An interesting perspective, though the comments have some quibbles with the argument put forward.

(Source: twitter.com)

(Source: twitter.com)

Unglue.it works by allowing the rights holders of an already-published book to set a funding threshold—generally between $5,000 to $25,000—and a deadline for a funding campaign. If supporters pledge sufficient funding prior to the campaign deadline, the book will be released as an “unglued” ebook edition, free of digital rights management (DRM) software, and free to copy and share under a Creative Commons license.

If I understand correctly, it’s basically Kickstarter for converting books into DRM-free ebooks.

(Source: twitter.com)

Let’s recap.  Customers today are expected to buy into a format that locks down their content into a silo, limits their purchasing choices based on where their credit card happens to have been registered, is designed to work best on devices that are rapidly becoming obsolete, and support only a tiny subset of the functionality available on any modern website.  Nonetheless, publishers are seeing their e-book sales skyrocket and congratulate themselves on a job well done.  How come?

(Source: twitter.com)

Even though the decision could possibly signal a lessening of fear among some publishers, DRM will remain an integral part of the library lending workflow for the foreseeable future. Whatever rethinking is going on among publishers, and that in itself could be a positive, it still remains that what a publisher decides to do with DRM on the retail side does not necessarily correlate to anything they will do with DRM on the library side.

[…]

A number of publishers, such as Osprey Publishing (parent of Angry Robot), F+W Media, and O’Reilly Media, make books available without DRM, but this does not translate to the library channel, which relies on DRM as the mechanism to control one of its quintessential functions – the loan—as well as to impose the one-book, one-user lending model.

It’s a good point that the way library ebook lending currently works actually requires DRM, despite the problems with DRM in the public marketplace. I would argue that DRM used in that context makes some sense in that it allows us to lend ebooks. But how long are we going to cling to the old metaphors that require us to treat ebooks as if they are physical books (i.e. one book, one user)? Is there a better way we could be doing this? The only comparison I can think of offhand is to PDFs of journal articles… should libraries and publishers be figuring out a way that libraries can allow patrons to download ebooks like they do PDFs? (What would the pricing for that look like?)

(Source: twitter.com)

Recently, I began chatting with a publishing industry executive about this. This person — who I’ll call Exec — was interested in learning how to break DRM on e-books. About a month later, Exec is a convert and was ready to talk about the experience, albeit anonymously. I don’t think Exec is the only person in the publishing industry breaking DRM on e-books they buy…and those who aren’t doing so already might want to give it a try, if only to see what readers go through. Here is Exec’s story.

(Source: twitter.com)

Has DRM prevented piracy? That seems unlikely, since it is relatively easy to get around those locks and copy a book if you really want to. What is pretty clear, however, is that those rights-management locks have cemented Amazon’s control over the publishers’ content. In other words, it has given the online retailer a stick with which to beat them, as Stross described it recently. And it has also made it more difficult for some independent e-book sellers, because publishers won’t let them sell their books without DRM.

(Source: twitter.com)

Following up on comments last week in which the RIAA finally admitted that innovation is the best tool for tackling piracy, Brin said that the piracy problem would continue as long as people found it easier than using legitimate offerings.

“I haven’t tried it for many years but when you go on a pirate website, you choose what you like; it downloads to the device of your choice and it will just work,” Brin explained, adding that the restrictive mechanisms employed by authorized sites only represent artificial walls and “disincentives for people to buy.”

(Source: twitter.com)

In 2011, Macmillan made headlines during its tense standoff with Amazon over e-book pricing, but the publisher was able to sway Amazon because it could make a credible threat that it might get up from the negotiating table and take all its books, too—and others might follow. But Macmillan’s edge—its scale—is also its undoing. Every day, Macmillan sells more e-books that have been locked into Amazon’s format. The millions of dollars that Amazon customers spend on Macmillan’s DRM-locked e-books represent millions of dollars of e-books Macmillan customers lose if they wanted to follow Macmillan away from Amazon. Publishers believe DRM protects their books. But DRM has created a world where publishers who walk away from negotiations with a DRM vendor like Amazon leave their customers behind.

(Source: twitter.com)

Imagine buying a car that locks you into one brand of fuel. A new BMW, for example, that only runs on BMW gas. There are plenty of BMW gas stations around, even a few in your neighborhood, so convenience isn’t an issue. But if one of those other gas stations offers a discount, a membership program, or some other attractive marketing campaign, you can’t participate. You’re locked in with the BMW gas stations.

This could never happen, right? Consumers are too smart to buy into something like this. Or are they? After all, isn’t that exactly what’s happening in the ebook world? You buy a dedicated ebook reader like a Kindle or a NOOK and you’re locked in to that company’s content. Part of this problem has to do with ebook formats (e.g., EPUB or Mobipocket) while another part of it stems from publisher insistence on the use of digital rights management (DRM). Let’s look at these issues individually.

(Source: twitter.com)

There’s plenty of excellent reasons to stagger the release of a new piece of software on an international scale: Doing so keeps servers from melting into pools of unusable silicon, and preserves the sanity of help desk agents, if only for a little while. That said, if a game’s not available in the states, even though the Italians have had it for a week, you know that someone, somewhere is going to be pirating that bad boy.  By giving consumers what they want simultaneously on an international level, developers could strike another reason for illegally downloading an application from the the litany of excuses pirates have been employing for years. 

This is also the case for movies and some TV shows.

(Source: twitter.com)

For various reasons the major publishers don’t sell direct to the public themselves — they go via external retail channels. Of these channels, Amazon is the 500kg gorilla of internet sales. Amazon has ruthlessly used its near monopoly of online sales to exert monopsony buying pressure against suppliers, forcing the likes of Holtzbrinck or Penguin or Hachette to give them a deep discount on ebooks. In the past they have de-listed publishers’ paper editions during negotiations, chopping their sales off at the knees in an attempt to force them to grant favourable sales terms. When Amazon extract deeper discounts from their suppliers, they pass some of the discount on to the public — this expands their monopoly position on the retail side by undercutting their rivals. It’s good for customers in the short term, but it’s not good for anyone in the long run: they’re sweating their suppliers, all the way back down the supply chain (read: to authors like me) and sooner or later they’ll put their suppliers out of business.

Anyway, my point is that the Big Six’s pig-headed insistence on DRM on ebooks is handing Amazon a stick with which to beat them harder.

(Source: twitter.com)

A second major publisher has altered the deal by which libraries can lend ebooks via libraryland über-vendor Overdrive. In February, the first publisher, Harper Collins, restricted the number of checkouts of its ebooks. Yesterday, word came down that Penguin Group USA is suspending libraries’ lending of  the publishers’ new ebook titles. Given that with Kindle format ebooks, both new and backlist titles are affected, Penguin’s move essentially eliminates Kindle support from a subset of Overdrive’s collections.

Of course, I can’t help but think, “here we go again,” because this latest situation reinforces what we learned during HCOD about the weaknesses in the agreements through which libraries can lend ebooks. Libraries get handed restrictions major restrictions on content from publishers, without evidence of legitimate threats to their content; and yet  libraries have no voice: Overdrive negotiates ostensibly on behalf of libraries; but when Penguin advised Overdrive to suspend lending of some of its ebooks last week, libraries were not advised. As Overdrive says it is “working with Penguin on this issue”, libraries are not part of that process: we cannot state our case and advocate for our patrons.  Because libraries have given so much control to Overdrive, our relationships with publishers have been compromised. Libraries are not partners, we’re customers. So, Amazon can build ads into Overdrive, but we can’t build our values into Adobe Digital Editions.

(Source: twitter.com)

Trying to consume an e-book can be an infuriating experience.

Consumers like me want to enjoy the digital version of a book when, where and how we want. We love to be able to read it from multiple screens, search it automatically, share annotations, even have the text read aloud as we drive or do dishes.

In theory that’s the promise of the new world of book publishing. But in practice, we’re blocked at many turns and end up looking for other solutions. For publishers and booksellers, that’s not a good thing, and can even be quite costly.

(Source: twitter.com)