The Sword and Laser discussion
DRM free books from Tor
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It really comes down to the publishers and Tor is a publisher. It will be interesting to see if the Tor books on Amazon remove the DRM since I know they also sell ebooks direct.
I'm sure a DRM decision would play a part, but what I want is a cloud service that I can buy a book from and know that I have a future-proof access to the book at any time. It bugs me that I purchased the first two ASOIAF for my Palm many years ago, but lost them in the ever changing tech landscape. Then had to repurchase them when I wanted to reread for the TV release.
But - if you purchased a paper back and it wore out, or was lost after "many years", would it bug you as much ?
Stan wrote: "But - if you purchased a paper back and it wore out, or was lost after "many years", would it bug you as much ?"Owning and rereading a beloved paperback over many decades until it disintegrates is much different than buying an electronic copy of a book and having the reading platform become obsolete after only a few years.
DRM has been my biggest problem with buying electronic books because I have the expectation that, if I treat a book well, I will own it for the rest of my life. It feels like there is no point in buying an e-reader until this is sorted out. Go Tor!
Congrats - my paperbacks tend toward "years", not "decades"But - I buy ebooks from amazon and DRM does not prevent me from reading on my phone, iPad, Desktop, netbook, and laptop. (same thing for Barnes & Noble)
If I let the fear that technological advancement would turn my media purchases worthless, then I never would have bought those VHS tapes. (or now days, DVDs with the market shifting toward streaming)
Stan wrote: "But - if you purchased a paper back and it wore out, or was lost after "many years", would it bug you as much ?"Actually it would. I'm rather disappointed in the quality of the binding on some of my early WOT paperbacks.
I actually like the Kindle platform myself. I haven't purchased an actual Kindle, but enjoy the freedom that the software has given to the flexibility of reading ebooks purchased from Amazon. I believe that to get the ubiquitous availability that I want, you have to sign on to a platform. The question becomes do you trust the company behind the platform to remain viable and not be forced to take advantage of their customer base.
Sam wrote: "I believe that to get the ubiquitous availability that I want, you have to sign on to a platform. The question becomes do you trust the company behind the platform to remain viable and not be forced to take advantage of their customer base. ""This is a sad premise to me. And I believe it will be gone in a few years. Just like music I think e-books are headed down a DRM free road where you will be able to port your books to any device without breaking the law.
And TOR is making the right move here. Make it DRM free and easy to get ahold of and people will pay for your product. Put restrictions on it and the only people hurt are those consumers not savvy enough to skirt around the DRM.
Micah wrote: " This is a sad premise to me. And I believe it will be gone in a few years. Just like music I think e-books are headed down a DRM free road where you will be able to port your books to any device without breaking the law..."There certainly a problem with the current model of drm preventing interoperability across platforms. If amazon decides to jack up prices after I have committed to the platform it becomes more difficult to switch to another platform. A drm free environment of cross-platform friendliness keeps a more competitive playing field. (one could argue that a platform agnostic device I.e. iPad is best because it provides similar access to all)
However, even in that environment i think I'm still going to look for a central platform to consolidate my purchases. I'm not going to go from publisher to publisher trying to find a drm free ebook version.
http://arstechnica.com/business/news/...