101–110 of 145 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
There are people who have 200GB of books (non-fiction only so none of the fiction books that seem to come out at an alarming rate every day)
Books that are 350MB individually* Many comic books from recent humble bundles have been around that size, for example.
I've always just used Calibre because it's a nice way for me to strip DRM and then archive my books. I've never really used it any kind of active way. Since I buy pretty much everything from Amazon, I already effectively have a content server. Does anybody have a link to an online server (with public domain books)? I'm curious to see what the presentation is like. What's the typography like? Does the screen dim after…
Why are you guys so concerned about authors trying to control the profitless distribution of their product? I'm being serious -- what's the issue?
I've always just used Calibre because it's a nice way for me to strip DRM and then archive my books. I've never really used it any kind of active way. Since I buy pretty much everything from Amazon, I already effectively have a content server. Does anybody have a link to an online server (with public domain books)? I'm curious to see what the presentation is like. What's the typography like? Does the screen dim after…
Why are you guys so concerned about authors trying to control the profitless distribution of their product? I'm being serious -- what's the issue?
When I buy books I can give them away, I can resell them, I can loan them to you, I can leave them to my kids in my will, and I can read them in any country that I want.
I want to be able to do the same things with digital books. I remove the DRM from every book that I buy and I feel no guilt over doing so. Today I read on a Kindle, but maybe tomorrow I want to buy a Kobo device. When I do, I don't want to lose access to my library.
Is any of that unreasonable?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why are you guys so concerned about authors trying to control the profitless distribution of their product? I'm being serious -- what's the issue?
Because their quest for control works only when it restricts the things I've always been able to do with paper books. When I buy books I can give them away, I can resell them, I can loan them to you, I can leave them to my kids in my will, and I can read them in any country that I want. I want to be able to do the same things with digital books. I remove the DRM from every book that I buy and I feel no guilt over doi…
Authors need to get paid. I completely understand the irritation DRM presents, but if you want to be able to resell your books or pass them down through the generations, maybe paper copies are the way to go under our present conditions.
A second question. Most of us, I presume, work in software. How do you approach the distribution of your work? Is unlimited piracy of your code an acceptable price to pay for giving customers unfettered access to the product of your labor, in your eyes?
I've always just used Calibre because it's a nice way for me to strip DRM and then archive my books. I've never really used it any kind of active way. Since I buy pretty much everything from Amazon, I already effectively have a content server. Does anybody have a link to an online server (with public domain books)? I'm curious to see what the presentation is like. What's the typography like? Does the screen dim after…
How do you differentiate between DRM-free and DRM-protected books on Amazon? Up until I have read this comment, I didn't even know that Amazon support DRM-free books.
We've been releasing ours with the same CC license as Cory Doctorow, but honestly very few people really seem to care, unfortunately.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Because their quest for control works only when it restricts the things I've always been able to do with paper books. When I buy books I can give them away, I can resell them, I can loan them to you, I can leave them to my kids in my will, and I can read them in any country that I want. I want to be able to do the same things with digital books. I remove the DRM from every book that I buy and I feel no guilt over doi…
Perhaps that's just the price you pay for access to ebooks at all -- particularly via an incredibly convenient system like Kindle? (Also, loaning -- the most pressing concern here -- is supported.) Authors need to get paid. I completely understand the irritation DRM presents, but if you want to be able to resell your books or pass them down through the generations, maybe paper copies are the way to go under our prese…
You suggest sticking with paper books, but the accessibility benefits (ie large typefaces or screenreaders) that you get with ebooks is hard to give up. For some people, it isn't a matter of choosing between paper or digital, it's digital or nothing.
I agree that authors should usually get paid (I say usually because I support public libraries). However, I don't think there's much evidence that DRM helps authors get paid. Is there a popular book that hasn't been pirated thanks to DRM? Do you think the Amazon lock-in that DRM provides is good for the industry? I certainly don't.
As for your second question, you are probably not going to get the answer you expect. Lots of people here support and work on free and open source software.
Related but slightly off topic: Am I the only one who is turned off to calibre due to how "heavy" and clunky it feels? I suspect this is due to the program being written in Java. I think the author does great work maintaining the project but frankly wish it was more modern. Perhaps this is a good side project for me to delve into ;) EDIT: thanks to users who clarified that Calibre is written in python.
I am a happy user of Calibre and am grateful for the work the author has done, but I've never heard a convincing explanation of why it is so slow when adding books and updating metadata. 10-15 seconds to add a 500KB ePub. I have apps that will transcode 4K video at a higher throughput than that. What's it doing?!