One of the anti-DRM arguments people often make is that if you make it easy enough for people to buy content legitimately, they won't need to pirate anymore. Here is a case study in favor of that argument: Thorin Kiosowski over at Lifehacker has a great essay up about why he stopped pirating media and started paying for it legitimately. Kiosowski begins by explaining why he pirated to begin with, namely that at the time, 'legit' digital media was confusing, expensive and failed to provide a good experience. He then lists three things that changed his mind: • He stopped feeling the need to own...

From a Post on Digital Book World [Press Release] SkyInk Studios Launching E-Book Subscription Service; booxl Seeks To Be A Leading E-Book Subscription Provider  Washington D.C.- e-book and book app developer, SkyInk Studios, has announced a plan to launch a new e-book subscription service, booxl. The service will employ a model similar to both Netflix and Spotify. Customers will be able to download the booxl app to view e-books and book apps through their tablet and e-reader devices and also stream the content online. The company began developing the platform some months ago as a way to offer their own titles and those of partner...

I've never been much of an app freak, but Spotify is one of the few services that seems to nearly always be running on my home laptop. And while I haven't yet tried out the Spotify app on my new Android phone (it's also available on Androids tabs, natch), the Verge points out today that the Kindle Fire is the latest addition to the Spotify party: "Fire owners [now have] access to the standard fleet of Spotify features like offline listening, Facebook integration, and access to the service's huge catalog of songs—assuming you're signed up for the $9.99 per month Spotify Premium...

And speaking of cloud-based subscription models for e-reading, Publishing Perspectives has another company-founder-written column. Justo Hidalgo, co-founder of 24Symbols (which we covered here and here), writes about the cloud-based subscription model of his company and how he believes it can turn pirates into paying customers. Hidalgo points out that the music and movie industries have shown that trying to fight piracy is a fairly futile, and that pirates are usually dedicated fans who want more control over the way they consume their media. (Which makes sense, really—why would you pirate something you didn’t want?) He thinks that publishers...