After a one-year struggle of choosing a vendor and a model for a possible e-book reader, I've finally settled on an Amazon Kindle - a pretty neat piece of work that I have to admit I've instantly taken to liking.
However, as with just about anything that one's bound to like, there's an entire package of "buts" bundled with the associated item. This time, of course, it's the DRMs and the amazingly high e-book prices.
Now, some might already know of my disdain for the mentioned DRMs - to me, they're nothing but a waste of time and money for the publisher and developer of any type of software, as it takes just a fraction of effort for hackers to break their next generation of defense - and at the same time, legitimate customers end up being treated like dirt, which, admittedly, is not an attitude that I happen to enjoy. In any case, be it as it may, no sooner than I've got my Kindle, I've come across (thanks, Seagale) this lovely little article on publishers stiffing out the public libraries of funds for e-book usage.
As a TL;DR, some of the major book/e-book publishers are trying to impose various limitations on the number of use of e-books - as low as 26 in case of Harper-Collins - with a requirement to renew the purchase after the book has been read the said 26 times. Obviously, with the limited funding that public libraries get, this little scheme becomes quite taxing, and yet again, hits the segment of the population that the industry seems to have defaulted to the level of beggars and pocket thieves. Thanks, industry, students and the lower-middle/working class will remember you with gratitude!
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Personally I try to avoid using accessories that might, regardless of my desire, prevent or otherwise obstruct the usage of goods I've already purchased.
ReplyDeleteThere are sometimes more or less inevitable cases to this, like with Steam. But overall if, say, I have a new CD and I want to a) listen to it on my home player, b) listen to it outside like via phone, or player or whatever.
Techically wise some time ago I got PocketBook for these matters, and it works nice with a lot of formats, and has no DRM crap whatsoever.
Yeah, same here. I know that most things are made with a certain built-in "best before" date, like Japanese cars and the magic 250,000 km (or whatever it is these days) number after which it'll essentially fall apart, but at least such items are at least partially based on real-life material properties, and on actual production costs.
ReplyDeleteHow much does it cost to produce a scanned copy of Shakespeare's Sonnets and its distribution? Next to nothing. Why should it break down after 26 uses? Why does it cost ten dollars? Is a mystery, yes.
By the way, Kindle itself only has some form of "DRM" on its books, the device itself seems to be a basic book reader with PDF/mobi support (and I have a converter for all other cases anyway).