The Question of Value Part 2 - Responses · 9:21pm Mar 28th, 2016
Wow. What a weekend. Views for The Question of Value continue to pour in from every corner of the web, from everywhere from news aggregate sites to tumblr. And with those views came comments, questions, concerns, and even discussion.
Now, I did my best to read each of the reactions I got to The Question. In fact, I even went as far as to not just read the aggregate listings and response pieces, but comments posted there as well. And while some simply retreaded things that had already been discussed (one even tackled the dead horse subject I pointed out I was going to ignore ... so I did ignore it) I found there was a lot being said.
The conclusion? I may have been the one to voice it, but this topic, this question of how we value the mighty ebook is not something that I alone have been thinking on. There are a lot of you out there who've got opinions and thoughts on the matter. Even better, a lot of these thoughts overlap and coincide. For example, in comments I read just here, on my sister blog, and in one response post, at least five different people brought up the topic of resale. Several brought up durability (and at least one amusing comment brought up multiple people citing that an ebook couldn't be read in a shower by asking how they were reading normal books in one). DRM was addressed, as was licensing in general. And do you know what I learned most of all in reading all of these?
The market is failing the readers.
Okay, now that might sound like a harsh judgement to pass, and perhaps I could voice it differently (also, that could be taken way out of context, so aggregate sites, you do not have permission to use that line without context). When I say market, for the most part, I'm not referring to the books themselves, or what the authors are producing, though in a way, we share part of the blame.
No, what I'm referring to here is the actual market and the way ebooks are being handled. That is what is failing the readers.
You can read the rest of this post at Unusual Things
As someone who works in/with software... it's pretty standard EULA nowadays to not own the software you buy. You're just paying to be able to use it (presumably) indefinitely.
Except for all the things that you subscribe to, which is pretty minor at the consumer level, and still rather a big deal at the corporate level and using specialized software for business.
As far as I know there haven't been any cases of corporations revoking the rights to use that software. It's there to limit for patent and copyright things. You are typically not allowed to mess with the programming of your software, even though if you owned the software copy you had you could, theoretically, do whatever you want with it.
Which is why you don't own it.
It doesn't look like it's something going away any time soon, either.
That being said, while you technically don't own any software or bits you use, not everything has DRM on it that limits what you can do with it, other than asking you not to reverse engineer it or give a copy to all your friends. (Or, heaven forbid, sell it to other people.)
I think you're absolutely right that if a dedicated ebook service comes into being, something that's a high quality gamechanger, then standards will be set pretty darn quick.
... I am not current on that sort of thing, but I sorta assumed that kindles and nooks already had that. I'm a little disappointed to hear that they don't.
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Yeah, I get that, though I didn't want to get into the nitty-gritty details of it simply because most people don't get it. I do take issue with Apple's decision to make the same apply to hardware, though.
Most people don't realize that, though. The difference being, even if you don't technically own it, if it feels like you do, most people see it as them owning it. It's when you don't feel like you own it that people get upset.
Yeah, it's one of those things that I think is best explained by "Why spend money on it if no one else is doing it and the customers don't know better?" That certainly seems to be Amazon's response when I've written in to suggest even basic functionality capacity they should change (for example, I can't give away free copies of my book to review, I have to purchase them and send them as gifts, so I have to pay Amazon for them. If I send a copy from my own collection, the reviews are marked as "not verified." It's a terrible system)
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Mm! It's the same laws and the same standards that are applying to both software and ebooks, but I do understand wanting to keep it simple.
It gets into the question of "Even if you say I don't own it... if I can do whatever I want with it for as long as I want, don't I get all the benefits of owning it?" It's uncomfortable not really owning it, but, excessive DRM aside, it's usually a case that only specialists (or bad actors) are actually effected by this.
Until the day comes some company actually tries to revoke paying customers right to use what they have paid for, or starts controlling what you do with it more effectively than you do now. And the resistance to DRM helps my optimism on that front.
Sounds like one of those things where it means the market is more or less poised for an entrepreneur to come in trying to mop up by providing a better service themselves.
Which will, of course, be mimicked by the well-funded players who are already in the business in pretty short order, if it was successful.
Of course, I have no idea what other barriers there are to entering that sort of industry. If there is legal red tape or some other kind of block to new players creating their own service.
An inaccuracy: iTunes music has been DRM-free since Apple renegotiated with the major record labels in 2009. Movies, TV, and books are still restricted, though. [citations needed]
Otherwise, I generally agree with all of your points. Your comparison of lending a book to lending one's e-reader in order to loan a DRM-restricted book is quite interesting, though there is of course the issue that a single book can be very cheap and so easy to lend, whereas digital devices are generally still comparatively pricey. As you said, though: the cost of convenience. In fact, in that regard it is still better than a physical book, as it would generally still be possible for me to read/refer to the book via other methods (web interface, desktop app, phone app, other e-reader) even while someone is borrowing a device.
Also, while reading in the shower is just a waste of water, there do exist protective, water-proof sleeves that you can put an e-reader/tablet into to make reading in a bath safe for it, even if you drop it. Dropping a book in the bath: not recommended.