destroyed too many paper books through reading and carelessness for me to find this argument convincing. Unless you have the money to buy quality hardcovers, paper books actually start falling apart after a number of years of moderate use. I may lose my ebook library but so far it has survived computer failure and format shifting with minimal maintenance.

These days, with free and paid cloud storage services all over, there is no excuse for losing an ebook library. Multiple copies on different services costs little effort.

If you're really paranoid about cloud services, large flash drives are plenty cheap so again, backing up the files to multiple drives including one off-site is only due diligence. Investing US$20 in a 128GB drive (or $50 for a 1TB portable HDD) is only sensible if you want to protect hundreds or even thousands worth of ebooks.

No valid excuses left.