But beyond that, are the limits imposed by the BN DRM format substantially different than Amazon’s DRM format?

Thanks.

Amazon wants to hook as many readers as possible into the Kindle system, THEN they’ll up the price. Meanwhile, they are taking the biggest cut off the top of the book’s profit of any ebook distributor.

If they win the ebook distribution war, God help publishers and authors because they’ll own us or destroy us.

Right now, they are getting serious competition, but they are smart and have beaten the socks off of or bought anyone who has tried to top their paper or used sales so my money is on Amazon as the major player in the future.

Didn’t Ben Franklin say that? Anyway…

I, too, would have sooner paid more for an e-book presented the way I wanted it, then accept a format (and DRM) I didn’t appreciate, just to save a few bucks. IMO, you get what you pay for.

Presently there are a number of books that have been out for a year or more, but not yet in e-book formats… or (in the case of the latest Wild Cards novel) in e-books priced at hardcover price. As much as I want to read those books, I’ve refused to touch them, and I won’t until they are offered in a way that I’ll accept, reasonably priced and with No DRM. If they don’t become reasonable… they won’t get bought. Period. End of a series I’ve enjoyed for almost 2 decades now.

Because I want to be entertained, just as I want to entertain with my own novels… but not at the expense of getting ripped off.

The market will bear what the market will bear.

In this case the endpoint “solution”, for now, appears to be a new philosophy within Windows where the OS will now explicitly identify performance-sapping and/or crash inducing applications so people stop blaming Windows for the OEM’s crimes.
Would be nice if people boycotted laptop vendors that load their product with ad-ware but that ad- and demo-ware brings upfront money to the table so removing it costs them money. For the vendors the choice is literally selling a clean version at a higher street price, losing sales, or an infested version at a lower price. Given that most of the savvy folks know how to remove the ad-ware they go with the polluted boxes and give Apple all the room they need for their product-libel ads.
That is life in the real world, unfortunately.
The market bears what the market bears.
Sometimes the price is money, sometimes convenience, sometimes features.
Crusades can nudge the market sometimes but even crusaders have to live in the real world.
One should always be prepared for all outcomes; it may be that ebook DRM dies entirely (doubtful unless ebook libraries die with it), it may get toned down (very possible but not certain), or it could be that the market will find that the bulk of the buying public doesn’t care about DRM the way us theoreticians do.
At that point the option would be to join the black helicopter crowd prepared to live off the grid and google’s ad-supported library or make a peace with honor with the enemy.
Time will tell but a bit of pragmatism never hurts any crusade. More often it is the uncompromising true believers that hurt the cause. (See AMIGA, Commodore; OS2, IBM for examples.)
A sense of perspective can only help the cause and the final goal.
Here, I think we all agree the final goal is a pricing and distribution system that allows the ebook industry to grow and flourish and deliver something close to the full potential of the technology. And it would help to pay attention to what the market tells us cause that is the sign of things to come.
So far, the market cares about DRM… a bit.
The market cares about functionality, convenience, and reading experience a bit more.
And the market cares about pricing…a whole LOT!
That may change, but I’m thinking the pricing war needs to be settled before the DRM war gets addressed.

The market will bear what the market will bear.

In this case the endpoint “solution”, for now, appears to be a new philosophy within Windows where the OS will now explicitly identify performance-sapping and/or crash inducing applications so people stop blaming Windows for the OEM’s crimes.
Would be nice if people boycotted laptop vendors that load their product with ad-ware but that ad- and demo-ware brings upfront money to the table so removing it costs them money. For the vendors the choice is literally selling a clean version at a higher street price, losing sales, or an infested version at a lower price. Given that most of the savvy folks know how to remove the ad-ware they go with the polluted boxes and give Apple all the room they need for their product-libel ads.
That is life in the real world, unfortunately.
The market bears what the market bears.
Sometimes the price is money, sometimes convenience, sometimes features.
Crusades can nudge the market sometimes but even crusaders have to live in the real world.
One should always be prepared for all outcomes; it may be that ebook DRM dies entirely (doubtful unless ebook libraries die with it), it may get toned down (very possible but not certain), or it could be that the market will find that the bulk of the buying public doesn’t care about DRM the way us theoreticians do.
At that point the option would be to join the black helicopter crowd prepared to live off the grid and google’s ad-supported library or make a peace with honor with the enemy.
Time will tell but a bit of pragmatism never hurts any crusade. More often it is the uncompromising true believers that hurt the cause. (See AMIGA, Commodore; OS2, IBM for examples.)
A sense of perspective can only help the cause and the final goal.
Here, I think we all agree the final goal is a pricing and distribution system that allows the ebook industry to grow and flourish and deliver something close to the full potential of the technology. And it would help to pay attention to what the market tells us cause that is the sign of things to come.
So far, the market cares about DRM… a bit.
The market cares about functionality, convenience, and reading experience a bit more.
And the market cares about pricing…a whole LOT!
That may change, but I’m thinking the pricing war needs to be settled before the DRM war gets addressed.

EReader.com is offering the Conroy and other new titles for 9.95 — while the title is DRMd, the DRM is the most customer-friendly there is, and the book can be read on any device that supports the ereader format.

Just fyi.

Bests to all,

–tr

We can show the publishers we want non-drm ebooks by buying non-drm ebooks. And we can write letters to them telling them we want non-drm ebooks. They’d have to be pretty stupid not to get a clue. And if they don’t get a clue, that’s fine with me. There are people selling non-drm ebooks.

I would also rent a drm ebook – for a dollar or less.

Holding your breath until you turn blue doesn’t work because even if you keep holding your breath, the worst that will happen is you will pass out, at which time you’ll breathe again. It’s self defeating. It’s pointless. And it’s a bad analogy.

I can live without ebooks forever. Let them stop selling them. It’s ok with me.

There is a huge amount of free ebooks already available that I doubt are going anywhere as long as they’re in the public domain, and there are plenty of new authors willing to take advantage of the internet and give their work away to expose themselves to new readers.

If you don’t care about drm, then that’s your choice. The problem is people who say they hate drm and want it gone, but who keep on buying drm ebooks. Your money is speaking louder than any complaints you may have. You can’t keep saying you don’t want it, while PROVING you’re willing to pay for it.

I was just looking at the Simon and Schuster website. They are selling ebooks for the same price as hardcovers. Ha. There is no comparison in the value for the dollar, the hardcover is worth infinitely more than an ebook version is. But hey, if people are willing to buy, they’re willing to sell.

I sincerely doubt ebooks are going away. Publishers are just trying to figure out how much they can screw us for, I mean sell them for of course.

When I buy a DRM’ed book I’m aware of the limitations and chance that I may not be able to keep access to the book in perpetuity. I’m fine with “renting” ebooks.

Certainly I would prefer a world where ebooks would be available in a device agnostic DRM free format. That is not the world as it currently exists.

If we follow your lead and just refuse to buy anything with DRM then what will happen?

Will publishers just give in and say “OK…you win we will start selling our goods without DRM” or is it just as likely that they will decide that shows there really is no market for ebooks?

While you may not really care about encouraging a burgeoning market for ebooks many others do. I have a few thousand print books in my home library – I really don’t have room for many more. Nowadays, I would prefer to buy the vast majority of the books I want in digital form (I would prefer to save the remaining cubic feet in my house for those books that really need to be in print form).

I think it is more important at this time to show publishers that there is indeed a market waiting for and wanting ebooks and to send a signal what a likely price point for most ebook titles should be. It seems most major publishers really want to try and establish ebook pricing at somewhere near the same price as the print book. I don’t think most buyers will accept that – DRM or sans DRM.

If we all just stay out of the ebook marketplace I think that will turn out to be about as effective as threatening to hold our breath until we turn blue. If I remember correctly that never seemed to work – our parents always won in those situations.

We all have to make the choices that are right for us. But when you buy a drm’d book, you’re telling the seller that they can keep on selling because you’re going to keep on buying. Your dollars speak much louder than any words against what you’re buying. Complain, complain, complain, but YOU’RE STILL BUYING. It’s all background noise, drowned out by the sound of cash registers ringing. You don’t like drm, but your position isn’t so firm that you’re willing to back it up with your dollars. Your choice to make, but let’s not pretend it’s anything other than what it is.

There is lots of free content out there, I’m not at all worried about zero content. And if I want a best seller I can get it at my library or buy a hard copy. I’m not so enthralled with reading ebooks that I’m going to willingly be screwed around.

Where are these Sony Vaio laptops now? Unfortunately people would buy a laptop filled with crap because they don’t know that’s what they’re getting. Once they learn what’s being offered, I hope they would be smart enough to choose a different laptop.

I also wanted to add to my list of what makes an ebook valuable – formatting. The quality of what we’re being sold is ridiculously insultingly poor. That plus the DRM and price issues, multiple file formats, all these things make the ebook market a big ugly mess right now. As I said, I like reading ebooks, but not so much that I’m going to keep parting with my money for a poor quality high priced product. I’d rather go without, or choose a better alternative. And I’ve lived a long time just fine without ebooks. They have no leverage over me to force me into buying.

Fiction would be a tough sell to me. I do buy fiction in hardcover, but from a limited number of authors, wuch as David Weber and Harry Turtledove. Otherwise I buy fiction in ebook form, but only if it is DRM free.

To me DRM reduces a book’s value by 75-90% and I am unwilling to pay above $5 for a DRM-ladened book.

I don’t think David did the rigt thing because he muddied his message and simply demonstrated to Amazon that even the most vocal anti-DRMer will buy a DRMed book if the price is right. I disagree with HeavyG that this is a way to say that $9.99 is the DRM price point. Eventually, unless the publishers capitulate, Amazon will have to raise that price point. What would David have done if Amazon sold Conroy’s book at $12.99 and all other bookstores were selling it at $14.99 in ebook form? If David bought at $12.99, what would the message have been then?

Is the Teleread motto now “Do as I say, not as I do”?

So yes, by all means; don’t buy DRM’ed content if you don’t want to. (I try not to.)
But be aware that the alternative may be zero content, not DRM-free content.

Its great to rail against insanity but railing only goes so far. Sometimes you just have to settle for what you can get; commerce is about negotiation, not dictation. Leverage only goes so far. And the big publishing houses would *love* it, if they could make ebooks go away entirely.