Libgourou: A Free Implementation of Adobe's Adept DRM on ePub/PDF Files • Hacker News Board

Re: Libgourou: A Free Implementation of Adobe's Adept DRM on ePub/PDF Files

#71

Post by freedomben » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 9:23 PM UTC

unhammer wrote: post #66

4ggr0 wrote: post #65

Last week I bought my first eReader. Bought a book which had Adobe DRM. Had to download Adobe Digital Editions, to activate the book/ACSM-file. The activation failed. Tried it multiple times on different systems. My eReader is now filled with books downloaded from semi-shady places, but free. Fuck DRM.

Is it possible to use this libgourou to fix this situation? So that it's possible to both pay for books and read them without wasting hours? I didn't quite understand from the readme if this is specific to library things. So far all solutions i've seen are either 1. Pay and not be able to read (on device of my choosing) 2. Not pay and be able to read wherever 3. Pay and spend hours fiddling with weird windows-only so…

Unfortunately I think buying DRM-ed books just perpetuates the shitty system. All they see are sales, and that DRM isn't affecting them. They have no idea (by it's nature) how many people are stripping that DRM.

IMHO you either need to buy it from a reputable (i.e. DRM-free) seller, or don't buy it at all. Otherwise you're voting with your money for DRM.

If you're an author, you can sell your books through Kindle or whatever, but also list them with an ethical seller that doesn't DRM them! Trust me, your book is going to pirated exactly the same amount regardless whether it has DRM or not. You are just hurting legitimate people who want to pay for your stuff (and losing sales from people like me in the process).

Re: Libgourou: A Free Implementation of Adobe's Adept DRM on ePub/PDF Files

#72

Post by freedomben » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 9:39 PM UTC

codazoda wrote: post #40

WolfeReader wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(Devil's advocate here) When you made an Amazon account, and each time you purchase one of their ebooks, you agree to their "Terms of Service", which states that you won't do some of the things you want to do with your ebook. Amazon wouldn't sell/license you the book if you told them you were going to break the DRM and read it on a Kobo. In effect, you're lying to Amazon in order to use their property in a way they s…

Self-published author here—I agree with these points and I hate DRM myself. I write DRM free books and I publish them on Amazon for the Kindle. Since they ask authors, I presume they share the DRM status too, although maybe not as prominently. I recently decided to buy another Kindle. I prefer paper books but I’m running low on space. When I looked at my library I realized the Kindle app has faithfully kept a list of…

This makes sense, but what happens when the new Kindle sucks and you want to switch to the new super cool $startup e-reader? Can't take any of your books with you, so you have to hope that Amazon write an app for your new platform and that that app doesn't suck. So you're essentially trading long-term/future capabilities for a better short-term user experience. That might be worth it, after all it's hard to predict what will happen in the future. But I don't want to worry that someday I might not like the new Kindle and mine breaks, and I want to switch platforms and lose access to my whole library.

Are you able to save/export your own notes to PDF or something? (genuinely asking) I would be maniacal if I lost my handwritten notes to that! (I love my Remarkable tablet for it's ability to easily upload notes as PDFs to Google Drive).

I don't know how you feel about privacy, but behind that reading history data that you can see is details about exactly which pages you read, when you read them, where you read them, how long you were on the page, anything you happened to touch there, and more. Have you read any books that you would be embarrassed to admit to publicly? I have never had to worry that my paper book was spying on me, nor the epub version of the book.

Re: Libgourou: A Free Implementation of Adobe's Adept DRM on ePub/PDF Files

#73

Post by freedomben » Thu, Apr 11, 2024, 9:42 PM UTC

goosedragons wrote: post #60

codazoda wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Self-published author here—I agree with these points and I hate DRM myself. I write DRM free books and I publish them on Amazon for the Kindle. Since they ask authors, I presume they share the DRM status too, although maybe not as prominently. I recently decided to buy another Kindle. I prefer paper books but I’m running low on space. When I looked at my library I realized the Kindle app has faithfully kept a list of…

Amazon will put DRM on a "DRM-free" book if it's using their new format KFX.

Yeah I know somebody who has been buying kindle books for years planning to remove the DRM at some point, but it's never a great time. It finally was a good time for it and he discovered that he no longer can (even though his proof-of-concept test years ago worked fine). I would be beyond irritated if I had to isolate my Kindle from the internet and hope a vulerability is found that I'm capable of using, just for the chance to liberate books I purchased.

Re: Libgourou: A Free Implementation of Adobe's Adept DRM on ePub/PDF Files

#74

Post by 4ggr0 » Fri, Apr 12, 2024, 6:59 AM UTC

unhammer wrote: post #66

4ggr0 wrote: post #65

Last week I bought my first eReader. Bought a book which had Adobe DRM. Had to download Adobe Digital Editions, to activate the book/ACSM-file. The activation failed. Tried it multiple times on different systems. My eReader is now filled with books downloaded from semi-shady places, but free. Fuck DRM.

Is it possible to use this libgourou to fix this situation? So that it's possible to both pay for books and read them without wasting hours? I didn't quite understand from the readme if this is specific to library things. So far all solutions i've seen are either 1. Pay and not be able to read (on device of my choosing) 2. Not pay and be able to read wherever 3. Pay and spend hours fiddling with weird windows-only so…

I want to try it today, with the book I initially bought. Since buying it I've downloaded it from a different place, and even if Libgourou works, will probably not go back to buying DRMed books.

Not that used to compiling stuff myself, wasn't able to get Libgourou working yesterday, but I'll try today :)

Re: Libgourou: A Free Implementation of Adobe's Adept DRM on ePub/PDF Files

#75

Post by 4ggr0 » Fri, Apr 12, 2024, 9:14 PM UTC

4ggr0 wrote: post #74

unhammer wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it possible to use this libgourou to fix this situation? So that it's possible to both pay for books and read them without wasting hours? I didn't quite understand from the readme if this is specific to library things. So far all solutions i've seen are either 1. Pay and not be able to read (on device of my choosing) 2. Not pay and be able to read wherever 3. Pay and spend hours fiddling with weird windows-only so…

I want to try it today, with the book I initially bought. Since buying it I've downloaded it from a different place, and even if Libgourou works, will probably not go back to buying DRMed books. Not that used to compiling stuff myself, wasn't able to get Libgourou working yesterday, but I'll try today :)

EDIT FROM MYSELF: I think the .acsm which the shop gave me is broken. There are some sample .acsm's from Adobe which I've tested, and they work. But not the book I actually bought.

I gave DRM a chance. And similar to movies and shows, torrenting or other means seem way more usable. Time for the pirate hat, arrrrr.