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“The books will stop working.”

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Re: “The books will stop working.”

#221

Post by ohithereyou »

jgtrosh wrote: post #93
logifail wrote: post #84

My grandmother is in her late 90s, has dementia, and is in a care home. My mother sent me this update last week: > Went to see Granny yesterday, was quite cheerful, read though the poems in "When we were very young"[0], her original copy[1], given to her in 1928, how about that. She knows them off by heart and joins in when you read them to her Q: When we're in our late 90s, how many of us will be able to consume 90-…

I'm pretty sure I'll happily recite The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny.

The real tragedy of this is that nobody will know who Mister Rogers is by that time.

Re: “The books will stop working.”

#222

Post by the_af »

AnssiH wrote: post #142
the_af wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine if one day you went to find your well-thumbed, most loved book in your bookshelf, maybe to re-read your favorite chapter, and the physical book was missing, replaced by a note from the publisher: "this book no longer works, but worry not: we've refunded you!"

But this is not a physical book, so it is not a "unique" copy. All of my e-books are entirely replaceable by buying them again from a different store (or as a physical book).

It doesn't matter whether it's unique. I'd find it outrageous if a book disappeared from my bookshelf on a publisher's whim even if the physical book was otherwise unimpressive -- even if, in fact, it wasn't a very good book to begin with. The book is mine. The publisher cannot decide when it stops working. Only a force of nature, like a fire, can take my books away from me.

If you're content in the knowledge that you can buy your e-books again whenever a publisher decides to make them stop working for you, good for you. Me, I'm not happy letting publishers win and trample my rights. In fact, much like the original tweet, I find the notion outrageous.

Re: “The books will stop working.”

#223

Post by patmcc »

tolmasky wrote: post #83
blakesterz wrote: post #15

Can you imagine someone trying to start public libraries if they didn't already exist now? I think it's safe to say it would never ever happen, at least in the US. Between lobbying and the general disdain for most things run by any type of government here, they'd never have a chance. Luckily we still have places that still purchase printed books (along with ebooks) and you can go borrow them any time and they never s…

If we merely had the same copyright we had when the country first formed, this entire "your books turn off thing" would possibly be completely acceptable: a subset of works would be onerous and somewhat annoying for 28 years, after which you could literally do whatever you want with them. Key here is that this means that within your lifetime this would quite possibly be the case. This also means that a very large var…

>>>a subset of works would be onerous and somewhat annoying for 28 years, after which you could literally do whatever you want with them.

Unfortunately, what would probably happen is more like what is happening to video games now; they are no longer profitable to publish, don't exist in an easy-to-backup, easy-to-share format (like an epub file with no DRM, for example), and so are essentially lost to time. If an ebook that no one can access is suddenly in the public domain, that doesn't help anyone one iota.

Re: “The books will stop working.”

#225

Post by la_barba »

jforberg wrote: post #212
la_barba wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you found a solution to piracy that doesn't involve DRM? What was its success rate? I'm sure the publishers would love to switch to a better system if it exists.

Are you implying that DRM is a solution to piracy? If anything, DRM is a big driver for piracy, and its success rate is near zero. Virtually all major DRM-"protected" works are available on thepiratebay shortly after release. Sometimes before release. The "better solution" is to treat your customers with respect and let them own their bought goods. Gog.com is a good example here, in my opinion. What definitely doesn'…

Its fine to have an opinion on how things should be, but some of your assertions are not based on facts.

>Virtually all major DRM-"protected" works are available on thepiratebay shortly after release. Sometimes before release.

"Virtually all Server OSs get hacked/have had security bugs. Nobody should use them to host or store anything."

All you're saying is that DRM isn't perfect. Nothing is perfect, and it isn't exactly a revelation.

If it were impossible to pirate Windows, would all the pirates switch to Linux or another Free OS? If the answer is No, then a non-zero number of people will go out and purchase Windows. From a sales standpoint, preventing piracy is definitely going to drive sales. Also, if your answer is Yes to the question, then all the Free OS advocates should be making it impossible to pirate Windows. :)

>The "better solution" is to treat your customers with respect and let them own their bought goods. Gog.com is a good example here, in my opinion.

If we accept your premise that DRM == disrespecting customers, then you'll have to account for why people are still selling stuff with DRM, and continuing to make millions and millions of dollars. Do customers like being disrespected?

>What definitely doesn't work is to burden your paying customers with digital locks and hurdles to enjoyment, that the pirates will shortly find a way to remove for the non-paying audience.

The success of DRM'd products refutes your claim, entirely.

Re: “The books will stop working.”

#226

Post by 3xblah »

If you look up the word "browse" in a dictionary, you will see that it now has an entry relating to computer networks.

When we browse items in a library, we can see context, we can see neighbouring items. Even some of the library database software today allows you to do this on the computer, simulating the physical experience.

Maybe some of you can remember searching an item then going to retrieve it from the stacks and ending up just browsing the neighbouring items and discoevring even better items. I often discovered the best items through just browsing in a section, in the stacks.

This is one element that is missing from today's web. It is probably one reason why a search engine can become the most popular site on the web. The search engine controls the user's view of the web. The user cannot see the "stacks". Nor can she browse them as she would in a library to discover what is there.

Libraries impose an order that is missing from the web. Something like a Dewey Decimal classification system where a number reveals something about what is found in that location. IP addresses reveal almost nothing to us about the item(s) that may be found there; and whatever they reveal is not intentional. These numbers are in turn "hidden" behind potentially ambiguous names that sidestep the trademark system, another proven classification system, that serves to eliminate ambiguity and deception of consumers.

In the past I have seen some sites that listed the entire IP address space in numerical order where it was possible to browse at least some minimal information on each network number. These always seem to go offline eventually, as if they are breaking some rule.

Imagine going into a library where you were not allowed to visit the stacks or see neighbouring items, where the ordering of the items was a secret and all you could do is perform "keyword" searches. Imagine the results would not be ordered alphabetically, chronologically, or even by a known method of determining relevance (that too is secret). Imagine you could not sort the results or get a quick copy of all of them for reference. Imagine the library set the order of the results according to some "secret" methodology and preferred that you only view the first 5-10 items.

Re: “The books will stop working.”

#227

Post by la_barba »

mdpopescu wrote: post #209
la_barba wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you found a solution to piracy that doesn't involve DRM? What was its success rate? I'm sure the publishers would love to switch to a better system if it exists.

For movies? Netflix. For books? Piracy is irrelevant. (See far too many articles from Konrath, who at one point uploaded all his books on a torrent site AND advertised that on his blog... to no effect on his sales.)

I don't know if you know this, but DRM is a core part of Netflix. No studio would ever have signed up with them if they couldn't control distribution.

>See far too many articles from Konrath, who at one point uploaded all his books on a torrent site AND advertised that on his blog... to no effect on his sales

I am not familiar with that example. Any link to the data?

Re: “The books will stop working.”

#228

Post by Sirened »

amaccuish wrote: post #170
Johnny555 wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you strip Kindle DRM? asking for a friend.

Search for DeDRM plugin for calibre. There's several ways to do it. If you have a physical kindle, you can download the books from your amazon account, and plug the serial number of your kindle into DeDRM. If you have the Kindle for PC or Mac app, DeDRM can pick up the relevent keys. I recommend getting the books in the AWZ3 format rather than KFX.

I couldn't make the desktop application ripping mechanic work. Apparently you need to download an ancient version which still uses AWZ3 since KFX wasn't support. I got lucky since I had an old gen one kindle on my account so I was able to download the files from my account portal but I think I would've been out of luck otherwise.

Re: “The books will stop working.”

#230

Post by justinmeiners »

docker_up wrote: post #13

I have a close friend who published an engineering text book. He worked a couple of years on it and it was well received in his particular field. The book was pirated within months and is freely available on PDF. It's unfair that his hard work is being used globally for free. So yes, having books shut off sucks but so does piracy.

This definitely sucks. Why do you think people are buying this book? Is it required for a course?

When there is a book I need, but don't want, I'll get by with a PDF. When its a book I want, I buy the real thing, because I enjoy having it. Just curious, what the intended use of the book is, and whether you think a similar attitude might have had any effect.

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