Cleveland Public Library Readies E-book Downloads

rtphokie writes "C|Net is reporting that the Cleveland Public Library is making ebooks available. Sounds like the 1000 books in the system initially will feature more than just public domain titles including 'the latest from authors such as Michael Crichton, Clive Barker and Joyce Carol Oates.'" The article also mentions that "only a limited number of each eBook will be available, and after a preset number of days, the eBook will lock out the current reader so another patron can check it out." A good time to re-read The Right to Read.

Comments

Prediction:

[Sean Trembath]

Mom: Stop messing around on that thing. Read a book for once.

Son: I am reading a book.

Mom: Keep lying like that and you're grounded.

Re:Prediction:

[irc.goatse.cx troll]

Offtopic, so I'll drop the +1 Bonus.

This comment reminds me of that commercial where the kids are playing with the educational toys teaching them to spell, and the dad comes in and says 'put the toys down, go study', kids put it down, then pick it up, etc.
Commercials like that disturb me, To see a father so out of touch with his childs life. Those things are like $45/ea, did his wife just go out and spend close to $100 on stuff for his kids without him even knowing it? Does he not care about his kids enough to know what they're doing?
I know I'm taking this too far, but damn that bothers me.

Re:Prediction:

[Negatyfus]

You know, when someone dies on television, they're not really dead; they're just actors. They get up and go home to their wives and children after the camera stops rolling. I'm not kidding you.

Re:Prediction:

[CaffeineAddict2001]

You know it's gotta be bad when it disturbs the goatse.cx troll!

Re:Prediction:

[Eric_Cartman_South_P]

So that's how Kenny keeps comming back?

Whewww! *relief*

*sigh* will they never learn?

[Com2Kid]

Ok first off, yah to Cleavland for at least trying this idea.

But major "why are you pulling this con?" to Overdrive for trying to convince ANYBODY that client side, err, well, heh, anything, is safe at all.

Listen, it has already been proven that without trusted hardware (which is not going to come along until consumers start trusting the companies) that NO DRM solution is secure. No matter what. Worst case, things have to be brute forced, but since the unencrypted data passed through the clients computer somewheres along the line, heck, there is your weak point right there.

Now if somebody figured a way to encase the decryption key in some sort of VGA dongle so the actual decrypted data was only ever sent over the VGA wire, but even then, doing it cheap and such, heh. No go.

Re:*sigh* will they never learn?

[js7a]

it has already been proven that without trusted hardware (which is not going to come along until consumers start trusting the companies) that NO DRM solution is secure....

Even with trusted hardware, or a VGA dongle, or whatever, the media still has to get to the display on some wires, from whence it can be re-recorded to unencrypted files. Palladium is a very expensive joke.

Re:*sigh* will they never learn?

[sheriff_p]

You can also photocopy a book. The point is, this puts barriers to stealing the content. Not insurpassable ones, but, for the average guy or gal, a pretty high one.

Re:*sigh* will they never learn?

[Rogerborg]

You can also OCR a book and redistibute it even more easily, which is where I agree with you.

But when you do this, it's copyright violation, not stealing the content.

Re:*sigh* will they never learn?

[Mitreya]

...without trusted hardware (which is not going to come along until consumers start trusting the companies)

which, in turn, is not going to happen until hell freezes over... Some (especially the ./ readers :) don't even trust the government enough... much less companies. I think companies know that well enough and are looking for other ways that do not require building customer trust.

Loss of revenue.

[Anand_S]

"...after a preset number of days, the eBook will lock out the current reader so another patron can check it out"

How are libraries going to cope with the loss of 50 cent overdue fees?

Re:Loss of revenue.

[kpansky]

I have never once had a library collect a fine from me. I once was supposed to pay off an $8 fine. As soon as I offered to pay it, the librarian smiled and said, "Thats alright." I guess my dashing looks and suave attitued impressed the 75 year old blue-haired lady. :)

Re:Loss of revenue.

[great om]

I.A.L. (I'm a librarian). I'll let you in on a little secret. We don't, for the most part, care about the fines. They're really just intended to help encourage library patrons to return the shared resource they have borrowed. The fines do provide a little revenue, but for the most part, the administration involved with these fines makes it much less than one would think

P.S. Penn. Public and School libraries (throughb their Powerlibrary online iniative) already have e-books, although the system could use a little work.

Re:Loss of revenue.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think it would be much more likely that you looked like such a slob that she assumed you had no money and were down on your luck.

It's charity, nothing more.

How did this work out ?

[Gyan]

"...and after a preset number of days, the eBook will lock out the current reader so another patron can check it out."

in conjunction with

"...including the ability to download books onto PCs and PDAs and create a portable eBook that can be read even when patrons are offline."

I'm assuming that the portable eBook created will be encoded with a 'lock' date.

I think it will work on a modest scale. It will be broken and pirated quickly.

But frankly, there's nothing like holding and reading a real book by the bedside or on the go.

ePaper, where are you ?

Re:How did this work out ?

[kpansky]

You're right that "there's nothing like holding and reading a real book by the bedside or on the go", but you cant grep a dead tree, can you? :)

Re:How did this work out ?

[Gyan]

"You're right that "there's nothing like holding and reading a real book by the bedside or on the go", but you cant grep a dead tree, can you? :)"

That would indeed be most useful for technical and reference books. But somehow I don't tend to read those by the bedside.

Re:How did this work out ?

[scotch]

I read those technical books by the bedside. Stroustrup's 3rd edition is a sure cure for insomnia.

Re:How did this work out ?

[Gyan]

" Stroustrup's 3rd edition is a sure cure for insomnia."

Maybe it should be renamed from C++ to C(leep)++

Re:How did this work out ?

[evilviper]

It will be broken and pirated quickly.

I'm really not sure why everyone is so worried about eBook copyright infrigement.

By god! You can digitaize the paper version! There will be electronic coppies everywhere in a matter of days! Stephen King's thousands of shopping bags full of money will disappear, and authors will go hungry! We need DRM for these paper versions!

Slightly more seriously... a sheet-fed scanner, or a automatic document feeder (ADF) can be bought for around $100. Any shmoe can buy a book, pull the pages from their bindings, stick them in the feeder, and come back when the entire book has been scanned-in. Sure, someone has to buy one copy and essentially sacrifice it, but I don't think that's a problem.

So why do ebooks get illegially copied? Primarily because of the protection. You tell someone that they can't copy it, and guess what happens...

Then there is the market of disabled people, or those who use a non-blessed platform (like Linux) who aren't able to read the version they can pay for, so someone buys it and cracks the protection, then distributes it for others who are in that situation. the ironic thing is that the encryption is actually what gives those people a very good reason NOT to pay for the offical version. If you can read the free one, but can't read the $10 one, would you pay them $10. Paying for it would only encourage them to make more with protection that is just as bad, and just as useless to you.

Phew, that was long.

ePaper, where are you ?

All we need is monitors that are NOT backlit. Which is the reason people will read on their black and white 2" Palm-pilot screens, but read little on their computer screen. If screens weren't backlit (think; polarized light) it would be just as nice to read on as good old paper, with all the advantages of being electronic.

Re:How did this work out ?

[LX.onesizebigger]

Yes, it will be broken quickly. The CPL has a huge collegtion of software for patrons to "borrow". I don't think they honestly care too much.

Re:How did this work out ?

[evilviper]

This happens every time I bring up the subject...

I did not say that it can't be lit at all... I just want the light that reaches my eyes to be polarized, not like it is now.

Reading text off of a computer screen is like reading the label on a flourscent lightbulb while it's turned on... Just like a book, the colors are black text on a white background, but any idiot knows that one is going to be far harder on your eyes than the other.

Try reading a book for 20 hours, then try reading the same text on a computer screen... Reading on screen will take you much longer, you will need more frequent brakes, and your eyes will feel like they're on fire after you're done.

It wouldn't be any more difficult to make a screen which is front-lit (hence the light reaching your eyes would be polarized) and no harder on your eyes than plain paper, yet no one has made such a computer screen.

/. is the best protection system around.

[wackybrit]

The article also mentions that "only a limited number of each eBook will be available, and after a preset number of days, the eBook will lock out the current reader so another patron can check it out."

That's weird. I've noticed many Web pages that Slashdot links to also have this feature. I click on the link and it tells me too many people are reading the site and that I should come back later. So if Slashdot links to every e-book in the library, they won't need to pay for fancy protection systems.

Re:mIRC

[kpansky]

Most of these books are probably already out on mIRC anyway. Not only that, but why go to mIRC and sit through hours of queues and porn solicitations when you can just get it from the library without any effort?

I have serious reservations

[Henry V .009]

Trying to make the digital world just like the real world doesn't work. Sure it would be great to check out e-books from the library. And it would be great to rent videos on the net. But in order to make it happen you have to take away freedoms.

You see, the internet is just information passing between computers over the phone lines (or what not). In order to get an ebook to you over the internet, that ebook needs to be copied. You cannot transfer a physical copy of something over the internet. Now, since duplication occurs, this falls under copyright.

But wait--what if we were to use technology to lock out the copy at one end, and only allow one user at a time to access the ebook? And after a period of time, technology locks out the information on the user's side? That would be just like a library correct?

No. Because in order to accomplish that, you need to take away a user's control over the information he possesses. This is taking away a fundamental right. In other words, you can make the digital world like the real world, but you can't make it the same. Sure, you open up a new business model or service. But on the other hand, you take away rights.

And that is exactly what a set-up like this can do. Luckily, in America, rights are protected, not business models.

But you can erode rights. A set-up like this comes along at first. Laws like the DMCA are passed to strengthen it. Hell, the DMCA is enough already. Suddenly renting digital information is possible.

And what if one year then, your college decides that it's cheaper to rent ebooks than have you buy real thing? Maybe they don't even publish the dead tree version anymore. Palladium and the DMCA lock out you out from real control of the information. In fact, the ebook manufacturer--given the ease of EULAs with this distribution system, might even decide to make a little more profit. After all who's to stop him? He makes you agree in the EULA not share the information you rent. Suddenly Stallman's vision of the future has come true. Brave new world, what not.

Re:I have serious reservations

[evilviper]

He makes you agree in the EULA not share the information you rent. Suddenly Stallman's vision of the future has come true.

I don't think you can call it Stallman's vision for one thing... Inumerable others concieved of, and conveyed this very fear, likely long before Stallman was even born.

This all leads to one problem, with one solution... We need Fair Use rights to be legally guaranteed. Sure, allow companies to include all the copy protection they like, but make sure that you have the ability to make a backup copy, and can exerpt that information as you choose.

I know Sony gets a lot of slack for including copy protection in their products (eg. SACD), but, so far, I have not seen one copy protection scheme from them that will stop fair-use. Their MiniDisc system, that's been around for years now, allowed you to make a copy from an original disc, but did not allow (digital) copying from the copy.

My point is that the technology to give users their fair-use rights, while not allowing unlimited use, has been around for some time, and there is no excuse for restricting it.

While I'm no fan of copy protection at all, even I could get behind a scheme as long as it allowed for fair use, and wasn't limited to a handful of platforms.

Re:I have serious reservations

[dmaxwell]

The SCMS protection on Minidiscs have stopped bands and other content creators from legitimately making digital copies of their own work. It has been one of the strikes against the format at the outset. Non-professional (read affordable) Digital Audio Tape has the same problem. This is the real reason for DRM. "Piracy" is a red herring. Making it almost impossible for non-cartel members to create and distribute content is their true agenda.

Re:I have serious reservations

[ReelOddeeo]

Luckily, in America, rights are protected, not business models.

Meesa thinks yousa hasa got it backwards.

Re:I have serious reservations

[Planesdragon]

We need Fair Use rights to be legally guaranteed.

If you can read it/listen to it, your Fair Use rights, in the classic sense, ARE guaranteed.

What you're talking about is your right to configure your system as you want and still use it. Much, much different thing.

Re:I have serious reservations

[geekee]

Your argument is like saying, we shouldn't have public roads, because then we'd need to pass laws limiting the speed at which people drive for safety reasons. This of course is an attack on a person's freedom to drive as fast as they want. There's no inherent right to information that you didn't produce. If you check out an e-book, you are entering into a contract whereby you agree to relinquish the information after a certain period of time. DRM is there to insure you hold up your end of the contract.

Re:I have serious reservations

[evilviper]

For about $50 you can make an SCMS stripper, which allows you to set the SCMS bit to ``Unlimited", which means no restrictions on copying that copy... ever.

But I assume we are talking about the ideal, rather than the specific implimentation.

Since the introduction of minidiscs, there have been several reasonably priced professional MiniDisc recorder (such as Tascam) which don't have those restrictions. The Tascams were only about twice the price of a consumer recorder at the time, so they aren't exactly using SCMS to bully the little guys.

Re:I have serious reservations

[evilviper]

If you can read it/listen to it, your Fair Use rights, in the classic sense, ARE guaranteed.

I can still time-shift Digital TV despite the copyright bit? I can make a backup copy of my DVDs? I can buy a copy of Windows XP, use it (which includes registering it) and then sell it to someone else, who will also need to be able to register it?

Each is an example of fair use, and currently cannot be done without special tools that are illegial in most cases. So feel free to elaborate on your point.

Re:I have serious reservations

[Planesdragon]

I can still time-shift Digital TV despite the copyright bit? I can make a backup copy of my DVDs? I can buy a copy of Windows XP, use it (which includes registering it) and then sell it to someone else, who will also need to be able to register it?

Each is an example of fair use, and currently cannot be done without special tools that are illegial in most cases. So feel free to elaborate on your point.

Your examples are NOT Fair Use. They're use. It's entirely possible for me and you to enter into a contract whereas you get to read my novel, but you may tell no one else of its contents nor transer your rights or duties without my explicit written permission. Unless I convince you to give up your Fair Use rights as consideration for this contract, you could still quote portions of my novel in a scholarly, journalistic, or paraody-ic (?) manner.

Fair Use is blatant Copyright Infringement that can be justified before a Judge and Jury. Time-shifting, backups, and transfer-of-sale are all legal unless (and only if) the Copyright Holder proves Copyright Infringement or breach of contract.

When RIAA busts you for file sharing, and says that you're committing copyright infringmenet, you kick and scream and hire lawyers to say "No, I did not commit Copyright Infringement."

When RIAA busts you for making Flash Parodies of their movies, or running a 30-second grainy clip of a pirate video in your academic presentation on Video Piracy, you politely say "yes, that's Copyright Infringement, BUT" and then kick and scream and hire lawyers to say "This infringement was Fair Use."

It's a specific semantics thing--just like the differnce between "stealing" and "copyright infringement." Abridgement of Fair Use has a chilling effect on the creation of additional and necessary works and therefore harms society; abridgement of simple use merely harms those few individuals who wish to enjoy a copyrighted work.

Side note 1: Windows XP, IMO, is more of a contractual problem than a copyright issue. By agreeing to the EULA, you give up certain rights, including your right to an ammount of money equal to what you paid for it, in exchange for a copy of the software program.

Also, unless you have an OEM copy (or some other copy that prohibits transfer of rights), you should be able to contact MS, "de-register" the software, and then sell it to someone else.

Side Note 2: The DMCA (and other relevant federal law), AFAIK, does not prohibit hacking, cracking, or otherwise reverse-engineering so long as the sole purpose of such is legal. TiVo-like timeshifting of Digital TV should be both legal and, if the seller knows what's good for them, included in the deal or offered as an option. And you should still be able to use an analog VCR to time-shift the Digital TV signal.

You can also, AFAIK, make a copy of the DVD you purchased without decoding CSS. I could be wrong, though...

IANAL, YMMV, Consult your Own Lawyer for Legal Advice, which this is not.

Re:I have serious reservations

[evilviper]

I'm not even going to read your entire post. My entire point was that fair use SHOULD be REQUIRED and ILLEGIAL to inhibit. You go on to say why you aren't allowed your fair use rights. That's completely besides the point.

eBooks isn't bad by nature

[Wrexs0ul]

There seems to be a lot of people missing the argument when it comes to eBooks. Publishers and authors have a right to profit from there work regardless of what it is. In principle this would allow you to handle your digital book just like a paperback: you could read it for a time, share your license with a friend so they could too, and then return the book automatically when your rental time is up. No big deal and automation would most certainly save you from a $200 late charge!

Unfortunately in practice a digital system provides far too much power to the provider. Not only are you limited to how long you have a product but how you can use it. It's digital communism where on paper everyone gets exactly what they need but in practice leaves the power so readily exploitable by a select few.

Question is can we prevent a future like that presented in the linked story? With the growing power base among a select group of individuals/organizations and leaders put in power from the old boys club it'll be an interesting 21st century.

-Matt

Re:eBooks isn't bad by nature

[Simon Field]

You said:

Publishers and authors have a right to profit from there work regardless of what it is.

That right is given by the people through their representatives in Congress in accordance with the Constitution.

The reason the people gave that right is to encourage authors to write. By giving a limited time monopoly on their expression, we are giving them an oportunity to make money by giving us the results of their talents.

Now, personally, I believe that current law gives way too long a monopoly. Walt Disney was encouraged to create Mickey Mouse when the monopoly was much shorter. Mark Twain was also encouraged and well compensated, despite a shorter copyright.

Do we think that by extending the copyright to 70 years, we are getting more creative effort and better literature than we did back then? What are we getting for those extra years?

I someone can't make a profit from their efforts in, say, 10 years, maybe the benefit to the people from those efforts has already been expressed by the marketplace.

Re:eBooks isn't bad by nature

[Com2Kid]

• There seems to be a lot of people missing the argument when it comes to eBooks. Publishers and authors have a
• right to profit from there work regardless of what it is.

Uh, no.

They have the right to TRY AND PROFIT from their work.

NOBODY has the RIGHT to PROFITS.

Companies just THINK they do.

PURSUIT of happiness folks, PURSUIT, not all packaged up and left on your front doorstep for you by Uncle Sam.

Now the companies do the have RIGHT to sue my ass in court for theft if I steal it though. :)

Re:eBooks isn't bad by nature

[seanadams.com]

you could read it for a time, share your license with a friend so they could too, and then return the book automatically when your rental time is up

How does the author benefit from me returning the book? Does it mitigate his cost in some way?

I've never brrowed the same book from a library twice. Now that I think about it, I don't think I've checked out anything from the library in over five years. Big hard cover reference books hold their value (content-wise) for many years, and are generally worth the investment. Paper back novels are so cheap that it's not worth a trip to library and back, when you can just grab one in the checkout aisle.

I just don't see the value in time-locked eBooks... for me or the publisher. Just give me the material with no restrictions, at a good price, and I'll buy *lots*.

Reasons why eBooks never will take off...

[NilObject]

To me, the whole reason I *hate* eBooks is that it's entirely counter to the whole reading expirience. I like to be able to sit down and flip open a good smelling book and *feel* the whole thing as I read it.

I also like to not have to worry about batteries, screen glare, squinting at the small screen, etc etc

Plus, electronics are still too fragile. Can you drop your eBook reader 10ft on to concrete without worrying? Not that we do it intentionally, but accidents happen. Paper books are some of the most durable and long lasting storage methods around.

I mean, what's the longest lasting digital medium? CDs? 50 years?!?! Paper lasts thousands of years!

So I'll stick with my grand 'ol paper books.

Let me know when eBooks are practical (if I'm not dead by then...).

(Yes, I had a Palm V. I tried the eBook thing and it was bad. The screen *alone* was hell to read. Who want's to read a book on a flickery screen anyways? Whip out a 5 pound laptop to read a book the size of that laptop's battery? Squint at a bad screen for 20 hours?)

Re:Reasons why eBooks never will take off...

[IIRCAFAIKIANAL]

I prefer audio books. I can't move my arms on the train in the morning, so listening to a book is a sweet deal. It's slow (I read pretty fast) but my mp3 player holds about 4-5 hours worth of audio books (32kbps is fine with spoken audio) and it's the size of a matchbook.

About 1/2 through the unabridged "The Return of the King" right now :)

Re:Reasons why eBooks never will take off...

[BWJones]

Let me know when eBooks are practical (if I'm not dead by then...).(Yes, I had a Palm V. I tried the eBook thing and it was bad. The screen *alone* was hell to read. Who want's to read a book on a flickery screen anyways?

So, a major problem has been the screens and text rendering technology. Yeah, I too tried reading books on my Palm at one time (even on my old Newton which had a much better screen than the Palms), but the text was too small and you were still dealing with pixelated letters and words. With the systemwide support for anti-aliasing that OS X has however, reading books with the Quartz rendering setup and an LCD would not be that bad. (See OS X is easy on the eyes for more detail).

At any rate, even with the best OS for eBooks (OS X) we are still stuck reading on laptops unless Apple pulls something out of their hat soon (tomorrow) and released a tablet or similar device for eBooks and markup that would be Acrobat capable. ;-)

eBooks are a bad idea for DRM to start with

[Arethan]

Everyone here pretty much agrees on the same thing when it comes to eBooks. The DRM in them isn't worth a squirt of piss. Still, even if you had some magic DRM algorithm that was 100% impossible to break (which we all know eBooks do NOT have), the viewer still has to be able to read the damn thing, so it has to be displayed in an unencoded form. Attach homebrewed screenshot app here, insert optical character recognition there, and viola! Instant DRM-free eBook! Time for the usual distribution channels! IRC, 0day ftp sites, eDonkey, FastTrack, Gnutella. Thank you for your contribution to society Hamilton Press! You know we really, uh..appreciate it. lmao!

I suspect that this will last for about 6 months. Then the publishers will start whining 'foul'.

Thinking about this has stirred up an interesting idea though. The only way to make money from eBooks is to devise a method to make people want to pay for information that they could otherwise get for free. So what about providing useful services for a flat monthly fee?

How about the ability to search for text strings throughout an entire library of books. That could certainly make research a little easier. You want to know all about Albert Einstein? SURE! Here is every document he authored, every biography, every newpaper that mentioned him, and every other book or magazine that's referred to him in existance. If done correctly, you could even get search results back in under 2.4 seconds like Google.

Now I'm not saying that full text indexes are the killer app that will make people pay for electronic access to published works, but its a start....

Re:mIRC

[packeteer]

I should warn you that you will sound like a windows newb if you keep talking like that. I dont want to flame you and this Is offtopic but here i go. mIRC is a program to access the IRC network. mIRC is also for windows. By saying its on mIRC you are basically shouting to everyone that you use windows and dont know how IRC works. I am not the type of person who wants to flame for this but you might wanna look into how the system works before some ass does flame you. Also as you learn more about the many different IRC networks you will find that it is very possible to find the right content with very little BS.

Re:mIRC

[Simon Field]

I am an author.

My latest book is coming out later this year in paper form, and will cost money.

The same book (actually bigger, since the publisher has asked to pare down the number of pages) is currently available on the web for free. It will continue to be on the web for free after the paper form is published. In fact, the web version is a significant part of the marketing of the paper version.

I will sell more paper versions by giving away the web version than I would if the web version were not available.

The web version of the book has been available in ever-growing form for about seven years now. I am constantly getting email asking if the paper version is available for sale. Those email inquiries alone (if they were actual sales) would make the book quite profitable.

The web and paper publishing are complementary (and the web version of the book is complimentary).

I suspect the same is true of music sharing on the net -- after all, it seems to be true of music sharing on the radio. Without hearing the music for free on the radio, I expect fewer CDs would be sold.

That's my opinion, and I'm taking it to the bank.

The first?

[Cranky_92109]

I can't speak to who is the first, but I have checked out an eBook online 8 months ago through my local library: San Diego Public Library.
SDPL uses this company: NetLibrary.
It looks like NetLibrary provides this service for other libraries, but I'm too lazy to look for details.

Re:The first?

[lpret]

Yeah, my university has this too. Lots of C++, Perl, and PHP references, so I'm happy.

Re:The first?

[Punto]

so is the protection thing easy to circunvent?

A Good Idea (In Theory)

[E-Rock-23]

Now, I like the idea of a library putting out it's books on the internet, and I agree with the lock out date. If you go and check out a physical book, they stamp a return date on the back in the card pocket. Same general idea.

But, there are a few flaws. One, how long will the readable period be? Most libraries I've dealt with have a two week check out period. That's more than enough time to read a decent sized novel (such as one by Crichton, my favorite author, BTW). Will the lockout date correspond to their checkout period? Or will it be shortened in ebook form to prevent piracy?

And while I'm on the subject of piracy, there's a way that all ebooks can fail in their attempts to curb it. Let's say a guy with alot of free time, hard drive space and patience decides to download an ebook. He can't crack the encryption, can't copy the text directly. But what about screenshots? What's to stop him from hitting Alt+PrScr for each page and pasting them into a run of the mill image? He could then create a PDF, HTML or other collection of files and redistribute the book freely.

Is there a charge for these downloads? Then you get into the issue of fair use of something you've purchased. Libraries usually don't charge for check outs (at least not in my experience), and since this ebook model seems to work much the same way, I don't see the need to charge. The only charges I know of for libraries is overdue fees, which are more than reasonable.

And, is there a limit on how many copies can be digitally checked out at one time? If there is, that puts a waiting list into play. If there is a copy limit, then the lock out date makes sense. But let's say a person downloads an ebook and doesn't get the chance to finish it, and there are limited copies. Would they have to wait to download it again? Or could there be a renewal system to extend the lockout a few days to give the reader a chance to finish?

I've never dealt with ebooks, and probably never will (unless they outlaw physical copies). I'm an old school book nut and prefer to have a physical copy when I do my reading (which means I like to pay for my reading enjoyment, thus doing so legally). So, I really don't know if ebook reader programs prevent screenshots or not, or whether there will be charges and such. It seems like a decent idea, but the whole ebook idea is going to be flawed. Just like music (if I can hear it, I can rip/copy it), text will suffer from a similar ailment (if I can see it, I can copy it).

Re:A Good Idea (In Theory)

[cant_get_a_good_nick]

One, how long will the readable period be?
If anything it should be longer. Part of the reason for returns is to get one of a limited number of N physical books back into the system so others can read it. No need here, since the 'lending' of the digital book doesnt limit lending it to someone else, you don't have that restriction.

And while I'm on the subject of piracy, there's a way that all ebooks can fail in their attempts to curb it.
Anyone hear of a Xerox machine? OCR? Piracy existed well before the invention of Ebooks, and will continue.

Re:A Good Idea (In Theory)

[DennyK]

...the 'lending' of the digital book doesnt limit lending it to someone else, you don't have that restriction.

While that's true in a physical sense, it's not true in a legal sense. The library will likely purchase (or maybe be given, depending on the arrangement) a license to distribute X number of copies at once, not an unlimited number, as the article mentions:

"What's more, only a limited number of each eBook will be available, and after a preset number of days, the eBook will lock out the current reader so another patron can check it out."

DennyK

Even sign an NDA?

[Smallest]

They take away your "fundemental right" to share information, too. I don't see /. bitching about that. You can bet that the library in question has new customers sign a document of some kind where they agree to not distribute the precious precious content of the books the download.

-c

Re:Even sign an NDA?

[Henry V .009]

Fundamental right to share (copy) information? Never been such a beast. And for good reason. On the other hand, property rights over information bearing material--books, hard drives--are quite well established.

Re:Even sign an NDA?

[ebyrob]

Fundamental right to share (copy) information? Never been such a beast. And for good reason.

What... like freedom of speech?

Re:Even sign an NDA?

[kpansky]

If you want to take the time to read the book and re-cast all the material contained therein into your own words and ideas and then have somebody else record your ideas, then you can distribute the results however the hell you want. Other than that, it does not fall under freedom of speech protection.

Libraries w/e-books not new

[Red Warrior]

Skipping the various examples of Bain , inform it , and etc, Legit e-books have been available for free, or nearly so for quite some time. My favorite being the King County, Wa library system.Mostly tech books, but then it's mostly geeks who will look for and use them at this point.

Re:Libraries w/e-books not new

[Technician]

Sure they are available for free. I read the page in your link. If it's free, why do they need my credit card number? I never give credit card information online. It's easier than fighting bogus charges.

Re:Libraries w/e-books not new

[Technician]

Please read the page on e-books in the library link. In particular is the following snipped directly from the page supplied in the link;

Our site's registration form requires users to give us contact information (such as their name and email address), financial information (such as credit card numbers), and company information (such as name). We use customer contact information from the registration form to inform users of updates to Books24x7.com (such as New Book alerts that we send out weekly to advise of new titles added to the service) and to send information about our company and promotional material

What part of financial information such as credit card number didn't you understand?

Re:Libraries w/e-books not new

[Technician]

Thanks for the update. Reading the page as a visitor seemed to indicate the library does not actualy check out the books, but the keys and check-out are handled by the publisher who does require financial information. When you check out an ebook, do you actualy download it from the library, or do they redirect you to the publisher to get your e-copy?

Temporary

[MacAndrew]

Law books, those rows of reporters the TV lawyers always have in the background, are still a favorite for many, especially the older lawyers. But the convenience and power of electronic versions -- corrections and hyperlinks and potability and so on -- are winning out, even those the reading experience is inferior. It's pretty hard to juggle 20 of those big books.

The discomfort of the reading is getting better fast. Look at the difference in laptops in the last few years. Now there is finally talk of tablet computers that I hope will be more booklike, particularly if you can touch the screen to move things around. These will get sharper and faster and cheaper and battery life will disappear as an issue and so on.

Give it maybe 15 years to get really big, with incremental increases in the interim. Better screens, the biggest factor, are in the works. These active matrix screens haev only been affordable for a few years, and now they're standard. How about a screen with double or triple the resolution? Sure. Also, imagine having any book from any library available in seconds. Personally I'm getting tired of putting in for holds on new books at the local library, then waiting a month or, worse, spending $25 for it.

Re:Temporary

[BWJones]

Law books, those rows of reporters the TV lawyers always have in the background, are still a favorite for many, especially the older lawyers. But the convenience and power of electronic versions -- corrections and hyperlinks and potability and so on -- are winning out, even those the reading experience is inferior. It's pretty hard to juggle 20 of those big books.

We have the same problem in medicine. It used to be that new residents would walk around the halls with *all* their coat pockets bulging with pocket manuals and notes etc... making it a major pain in the ass when you had to move quickly or needed to find something quick in one of those damn pockets.....

However, some of the more recent M.D. grads are finding out about the convenience of a portable PDR, Harrisons Principles of Internal Medicine, clinical reference guides etc... and the only thing you have to worry about now is caring for the Palm pilot in thier lab coat and keeping it charged.

In fact, speaking of medical handhelds, the Apple Newton was almost perfect for medical use. It had a large hi-res screen, could accept lots of memory, was fast, very flexible, and was extremely rugged (having dropped mine more than once). I was truly sad when Apple killed the Newton division as I am one of those holdouts that really wishes Apple would bring back the Newton in some flavor with some flavor of OS X and the Quartz rendering for text.

Lets be fair here

[starX]

This is hardly the situation presented in "Right to Read." RMS's tale is about people who actually OWN the books not having the right to lend them to other people. This is a public collection being made available on the internet (and not just a single computer, as in "Right to Read").

I actually think this is a good idea, and if this model persists, then I think we'll all be in good shape. Think about it, in real life, when you borrow a book from your local library, you have to bring it back. This is for the simple reason that other people can read it too. If you don't bring it back, you have to buy a copy for the library to replace it. Of course we don't have the same problem here, but without getting into the debate about who gets more money, the authors or the publishers, books are a commodity that need to be paid for to support the authors who write them.

yes, there will be casesof authors releasing their works into public domain, and these individuals should be hailed for their contributions. And works that already ARE in the public domain should be made available online for free, but consider the ramifications of a newly published book by an autho suddenly made available for download without any restrictions. Anyway you slice it, the author is not going to make as much money as from a sale of the book. I grant you, there will always be people (like myself) who prefer the paper version for casual reading, but I do believe that the creator of a piece of art, literature, music, etc., is entitled to decide whether they should be compensated for possessing their work.

Yes the publishing companies are a bit tyranical in their price fixing, copy protection schemes etc., but just as we look forward to the day when people can download a song off of the internet, paying a fair price for doing so, and compensate the artist directly, I think we should also look forward to the day when the same can be done with books. But to support "full time" artists, there must be a system of compensation.

Simply allowing anyone anywhere to get and keep the book is just not a valid option. Yes, I know, these will be posted all over the net by their first check out. The debate of 2003 will become online book sharing, and the coalition of publishers will get together to crush programs like this. But really, it is a GOOD idea. You have the ability to keep the bhook on your computer for weeks without having to pay for it. If you don't finish reading it, you can just check it out again.

Honestly, I think we should be so lucky to have most major libraries doing this by the end of the decade. This, ladies and gentlemen, expands your rights online; make no mistake about that.

Re:Lets be fair here

[Robotech_Master]

Agreed with you all the way. As I read the story and got to the last link, I found myself wishing fervently that I could moderate part of the story as -1, troll.

It's what I call the "Slashdot mentality"--any time someone puts any kind of a limit on their product, a limit that they have every right to impose, a limit that's perfectly understandable given the situation, a limit that doesn't even take away any abilities people already had...it's all nasty and evil and next thing you know, the secret police will be knocking on your door in the dead of night. Bleah. Slashdot editors, kindly present your stories in a neutral fashion, and save the editorializing for comments.

Re:Why does the law prevent any books from being

[Elvis77]

Maybe cause if they're online they're too hard to burn (kinda reminds me of a book I read once...)

No.

[Anonymous Coward]

I suspect the same is true of music sharing on the net -- after all, it seems to be true of music sharing on the radio. Without hearing the music for free on the radio, I expect fewer CDs would be sold.

A book is tangible. It's different from text on screen. Buying a book will give you a distinctly different product than what you could get for free on your computer. Music is never tangible. Once you have an mp3 there's no reason to own the CD. You're getting the same experience whether you're listening to it on your computer or your mp3 player/burned cd. (and don't give me any 'well I could print the book' b.s.)

Re:No.

[PotatoHead]

I am not sure this is the entire story. Music is better on CD. In some cases, quite a bit better. So the experience is similar, but not quite the same. This difference can be enough to warrant a purchase.

There is more to the experience though. The packaging of the CD, cover art, liner notes and little freebies seem to make quite a difference to a lot of people many of whom also would not care about the sonic quality differences between CD and mp3 / ogg.

There is also the purchase process. Going somewhere or doing something to get a copy of a recording adds something to the value of that recording. --A tangible thing. You get something real to represent your investment in the music. You also get some sense of support for the artist in question. Yeah, the current system is broken, but it does not have to be.

Maybe you go with friends and have a coffee or catch a movie or some live music. You also get a memory that would not come from a download.

Live music is also quite a different experience. You could easily consider recorded music a promo for the real thing. Live performances have lots of energy. Many people are there sharing their reaction to the performance. You gain an understanding of the group that can add a lot to your perception of the music.

Downloads do not tell the whole story just as e-books don't.

Re:No.

[PotatoHead]

Wow, I never said that downloading was ok, I just wanted to make a point about the entire music experience compared to the sonic one and how that could impact how people behave. Right or wrong never entered my post because I did not state my position on it.

Have I downloaded? Sure. Do I purchase music? Yes, but now am very happy with *each* purchase. Is it right? Likely not, but neither is the current price and distribution structure. Wrong or right, peer to peer technologies are forcing a long overdue market change. I consider this Karma for the Recording companies. Thrash your customer base and source talent pool long enough and something will come along to fill the gap. I do not treat most things this way, but there is just something just slimey enough about the media distribution companies that makes me want to. Sure it's wrong, but that's the way it is and I am not the only one. To me this indicates a problem on their end that will continue to fester in one form or another until it is fixed.

Stripping basic rights is not the right way to acheive this BTW because this prevents people who own their content from using the system for their own good, ON THEIR OWN. It also does nothing to prevent us from being exploited again in the future with little or no recourse. There is no perfect system that will also be humane. Things are too complex for that to work. So there will be losses. Building that in to how you do business will mean success. Ignoring it, or worse trying to change it will mean failure. Is it right or fair? Not really, but it is the truth.

The author is totally correct in his statement. He is publishing content (good content BTW) in a way he believes will make him some money. Given the nature of his project, I am inclined to believe him. He has a right to do this because the content is his. So go grab his book and take a look. If you plan to do any of these things, you will likely want a paper copy. Nothing wrong in that.

Not all content will work this way, but his does. Maybe others interested in doing the same things will see his effort and try as well. This only benefits us in the long run. It will also benefit the smarter ones if they are able to capture user feedback and input because the audience will literally be able to tell the producer what will be of value before it is written. Pretty decent way to go really.

You know I was on /. 4 years ago and clearly remember the many ad discussions. We have learned a little since then. I do believe ads can be sold on the web to pay for content, but those ads and their delivery system must add some value to the process or it will fail.

Banners can be sold on a per click basis, not impression. Ad people will pay for results, but you have to be able to show it to them. Those who sell the ad space need to do some work to make sure those ads get seen when it makes some sense, not at random. Google was the first to really figure this out. Pay per click works and works well. My parents tried other schemes for their web business, but felt the money was wasted because they could not see any results. Using the google system worked in a clear way which let them see it's worth.

Content can be presented a couple different ways. Look at Ars Technica. They wanted to make money yet also understood that nobody would come to understand what they were about without free content to do the selling. Their solution? Present items for free, but add value to the subscribers. If you subscribe you can get nicely produced PDF files of their content. That content is also nicely indexed so it is easy to find and refer to. Given the technical nature of their productions, this ongoing growing library has worth that grows as you pay. They still use banners in reasonable ways as well. They are making it easy for those who could pay to do so while realizing that many people will not pay.

Look at pr0n. There is *lots* of it avaliable for free. Why then do people pay? And they do pay, mind you. They pay because those pimping the pr0n understand how to add value to the experience.

Lwn delays their content for non subscribers. This works to their advantage as well. Timely news is worth paying for, particularly when it is news with informed commentary added. Paying for that means you get the scoop early. They have not closed yet, though they were going to. Maybe they are learning now where their value is and how to make it worth purchasing.

The nature of your content has a lot to do with the audience you attract. For each audience, there will be ways to add value to both your potential subscribers and advertisers, but the work must be done in an honest clear way in order to get anything out of it. This also means not over-producing your content. For a lot of people, well formatted pages with text and a picture or two gets things done. Excessive bandwidth costs will kill a site even if they are getting ad revenue. So will excessive staff costs.

Forced ads have the opposite effect. Forcing people to see the ad, allows one to show impressions to the ad people, but at what cost? Are they good impressions or bad? Are they even targeted correctly?

Hell, if they want some revenue from ads, they could ask! "You have visited us a lot recently. Please take a moment to view this which we feel may be of interest based on your travels here." This could be anonymous and could be well targeted making both sides happy.

There are many other solutions not yet explored, but people need to work at it and understand what they are doing. The problem is both technical and social.

So you can't just throw up a banner with no targeting no value no nothing and expect someone to pay for that. Why would they? So a lot of web content funded through ad revenue schemes are failing right now because those working on them are not doing their job, not because it won't work.

Re:No.

[PotatoHead]

You make some very interesting points. I will tell you in advance that I am going to think them over for a bit before replying myself :)

And, yes we are growing way OT. Probably does not matter now as the /. masses are focused elsewhere. May as well have a conversation here as anywhere else...

Re:AC, eh?

[Simon Field]

What was your name again?

Re:mIRC

[Superfarstucker]

And they'll be all over mIRC channels an hour later...seriously, this is going to make authors the new dying breed of employment, after musicians and actors...

/RANT on
Puh-leeeze, for starters, DIGITAL theft, is not going to put *ANYBODY* out of business right now, its just insignificant at this point in time. ("first they ignore you..." we are a *bit* past that.. ghandi the wise ;))

What is going to happen though, is the self-proclaimed armchair warrior "DIGITAL RIGHTS ACTIVISTS" are going to create the very problem they are trying to prevent... you scream fair use, yet at the same time you pirate 1000's of mp3s you may or may not own (for now, how long before bandwidth and compression technologies allow 'exact' media copies? they already exist). What do you expect them to do? bend over and say *take me now*, of course not, DRM was inevitable from the getgo, because its in corporate interest, however, you are all taking away any *ray* of fair use we might attain, by simply acting like 'jackasses'...

Organizations like EFF and such are doing all the fighting and your.. well your busy looking up the next track to download or game to pirate. If the problem went untreated (and it is a problem.. just 'small' right now, smaller than anyone on the 'evil corporation side' is willing to admit) do you really think it would get better? I *doubt* it, unless human nature suddenly changed... its like.. cheap=good, free (with virtually no risk of punishment)=better.

Both sides are resisting the breeze of change, and neither will end up getting what they want. RIAA/MPAA want to keep their broken business model (which will force itself to reform eventually, the internet is not the last thing that will threaten the pathetically broken way they work, but may change it significantly), and "DIGITAL RIGHTS ACTIVISTS" we will call them for a lack of a better term, want to keep their fair use (and free content). I can see several 'middle-of-the-road' solutions, but none of them will occur unless their is some sort of agreement (fat chance of that).

so go ahead, give the RIAA/MPAA/[book/publisher? association of america] the middle finger, but dont expect anything but the same back...
/RANT off

Oh for the love of...

[The Bungi]

A good time to re-read The Right to Read.

Holy shit! What the fuck is that??

Holy cybernetic guacamole! Does anyone need anymore evidence that RMS went off the deep end years ago?

Go the fuck ahead and mod me down, but jeez, somebody has to say these things.

Re:Oh for the love of...

[slux]

Try listening to Lawrence Lessig's talk titled free_culture and it may suddenly not seem all that far-fetched.

All you people going on and on about how Stallman is an unrealistic madman should read Free as in Freedom: Richard Stallmans Crusade for Free Software by Sam Williams which happens to be available under the GNU FDL and you might understand him a little bit better. The book was initially supposed to be an ebook with all the regular protections in place (as described by Lessig's presentation). I found the epilogue particularly touching.

I can't honestly see any advantage in ebooks for libraries in their crippled form. Well, maybe storage space but that is about it. You get more restrictions on your access to the information, less durable way to store it and somewhat clumsy readers but no advantages over traditional books. You could offer so much more with this without DRM.

eBook hype again? Is it January already?

[mmoncur]

Looks like a decent system and definitely a boon for libraries. I won't use it, but then, I don't use libraries at all. I like to own stuff.

Really, it's the perfect use for ebooks. Nobody wants to pay for them, because they're inferior to paper books* in so many ways. But the libraries don't want to make money, they just want to let people read things for free. This system makes that possible at a lower price for the libraries, and publishers can feel good about themselves by giving the e-version away to libraries if they want to.

It won't take off, though, until the libraries come up with a cheap, incredibly durable ebook reader that they can lend out with the books. This will serve as a stopgap until the time when (and if) most households have a reader of some sort.

(Remember when video rental places rented VCRs?)

Re:eBook hype again? Is it January already?

[demo9orgon]

The moderation system must be retarded...mmoncur hit it spot on, and should be packing a (score:5) for this insightful post.

The only experience I've had with ebooks was vile, I only had tens-of-thousands of PepsiStuff points (Air, Diet-soda...both essential for life these days) and decided to try an ebook. I don't remember what the ebook was, but I do remember it taking three websites and twenty minutes before I essentially had an Adobe chastity belt (reading harness) suitable for reading an ebook on that machine, and only that machine. The whole process was just wrong...ebooks are premmature, and like the parent message in this thread points out, this isn't good or common tech. I personally wish they wouldn't waste our time with it. Haven't we emasulated ourselves enough already? There's probably enough dead-tree books out right now to build houses out of and fuel our cooking fires (and the occasional bacchanal) for some time to come. Let's worry about digital reader enslavement when someone out of Bill Joy's closet of horrors decides to play a joke on the planet and creates a prolific self-replicating nanobot that just loves paper. Then and only then will ebooks really work.

Re:eBook hype again? Is it January already?

[Reziac]

Actually, I bought my first VCR from a video rental store... at half price since it had been a rental unit. (This was back when VCRs started at $500 for the cheapest crap model around.)

And I have the same problem with libraries: they want the books back! Aiiiee!! :)

But for books I can't reasonably buy... libraries beat hell out of not reading it at all!!

And I think your scenario of libraries lending out cheap ebook readers is quite reasonable -- load the reader with the titles of your choice (could easily be more than one, or even "lots"), check it out for a couple weeks, then bring it back in the normal way for library books. I think once ebook readers get down to "disposable" prices, this can become reality.

Duh

[skinfitz]

"only a limited number of each eBook will be available, and after a preset number of days, the eBook will lock out the current reader so another patron can check it out."

That must be one of the most idiotic things I have ever hear in my life. The whole point of a library is to provide books for people to read - not restrict access to them. They have multiple (physical) copies (which cost money) so that more than one person can read a book at the same time. The only reason that a physical copy is not purchased for every person who uses the library is due to cost - it would obviously not be feasible for the library. Now an electronic alternative is available that could service every reader simultaneously and what do they do? Cripple it.

Yet another classic example of a perfect use of technology being crippled in the name of greed.

I suppose I better start working on my auto-book-renew script.

Re:Duh

[Robotech_Master]

The point of a library is to provide books for people to read. It's not to provide books, even electronic ones, that people can keep forever for free. If you want to keep it longer than a couple of weeks, you can go out and buy your own damn copy.

Libraries do have to pay for each copy of a book they buy...and that includes each virtual copy. That's part of how publishers make money. Besides, it's not like simultaneous-user-limit licensing is new; they've been doing that with computer software for years.

Re:Duh

[Compuser]

If even one library freely gives away a book
in electronic form then anyone interested will
be able to download a read it. Sounds good?
Maybe, except that now all ineterested readers
can get the book for free and the author goes
hungry.
To date no good solution exists to entice
authors into creating and preserve freedom at the
same time. Street performer protocol and similar
things do work in some cases but only in
"niche" cases. For instance many authors have only
written one good work in their lives (e.g. Steinbeck).
They would starve with SPP. Many singers have had
one or two hits (e.g. Billy Ray Cyrus (sp?)). Those
guys would starve too. Worse, people would not go
to the trouble of creating stuff if they knew in
advance that they would have to sustain their
production over long stretches of time.

Re:Duh

[skinfitz]

The point of a library is to provide books for people to read. It's not to provide books, even electronic ones, that people can keep forever for free. If you want to keep it longer than a couple of weeks, you can go out and buy your own damn copy.

I agree totally, which is why the expiration problem is not an issue. Restricting access to the book just because someone else happens to have it "booked out" is downright stupid when there are no costs involved.

Alternatively simply charge people a small fee to check it out but restricting access to the book when it is totally feasible to allow access is pointless.

Re:Duh

[skinfitz]

If even one library freely gives away a book in electronic form then anyone interested will be able to download a read it. Sounds good? Maybe, except that now all ineterested readers can get the book for free and the author goes hungry.

Fair comment, which is why the expiration will be important, however what is the point of making people wait for something that doesn't exist to be returned?

Oh sorry you cant download this ebook because someone else has not returned it? Stupid.

Re:Duh

[abe ferlman]

Maybe, except that now all ineterested readers
can get the book for free and the author goes
hungry.

Kind of like when too many people on slashdot read my posts I go hungry?

It continues to amaze me that people want to rewrite the laws of supply and demand in order to save the careers of people with poor business plans. Why didn't anyone try to save the Pony Express or 80's Hair Bands this way?

Re:Duh

[Reziac]

It's probably NOT pointless to restrict access -- since the library probably has to pay the publisher a certain amount for each *available* copy of the ebook.

This is no different from a library having to buy however many hardcopies, rather than simply photocopying a new one every time they run short.

Re:Duh

[Robotech_Master]

Take it up with the publisher...they're the ones who're licensing the books in that particular way.

At any rate, the whole thing is so ludicrous. I can't understand why there's such total hostility toward the idea that anyone should dare to be able to make money from his creative works. Is it perhaps a bit of "sour grapes" that nobody's paying you (plural, generic "you"--not necessarily skinfitz) for your creativity? Is it a Dire Straits "That ain't workin', that's the way you do it" thing, where you think, "Hey, putting words on paper? Anyone can do that"? Sure, people can create great works of art and give them away. But people can build their own houses, too (and in fact, the congregation of my parents' church is putting up a new church building with almost no outside help), and yet without a paid construction industry, somehow I think fewer and poorer buildings would manage to get made.

If someone does labor, he deserves the ability to profit from it. I'm not saying he deserves a profit itself--in a perfect world, that should depend upon the quality of the product--but he at least deserves a fair shot at making one.

Re:Duh

[Compuser]

I'll admit I put Steinbeck in there just to see
if anyone reads anymore. So yes, I share your
indignation :)
On the other hand, you have strengthened my
argument by singling out one work that Steinbeck
is most known for. As far as wide acclaim is
concerned most people only know Grapes of Wrath,
i.e. as far as SPP is concerned Steinbeck was a
one hit wonder. That is precisely the shortcoming
of SPP I was speaking of.

Re:Duh

[skinfitz]

I can't understand why there's such total hostility toward the idea that anyone should dare to be able to make money from his creative works.

I have no problem with this whatsoever, hence my suggestion to charge a small fee and leave the expiration. My problem is this: Libraries buy books that are printed and bound and this incurs a cost - naturally they pay for that cost along with extra which goes to the publisher and author(s). Due to this cost, there is a natural limit to the amount of copies that can be held at one time (not to mention physical shelf space), which obviously restricts the amount of books available to the public. If you want to read a popular book, you have to wait.

Now take the ebook - literally costs nothing to produce a hundred or a thousand "copies". Obviously you dont want people keeping a copy forever for free, so let it expire. The publisher must make their money after all otherwise there is no incentive to produce books.

I dont know about you, but I find it immensly irritating to go to a library only to find that the books you want are already out. I dont want to read them in a week or two I want them now and I would pay a small fee for that. Often desired books are out of print and it isn't as simple as "if you want it that badly buy a copy". I think that charging a small fee (like, say 50c or a dollar) for each temporary ebook view would be a good idea (perhaps have a limited number of *free* copies to encourage business and provide access to the unfortunate).

To deny access to a book purely because a database says that there are too many copies in circulation I feel defeats the object of what a library is about and will annoy people who would gladly pay.

It almost feels like a paper version of record companies attempting to stop electronic distribution of music. Imagine going to an online music pay per download site and clicking to download a song: "Sorry, we only published 5000 copies". The concept is ridiculous.

I used to be an anti-ebook snob, too...

[uptownguy]

But frankly, there's nothing like holding and reading a real book by the bedside or on the go.

I love books. I started reading at 2. I worked at an independent bookstore for three years in high school. Then at a library in college. I love books.

Why would anyone ever want to read an ebook? Paper is so much nicer. ...This is what I always used to say...

Then I tried reading an ebook on my Clie. At bedtime. I've got to say -- reading a book on a small bright handheld, no need for a reading lamp, being able to put it down and nod off... WOW. Reading in bed has never been so nice!

Moral of the story: Don't knock it 'till you try it.

is it such a good thing?

[deus_X_machina]

If all books go into ebook format, won't it make it that much easier to just "Edit" "Find" phrases and paragraphs in a book, rather than actually reading the entire book? Believe me, the Internet Classics Archive has been a godsend this semester for me, however, I confess that I also didn't read much the material I should have, rather just searched for the phrases I needed to write my thesis. Being a philosophy major, its come to a point where I barely buy books because they're almost useless in book format (just like music not in .mp3 format for me is also useless).

I'm sure to people who do indepth research it'll be a godsend, where people actually read the material but need to find key topics quickly, however, I think it's going to help provoke a world of undereducated undergrads.

Slightly off topic but somewhat still

[jpt.d]

I bought my grandmother some books for Christmas. All of them are old enough to be out of copyright. One of them didn't have any copyright notice in it at all. Another had this edition copyrighted, and the third had a plain copyright. The third being all of shakespear's works. How can any company put a copyright on public domain material like this? These works were over a hundred years old (books were new).

Re:Slightly off topic but somewhat still

[SheldonYoung]

You can copyright a distinct collection as if it was an individual work.

Re:Slightly off topic but somewhat still

[jpt.d]

There were no foot notes that I saw, but I could be mistaken.

Which system?

[GrouchoMarx]

Does anyone know what software they're using to enforce this? It could be Palm's, but it could be another as well. Either way, I'm certain it will lock out GNU/Linux users. And, of course, trying to find a way to read such books on Linux will be a felony. (Hey, Dmitry, up for another challenge? :-)

I read ebooks. I buy ebooks. I pay for them. I only buy unencrypted, public format ebooks. Anyone else can bite me.

Re:Which system?

[HiThere]

I don't read ebooks. At first I wouldn't because they were too expensive. Later I wouldn't because of the license.

ebooks are a bad idea, that has been made worse by licenses. May all companies involved in this atrocity go bankrupt quickly.

ebooks, as offered, have a decreased value over regular books at an increased price. Anyone who buys one without actually needing it is being silly.

Re:mIRC

[kpansky]

You're right. I am on 4 different IRC nets right now and should have caught myself while making that post. And the last thing I need now is a reputation as "windows newb" tarnishing my sterling reputation :)

Re:coming soon

[MacAndrew]

Yes, a pulmonologist I saw had a palm or equiv. with lists of all the drugs, dosages, adn which would flag interactions on the spot. He said he'd like to use a Mac but "there's no software for it." Sigh.

Imagine a wireless connection on that handheld for checking medical records and entering orders. No more of the *&^@$*! physician handwriting. I'm sure you've heard of the people who died over handwriting (although arguably some were pharmacist error -- and they've had computers looking over their shoulders for a while).

With hardware like iPod (practically a computer in its own right) and writing recognition software like Inkwell out I would be very surprised not to see an Apple handheld in the near future. The way Newton was handled was bizarre, but then it's not easy being a trailblazer, and those were the "dark days" for Apple. It is rumored that Jobs' ego is simply antagonistic to anything he didn't invent. an interesting article They should leave the low end of the market to Palm etc., I doubt there's much money to be made there; same strategy as the iPos v. al those other MP3 players.

Hey, I wish they'd stayed in the web browser game, too. :)

w00t!

[Tuxinatorium]

If what the library is doing holds up in court, it would set a good legal precedent for the legality of some kinds of file sharing...

ARGH!! Quit One-Side-Viewing EVERYTHING

[SuperDuG]

Want to get Free Music, Free Videos, Free Internet Access, and Free Copies of Nearly Everybook ever published?

Sound all to good to be true? Just can't be right? Well fret no longer boys and girls and walk on down to your LOCAL LIBRARY.

It's very common to be able to read a book/magazine/newspaper or listen to a COPYRIGHTED music CD, or watch a COPYRIGHTED DVD, or surf the internet on a rather large pipe all for the low cost of NOTHING at your local library.

The previous arguments of "This will never work people will just find a way to circumvent the security" make just as much sense as checking out a book at the library will never work because no one will bring it back. You want to make an illegal copy of a book, then walk to your local library and use their copy machine and whamo you've got a copy of the book, AND you've violated a copyright law, when all you really had to do was check it out and then renew it or check it out again at a later time.

It boggles my mind how many people who have commented seem to have no idea how the library system works. Here let me put it in "Spent Too Much Time In The Dark In Front Of The Computer" terminology. Libraries are publically accessible databases of all the information in the entire world, it's like a leech ftp server where anyone can get one and reep the benifits of it. You never have to pay for anything so long as you follow the rules.

The difference between p2p and the library is a lack of hardcore porn.

Re:ARGH!! Quit One-Side-Viewing EVERYTHING

[gaj]

I agree that libraries rock. However, one minor quibble: they are not free. Nothing is free. Public libraries are paid for with a combination of tax dollars (which most of us that participate in the economy pay), fees and donations. I'd guess that, in most cases, it's tax dollars that pay most of the bills.

Always remember, if you think you're getting something for free, you just haven't thought about it long enough. There's a cost for all things. I'm not saying that's a bad thing. In fact, I'm pretty sure it's a good thing. Just pointing it out.

Re:ARGH!! Quit One-Side-Viewing EVERYTHING

[stephenbooth]

Don't know if libraries work the same in the US or whereever .tk is, here in the UK (all price coversion approximate)...

It's very common to be able to read a book/magazine/newspaper or listen to a COPYRIGHTED music CD, or watch a COPYRIGHTED DVD, or surf the internet on a rather large pipe all for the low cost of NOTHING at your local library.

Books are free to borrow and you can read any of the magazines/newspapers in the library (so long as you cna pry it from the hands of the OAP who's come in to keep warm and catch a nap but is hanging onto the latest issue of "IEEE News" so it looks likel they're there for a valid reason. Whilst some libraries do have study carrels with CD players they're pretty much impossible to book unless you're a music student on an acredited course and none that I've seen have DVD players. Borrowing a CD generally costs about $1.60-$2 (usually 2 weeks) and borrowing a DVD or video anything up to $5 (usually 1 week). Internet varies from free to $2/hr and you have to fight the 12 year olds downloading porn and $LATEST_PLAYGROUND_CRAZE graphics to use it. Oh, and when you do get on you're sharing a 10Mb pipe with about 500 other people scattered around the various branchs plus library staff (who, due to QoS and similar settings, get a much bigger share of the pipe than the public do)

You want to make an illegal copy of a book, then walk to your local library and use their copy machine and whamo you've got a copy of the book, AND you've violated a copyright law,

All the libraries I've seen charge $0.15 per A4 page (single sided) and have someone watching like a hawk (similar attack pattern to) to make sure no-one exceeds copyright/fair-use bounds in their copying.

The difference between p2p and the library is a lack of hardcore porn.

Depends on how well you know the librarians. If you know them well enough they'll let you into the restricted "Serious Scholars Only" sections.

Also here in the UK a library will typically only get a book, CD or DVD 6 months to a year after it's initial publish date and there'll be very few copies. Usually to get a popular book in it's first year in the library you'll have to make a reservation (costs about $1-$2 per item) and have no chance of renewing it once the loan period is up (have to pay another $1 and wait till your turn comes around again). Bear in mind that we have already paid for all these items through local taxes, the reservation fee probably doesn't even cover the cost of collecting it most of the time.

Stephen

Re:ARGH!! Quit One-Side-Viewing EVERYTHING

[JimBobJoe]

How libraries work in the US goes back and forth between state, because it is the state that funds em. Ohio has been consistently ranked as having the best libraries in the nation (and on the smaller level, individual Ohio cities win lots of contests. No surprise to see Cleveland doing something innovative.) This is because a good chunk of their funds come from the state, and then they can add additional property tax levies, if they desire. (You would think that would be common, but apparently we're the only state that does it.)

So my local library (Columbus public) has everything for free. I can rent 5 DVD's at a time for five days for free, same thing for videos, 10 CD's/audio cassettes for thirty days for free, et cetera. And I guess it's a cool thing to take advantage of (wanna rent more than 5 DVD's at a time? Just bring in two library cards.)

They get new books, cd's and DVD's very quickly, and that's cool too. When it comes to books, if the book is popular enough, they'll order several dozen of em.

One thing that is neat is that, generally speaking, it's people in the urban areas who take advantage of the library more than those in the suburban areas. That's cool.

However, I have to wonder if it is appropriate to have a state funded Blockbuster...because that's essentially what it is...my income and property taxes going to create a "free" Blockbuster.

Does this mean that we'll start seeing laptops...?

[Newer Guy]

Does this mean that we'll start seeing laptops with ebooks on them left on trains and busses? Hmmmmmm.....

Footnotes, illustrations, modernized language...

[Kjella]

All of those are copyrightable, presumably also other things as typesetting and whatever, as long as it's the publishers work. If you want an edition free of copyright, you could get the actual text electronically from project Gutenberg or similar.

Kjella

Have you used Kazaa lately?

[wackybrit]

P2P has gone to shit. I remember 'back in the day' on Napster when half the MP3s you'd get were crappy. Now, however, it's up to at least 80%.

Some people have songs in excellent 192kbps or 128kbps, but mostly are VERY badly encoded 128/112/96/64kbps. What's worse is that Kazaa 2 encourages people to rate these as being 'Excellent' integrity files!

Many MP3s of popular songs on Kazaa now are recorded from low quality radio streams, or off of TV. Seriously, I think so few people are buying CDs nowadays that no-one on Kazaa has a proper well-encoded rip of anything.

I used to download tons of music a few years ago. Now I'm buying CDs out the ass instead, the quality of MP3s on Kazaa is absolutely crap, and I just use them for sampling CDs I want to buy.

My book

[Flarelocke]

I wonder if they'll make my book: How to Circumvent Cleveland Libraries' Time Restriction Mechanism available, too. :)

Re:mIRC

[jazman]

> I am an author.

And one I've never heard of, no disrespect intended. You are currently no Pratchett, Gibson or Tolkien.

When you are, and you want profit to increase, and you see falling sales and increasing downloads, it won't take more than a few seconds for you to start thinking "hey, they're stealing from my children, the terrorists!"

At the moment you're benefitting a lot from the free publicity. When this stops, the downloads will too. Or at least the complementary nature of the web offering will decrease in value.

Re:you cant grep a dead tree

[Technician]

You also can't grep an encrypted text. So what's the point. This is not an unencrypted text file.
I think it will only be readable on some protected (not open) client on a protected OS (not Linux). Don't expect to read these books on your Linux handheld until after the DMCA is broken.

Clue calling...

[MosesJones]

Don't you think that maybe, just maybe, the Library ISN'T allowed to make lots of copies of books for free ? Otherwise they could copy all of those paper books too.

Sheesh

Re:mIRC

[stephenbooth]

Weren't we talking about this yesterday?

Stephen

Here we go.. total control

[nurb432]

And you thought I was kidding about control of all information?

With this little trick, once people adjust to the idea will give people in power complete control of information.

Sure it will be cracked, but that wont help the common man that isn't capable of doing such a thing. Their entire view of the world, and history will be controlled.

It will take time, but this is the next logical step in the progression.

20 years ago if I told you people would be paying to listen to radio, or that you wouldn't be able to copy your music from your house to use in the car, possibly tossed in jail if you try..you would have laughed. Today the practice is pretty much accepted.

Re:coming soon

[BWJones]

Imagine a wireless connection on that handheld for checking medical records and entering orders.

Oh, I would go further than that. The current state of medical management software for patient management, medical records etc... is abysmal and the costs are mind bogling. I have often thought that a Mac based medical managment package could be put together that would scale from a single doctors office (rare these days) to large hospitals. Handheld devices could be both 802.11 aware for wide area access and Bluetooth aware for synching with patient info when medical staff walk into a patients room. That way, access to all information including radiological would be available at all times even at the patients bedside.

Re:mIRC

[Arcturax]

Oh please, books are different because its hard to enjoy a book on a computer screen. Most people either want to read them in a nice portable form they can take anywhere with them. Yes you could lug around a laptop or a handheld but it is just not the same as the feel of crisp paper between your fingers. Reading a paper book has an interaction to it you just can't reproduce on a computer. The feel of paper, the smell of it, having to turn the pages. With books you have an interaction with the object that you don't get with movies and music. Those you can play on a computer and enjoy them just as much as on other hardware (tv, stereo, etc). But you can't put a book on a computer screen and get the same experience as reading it in paper form.

That is why books will still sell well online. That is why most people won't bother with e-books.

Typical /. knee jerk reaction

[Arcturax]

What is so bad about this? This is only an electronic form of checking out a book and then returning it after a set period of time. Are you all going to complain next about having to take back that real book you borrowed?

I just can't believe that I am seeing so much whinign about what is a valid use for an e-book. Its not like you are buying the thing and then being locked out after a few days, you are BORROWING it. So what is the big deal?

I've been reading PC Magazine online...

[rtphokie]

And have been pretty happy with it. It uses the Zinio Reader and is pretty functional. Links are clickable, which is really nice in a magazine of this ilk. It's bookmarkable, searchable and you can write notes on it. The only complaint I've got is that it's too faithful to the paper version. It includes all those annoying subscription and other business reply cards and they have to be turned like any other page.

Old school librarians just dont get this

[rtphokie]

Not that long ago, I worked for a company that builds library automation software. I built a prototype version of our web based catalog searching application that integrated the contents of Project Gutenberg into the system. It gave the user the ability to view books available in Gutenberg online. Included pagination, bookmarking, and searching.

Showed it to the cheif architect on the project and got rave reviews, showed the marketing department, they loved it. Showed the CEO and he proceeded to chew my ass out for wasting my time and his. I showed it (secretly) to a few customers and half loved it, half hated it. But nobody was willing to try it. That's just dumb.

The moral of the story? While many prefer the feel of a book in hand even the smell, some are willing to try other things.

Prove that it's their own work

[yerricde]

The SCMS protection on Minidiscs have stopped bands and other content creators from legitimately making digital copies of their own work.

Because it's not their work. Assuming that the band in question is a cover band, recording a performance of a musical work without the permission of the songwriter is an infringement of copyright. In general, the license to record somebody else's work isn't bundled with the standard ASCAP/BMI cover band license.

At this point, you're thinking, "What if members of the band wrote all the songs?" Prove it. Prove that your band didn't pull a George Harrison and unconsciously plagiarize an existing song. Prove it in court against a music publisher whose legal budget is 1000 times bigger than yours. Under such conditions, I'm not sure how a songwriter could prove that he didn't copy something else.

Re:Prove that it's their own work

[dmaxwell]

Why should the owner of a piece of equipment have to prove to the equipment that he has the right to use it? You've only further proved my point. How will anybody other than the entertainment cartels be able to use A/V production equipment if they get all of the draconian things that they want?

Secure Video Path

[yerricde]

Attach homebrewed screenshot app here

Not if the kernel goes into a special graphics mode where video memory is write-only. Microsoft Windows already does something analogous for audio, not allowing unsigned drivers to play secure streams and not allowing trojan drivers (Total Recorder, What-U-Hear) to be signed unless they turn themselves off when the Secure Audio Path is open.

Re:Secure Video Path

[dmaxwell]

That makes it only slightly harder. Point a digital camera at the ebook and rig a timer to push the next page button and then the shutter. It would be a VERY trivial hardware hack. Oh and anything designed to screw up cameras will impact readability.

It could be a little fancier. The button pusher device could also trigger a download of the camera right back to the DRMed computer every x pages. Even better, have the button pusher BE the DRMed computer. I rather like that. Let's award bonus points if it'll automatically OCR it too.....ah man! Have the computer control a device that does the button pushing and then OCR's each page as it comes out. I absolutely love the idea of a DRM machine not knowing what it
's left hand is doing.

Re:coming soon

[BWJones]

Since when do doctors go to the bedside any more? ;-) (I used to work at a hospital, as an MRI tech; MD's vary in bedside skills ... a bit. :)

At our hospital at least, most services round in the mornings with attendings and residents and medical students are routinely interacting with patients. Another business I am associated with is an independent practice and patients come to us, but we do have an inpatient sleep lab and extended EEG monitoring service, but even in that practice we tend to spend more time with patients than usual to give a higher quality of service.

Yes, I do agree with anything that will improve care and somehow keep costs down. Or is that too much to hope for?

No, it in not too much to hope for. The problem in medicine for the past decade and a half has been HMO's and insurance companies. They were a con foisted on the American public that absolutely did not keep medical costs down. All they did was make the delivery of medicine into a big business and they transferred much of the money that went to doctors, nurses, technicians etc... into the pockets of middle managers. In fact, if you were to go into the parking lot of most hospitals, the expensive cars you will see do not belong to physicians. Rather they belong to all of the middle managers and hospital administrators.

Not true at all

[FreeUser]

To date no good solution exists to entice authors into creating and preserve freedom at the same time. Street performer protocol and similar things do work in some cases but only in "niche" cases. For instance many authors have only written one good work in their lives (e.g. Steinbeck). They would starve with SPP. Many singers have had one or two hits (e.g. Billy Ray Cyrus (sp?)). Those guys would starve too.

Nonsense. They would work day jobs like the rest of us, and practice their craft as a hobby. The best authors are those who do it for love of writing, not for cash. The downside would be that they would spend less time working on their writing ... but arguably that would be a good thing in some instances as well (consider the dreck produced by the paid writers in the last two Star Wars episodes and the last Star Trek movie, and contrast that with some of the excellent, and vastly superior, fan fiction that has been circulated for free, at no cost, with no profit incentive whatsoever.

Worse, people would not go to the trouble of creating stuff if they knew in advance that they would have to sustain their production over long stretches of time.

You mean, be productive over long stretches of time like every other working human being on the planet? Why is it content creators, and their purveyors (the publishers, who are generally the ones receiving the vast bulk of the profits) feel they are entitled to rest on their laurels forever, and never work another day in their life, or at least only as much as they deign to choose, for creating one work, while the rest of us accept that we will work, and work hard, until retirement?

This entitlement mentality must end, and the notion that we should destroy the internet, hobble libraries, shred the constitution, and turn every digital device in our homes and on our persons into a governance device that monitors and reports our usage of digital data is not only offensive and appalling, it is simply, flat out asinine.

The myth that people will only create valuable and worthwhile art is not only provably wrong, it has already been proven wrong countless times, not only by myself, but by many, many others. Peruse USENET or any number of Free Media and Free Literature sites ... much of the best work is available online, at no cost, with no profit motive. Whether it fits your particular taste or not, the allegation that "people would not go to the grouble of creating stuff" if it were free (the assumption implicit in your statement) is simply false.

Content creators will have to give up the notion, and assumption, that they are entitled to be paid for creating content if we are to have anything other than a draconian, Orwellian society in the digital age, in which a police and surveillance state is instituted in order to enforce digital copyrights (and even that will likely prove insufficient, though I'm sure the effort will further overpopulate our prisons and destroy thousands, perhaps millions of lives in a misguided effort that will make the War on Drugs, and the former Communist East, look like a liberal , democratic picnic in comparison).

Copyright initially reduced the number of books printed to 1/3 of their former numbers ... this is not the consiqence of a regime designed to foster creativity and productivity, it is the result of a regime designed to facilitate censorship and foster a profit motive above love of the art, and we as a culture have paid a heavy price in seeing our culture diminished and privatized to a point where singing "Happy Birthday" to your child is a technical violation of the law, punishable by fine and, if you send such a greeting to your college bound child over email, by 5 years imprisonment.

Cleveland Library: an unusual case in itself

[Reziac]

My experience with this library from a distance, going back to the 1970s, is that they have a most unusual assortment of books, often quite eclectic, and don't necessarily go down the beaten path. In Montana, I had access to an interlibrary loan program of which Cleveland was the eastern terminus, and it was amazing how many rare and oddball SF/F requests they filled for me. (And they're one of only 3 public libraries in the entire U.S. that carry the AKC Stud Books, definitely a specialty/niche item.)

My guess is that as Cleveland goes, other libraries will follow.

Overdue fines are not really "revenue"

[Reziac]

Overdue fines are not a significant source of revenue. They exist mainly to encourage people to return the books, hopefully in a halfway timely manner. Most libraries have regular "amnesty" periods when you can return books fine-free, no matter how much overdue time it has. They'd rather get the book back than collect the fine (itself trivial compared to the price of a hardcover book).

If it bothers you, then buy the book

[Reziac]

I don't have a problem with *library* ebooks that evaporate after a fixed timeframe. After all, you didn't *expect* to be able to keep a =hardcopy= *library* book after it was due; why should you have different expectations for an =electronic= library book??

Now, if I'd purchased the ebook, then I would bloody well expect to have the same rights as I would for a purchased hardcopy book.

I'd reasonably assume that the Cleveland library is paying the publisher X-much per available copy of the ebook, just as they'd have to for hardcopy books. So they can't realistically be expected to provide unlimited use.

What would be sensible from a revenue standpoint, is to let patrons buy the ebook outright, should they so desire. That would be the best of both worlds -- the ability to read before buying (just as you would with any regular library book), and to buy a copy you want to keep it. (I'd expect that in this case, the library would be acting as the publisher's sales agent, so would get a commission of sorts.)

Taxes and interlibrary loan programs

[Reziac]

County library support costs me around $400/year in property taxes (about 20% of my total tax bill). Considering the state of the Los Angeles County library system, I am definitely NOT getting my money's worth, no matter how much I use the library (it's simply not that good a system, and has relatively poor selection -- I get more good books from their ongoing donations and discard sale than I ever find to check out).

Maybe if they had ebooks available for checkout, they'd have a better selection and I'd finally feel like I was supporting something worthwhile, instead of getting ripped off at tax time.

ISTM that interlibrary loan programs (the biggest weakness of the LACounty library system) could also vastly benefit from ebooks. Don't have the book your patron needs? Just download it from some other library, where it would be "checked out" in the normal way for interlibrary loans. No need to pay postage to send and return the book, either.

Re:mIRC

[Reziac]

[goes to look] I think you've got the ideal sort of book for a dual market, too. Ebook for quick and free perusing, hardcopy for gift and "fun with your kids" (kindof hard for dad and a bunch of kids to share one monitor). In this case, the ebook serves as cheap advertising for what is likely a great family-fun and coffee table book.

Novels are in a slightly different basket, in that there's not nearly as much functional difference between ebook and hardcopy. Even so, people will either buy the book or not, and the "not" are not spending money regardless. But get 'em addicted, and real readers (the kind who buy books anyway) be too impatient to wait for an ebook, or will feel the need to have the real thing too (just as many do for MP3 and audio CD).

I've got a series of space opera novels in the hopper, so I've been thinking about this, and have pretty much decided that the way to go is the preemptive strike: do my own ebook release, so what winds up in newsgroups/IRC has quality control and serves to incline folk toward buying the real thing, if they like it well enough.

And as to those that wouldn't buy in the first place -- well, they still got exposure to my work, just as with a library book (or a song on the radio or scrounged thru P2P). Maybe they'll tell a friend, who likes it well enough to buy it. Either way, I'm out nothing *tangible*, and I might gain something.

sue?

[twitter]

Now the companies do the have RIGHT to sue my ass in court for theft if I steal it though. :)

No they don't. They have only convinced you that it is wrong to share and that electronic copy is theft. By the way, I would not give two dollars to own a donkey, much less try to bring one to court.

Clue Stick for Clevland.

[twitter]

Yes, it is idiotic but it's also imoral. The fundamental wrong here is that the publisher demands control of your printing press. Your computer is your printing press, and the library's program takes control of it. That's right, if you don't have control of every byte on your computer but someone else does that someone else owns your computer. Obviously, the publisher is trying to set up an unreasonable system.

The crux of the Right to Read is that publishers would use technology to own all information. The idea is that you are so greatful to have access to that information that you will give everything that you create back to the publisher. In order to do this publishers have to make copying their information difficult and convince us all that sharing infomation is moraly wrong, that our own intelect is not worth much and most importantly THAT THERE IS NO OTHER WAY TO SHARE INFORMATION. Compared to the vast wealth of everyone else's intelect one person is not much, so the publishers will always win that one. The other notions are absurd, moraly reprehesible and must be fought every day. We can publish information ourselves for free if we wish and there are other ways for publishers to get along.

The Clevland library should be ashamed of itself for working for disreputable publisher who demand more than their due for an electronic copy. Electronic information is easier to publish than any other form of information ever. It can be coppied efortlessly, editied easily and transormed into many forms. Reputable publishers will have to find some way to use their reputations for profit and libraries, which exist as you point out to share information, should work to support and encourage them. Where's the link to Project Gutenburg and other free libraries on the Clevland site? The over simplified and distorted globe that sits on their front page is appropriate to the way they are running themselves. Yeah, they use M$ crap, it figures. They are so greatful their computers sort of work that they are willing to relinquish control of them when there are superior and cheaper free alternatives. Get with it, Clevland.

This is news?

[spectecjr]

The King County library system in Washington State (that's Redmond, Seattle, Bellevue, etc) has had this for ages.

don't be confused.

[twitter]

You say: An artist should (and under law, does, unless they sign it away) have complete control over their artistic creations ... YOU do not have the right to determine how the artist's creation is distributed. For better or for worse, it is their choice. Deal.

I have the right to do as I please. Artists do to. Copyright, however, is a created right which requires government intervention and protection. Natural rights require no such protection and are only violated by unbearable governments. The exclusive distribution you seem to love was created by the framers of the constitution to promote publication. As publication is much easier and cheaper, there is less protection needed.

Electronic copy is not theft. Republication of an electronic work is copyright violation and might be persued that way. A publisher might be due lost sales, proved in a reasonable manner and punitive damages if the copy was willful or malicious. Me making a few copies of an ebook for my own use represents no loss at all. Sharing with a few frinds and family may actually promote sales. If I can't have reasonable control over electronic works that I purchase, I won't buy them. The best things in life are not made for money anyway.

Nope. Go Back and Study the History of Copyright.

[FreeUser]

Hmm. Well, if this is a troll, it is a clever enough one that I'll respond anyway.

And the reason why copyright reduced the number of books is because it got rid of those publishers who were making money by simply not giving the author any as they were just reprinting the novel themselves. So yes, we got rid of the leeches who were simply coasting on the coat-tails of somebody else's effort and the number of books printed dropped

Go study the history of copyright (hint, contrary to the myth proponents of copyright promote, copyright came into existence a century or so before the Statue of Anne). You couldn't be more wrong in your assertions. Original copyright didn't grant authors any rights whatsoever. It granted certain publishers the right to publish, and denied those rights to everyone else. The publishers who had been granted the right to copy by official sanctioned of the British Crown quickly learned they could make more money by not competing with one another. So they got together and formed a trust, something that would be illegal if it were to happen today, creating what they called the "White Book" in which a publisher would register a work and the other publishers would then refrain from publishing competing copies. It began as a gentleman's agreement, and later was encoded into formal, professional rules publishers in the cartel abided by, and later still into law. The authors and artists had no part in this ... except that 2/3rds of their voices were silenced in the process.

It was cartel politics, pure and simple, that led to the monopoly regimes adopted by the Statute of Anne and subsequently the US constitution, a cartel created and formed with the express purpose of controlling what was published, facilitating censorship, and controlling who could gain access to publishing equipment. Much like the FCC does with modern radio and television today, and much like what Microsoft and the Hollywood cartels are trying to do to the Internet through Palladium and DRM (Digital Restriction Mechanisms).

Publishers who published their own works, unsanctioned by the Crown, were even drawn and quartered for their offense. The decrease in public materials came about directly as a result of the stifling and chilling effects of copyright, not because Authors suddenly had new monopoly entitlements that allowed them the privelege of ceasing to be published and read, but instead to demand publishers pull their works from the public eye and fade into historical oblivion.

This is the consequence of a regime designed to foster creativity, productivity, and fairness to those who use the limited time in their lives to create something that betters all of us.

Only someone completely ignornant of the early history of copyright could assert with a straight face that copyright was ever designed to foster creativity, productivity, much less fairness. The US constitution included copyright because, quite frankly, the founding fathers were hoodwinked by publishers ... the same publishers who had fought the author rights and limited terms introduced into copyright by the Statue of Anne tooth and nail for decades previously, through bribery and litigation.

Copyright was established to provide a simple mechanism for the British monarch to censor the printing press. It has come full circle, returning to its roots, in that it has become, by far, the most effective means of censoring the modern internet and stifling a variety of otherwise protected speech. This is not what anyone without an agenda (c.f. the BSA, MPAA, RIAA) would characterize as "fostering creativity, productivity, or fairness."

OT: Internet ads

[PotatoHead]

Guess I had time to think enough :) It will be long though, I just can't see anyway around that. (sorry)

"but have "we" really? Firstly, by "we", I assume you mean the /. moral majority. "

I really don't mean the moral majority of /. I mean 'we', in general, the users and builders of the internet.

"/. is a refuge where geeks can share in a mass delusion for awhile, until it inevitably proves false. The moderation helps ensure this, especially that new foe of a friend BS."

Agreed. BTW, I use the foe/friend stuff to mark people I want to read later, or whose opinion I would like to see play out for a while. This does change how /. does present the comments, but there is always logged out browsing. For me it's about 70 / 30, the majority being logged in and thus biased browsing of comments. Slippery slope to be sure. Not sure what to think of that other than I am aware and will see where it goes.

"At the peak of the bubble, about half the ads I would read on the Internet were ads for other businesses that make money selling ads. This is not a way to make money."

You make some good points here in this paragraph.

Your assessment that ad revenue is limited is correct, to me, as is your assessment of the basic problem with many internet ads today.

However, that does leave some ad revenue and it does not take into account potential revenue that could come from value adds. People want to reach others, but they want to be able to see results so they can judge worth. People also will pay for things they find of value.

Adding value to the process will get the bills paid if one works hard at it. Not very many sites on the internet do that right now and things are changing because of that.

I will agree also with your idea that the current ad revenue pool will not support all the takers right now. Sites that are not adding any real value will eventually change, or wither away as a result of this.

Not a bad thing, just a growing pain. For what it is worth, I believe an awful lot of the Internet today does not really add a lot of value. Things are going to continue to change, for the better I hope.

I am not sure of the best order to continue, so take this next bit as you must to make sense of it.

I chose ARS, Lwn, and pr0n because I see them doing things differently.

I did not include RedHat because I am not sure they are going to be a success yet, why is another long thread...

Google is also on risky ground, though I believe their general position on things is very good because they add a *lot* of value. Brin is a sharp guy. He should be able to make something of that.

Ars adds value with their informed commentary on many technical issues. They know they cannot survive on ads alone and said as much. They provide some good information along with general news and discussion. To me, this is interesting because you can get news and discussion everywhere, so that ends up being a promotional cost partially covered from general ads.

The good information though has value. Those that see that will pay because they can see worth, not because they want Ars to continue to exist or because they are altrustic. Limiting content via subscription turns many potential readers away. Indexing and formatting that content as reference material for subscribers adds value without turning away casual readers.

Lwn does a similar thing, though their approach is not as good. They make non-subscribers wait. So they don't have to work any harder, with their model, but they do turn away readers.

Ars has a better chance than Lwn does.

Not sure what to say about pr0n. Lots of people pay, maybe the nature of the content itself will continue to support that end of things. I will leave that one alone for now ;)

I did not catch the story last week. (Link?) If your summary is correct, then I agree. And again, that is not a bad thing. Consider though what I said about value adds. Perhaps the content itself can be the ad given a reasonable value add to support the ongoing production of it. The technique Ars is using right now makes me wonder about the viability of that.

Same with the various authors trying the open content models.

BTW, the story about the new novel posted yesterday got me interested. I downloaded it and read some. I will likely buy his book because I enjoy reading stuff like that away from the computer. Funny thing is I would have likely skipped a review, and maybe I would have been hooked by a sample chapter. Hard choices for authors to make.

Same goes for the Neil Stevenson essay "In the Beginning was the Command Line". Purchased that one because of the online essay.

These things lead me to believe that the content can be the ad in some cases.

I find your two laws interesting.

The first seems to indicate that successful web enterprises will be those that can partner with each other and form communities of loyal readers and participants. These sort of communities are valuable from a marketing point of view. They also can be somewhat localized.

The second means fewer free Linux downloads. :( Very quickly, that also seems to be the way things are heading. Either you invest time and download and assemble your OSS software, or pay someone to do the work for you. Again, value adds can generate revenue if the value is true.

Sorry again for my long replies, know that I appreciate your part in the discussion because it has value to me. That is at the core of why I post. Good things are learned over time this way.

Re:OT: Internet ads

[PotatoHead]

Ok,

I will think all of this over. Your comments about /. business cases have some definite merit. You point out some easy mistakes that I will watch for.

Since we all only have so much money, actual new revenue is small. Everyone competes for their piece of the monthly pie... I have actually bumped into this fact in my own arguments from the past, but did not give it the attention it should have gotten as you have done.

Internet access fees have stolen revenue from television in my case. I prefer to purchase media and use broadcast TV in favor of cable for some of the very reasons you identify. Did not realize exactly why though. Hmmm.

About the CD thing. I do feel audio CD media is over priced. $3 is too little and does distort the math, but $9.99 - $11.99 is not. I must come clean here. The problem for me is not so much price as it is control and quality. The consolidation of radio and music distribution companies has diluted programming choices considerably. The result is a less valuable experience which is why I feel the way I do regarding price.

People know now that there is a lot more music out there than they are currently exposed to, and they know it can be cheaper. Right or wrong, this does change the nature of things. Maybe CD media stays at $16.99, but they could offer for $10 - $20 a month for access to a wider catalog. Sure they steal some sales from themselves that could be tempered by limiting what is offered online, but the more important thing to them is the chance to steal from other sources. Music gets more important, perhaps I buy one less DVD. (Which in my case I would do.)

So, Ars then still is an interesting case to me. They are promoting themselves through Ars. Ars is the ad. Any subscription revenue will just make the selling through Ars cheaper. But you are correct in that Ars exists not because of any revenue, but for its value to its creators. It is not a matter of the profibility of Ars, but the cost of Ars as a promotional tool. (Or maybe they just like publishing cool stuff for no profit!)

This has been a good thread.