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DRM and the Destruction of the Book
Hugh Pickens writes "EFF reports that Cory Doctorow spoke to a crowd of about a hundred librarians, educators, publishers, authors, and students at the National Reading Summit on How to Destroy the Book and said that 'anyone who claims that readers can’t and won’t and shouldn’t own their books are bent on the destruction of the book, the destruction of publishing, and the destruction of authorship itself.' Doctorow says that for centuries, copyright has acknowledged that sacred connection between readers and their books and that when you own a book 'it’s yours to give away, yours to keep, yours to license or to borrow, to inherit or to be included in your safe for your children' and that 'the most important part of the experience of a book is knowing that it can be owned.'"
And here I was thinking the content of the book was the most important part.
God spoke. He wants His commandments back. It might get very wet for a long time.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
Cory's Sacred Ancestors (or whoever the hell he was referencing) didn't have a clue about what effect the scanning and distribution of a book to 100,000 strangers on the Internet would have on the publishing industry.
Being able to give away, bogart, lend or to borrow, pass as inheritance, or roll up and smoke a book is possible because the book is yours because you own it and the Doctrine of First Sale formalizes these possibilities.
One of the many things wrong with digital restrictions management (drm) technologies is that it tries to do an end run around the democratic process and eliminate these rights, some of which are codified in the Constitution. Some would assert that not only is the constitution the foundation upon which the country has been built, but also that it represents freedom and democracy itself. So these affronts by Bill Gatesists and the other 'freedom-hating' (tm) digital taliban, can be considered as affronts to the US itself if not also to higher ideals.
It may sound harsh to some fanbois, but step back and take off that 'with a computer' clause and see if what they are doing is acceptable. If not, then you know what to do.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
"The most important part of the experience of a book is knowing that it can be owned"
Huh?
I thought that perhaps the story told within said book is slightly more important than the media.
Then again, having bothered to (try to) read some of Doctorow's mystifyingly much-lauded short stories, perhaps I can understand his point of view would be different.
-Styopa
Everything is consensual. Whe share ideas and needs, and make deals.
No, I don't want to buy the idea of books as licenses, I like the idea of ownership of the phisical book, with the strings attached to give it to other people, even make a copy. The idea that I don't like, is to elevate a inventation to the sacred level. We born in a blank slate, almost everything is learned, and everything that we learn was invented or created. Theres nothing superior to us, sacred, where we ower fidelity.
-Woof woof woof!
yea but with ebooks technically letting your wife read the book is illegal and wrong and she has to buy her own copy.
40 years from now your kids are all grown up, and you pass away in your sleep. As they go through your stuff, they pick up the tom clancy paper backs and think about how you used to read them. Or they find a non working ebook reader and the DRM prevents them from knowing what kind of books you liked to read.
Pick one. It will happen. no one lives for ever. Memories must be preserved some how. DRM laden technology will prevent it.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
Yeah, that's what the church thought too when the bible was translated and the pressess started running. It'd surely destroy them.
Same as records destroyed the music industry, and home recording, and VHS, and CD-burning, and DVD copying, and Bluray copying, and.. There's an oddly long history of continuous destruction of the publishing business, yet somehow they're still around to pester us with DRM!
What pray tell ARE the effects?
A physical book has a sort of built-in DRM! If you give it away, you can't read it anymore. It can't easily be copied (it requires a lot of scanning and printing to do that). Isn't that kind of thing also part of the intention of DRM?
IMHO though, the world has changed, we now live in a world where information can be copied without any physical restrictions. So I hope that one day humanity will be able to live in that world, instead of trying to enforce old ways onto us with DRM. I'm sure that in a world where information can be copied freely, there can also be culture, people who make money, artists, and so on.
Doctorow is a pundit first, and a story-writer, oh, somewhere around seventh or eighth. Bill O'Reilly writes novels, too. But nobody reads them because they want to sit down with a good mystery, they read them because they are a fan of the pundit's punditry and buy up everything associated with his "brand."
As Ben Franklin said, those who give up their rights for convenience deserve neither, or something...
The exact saying is:
They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
Ben Franklin loved convenience. Hell, the lazy bastard used a kite to get his key up in the air rather than climbing up himself.
I suspect that the answer to all of the above questions is: no.
I tend to agree with him some, but there is simply too much music, art and knowledge out there to take in the old fashioned way. and if you do own the physical media it becomes a clutter and storage nightmare
i don't buy too much ebooks but in the last few weeks i bought a MS SQL T-SQL ebook app on my iphone to read on the train to work and some pdf's from mannning books. and the convenience factor is very nice in not carrying around the extra weight
That's true, PDF's and electronic books in general spare you the storage nightmare. On the other hand I hate reading PDFs off a computer screen and I have yet to find an electronic device that didn't suck as a ebook reader and that statement covers purpose designed ones like the Kindle as well. Perhaps if that rumored Apple tablet turns out to be more than just vaporware I'll have cause to reconsider... although... now that I think about it I rather doubt it simply because with these eBook readers they can apparently remotely delete and silently 'revise' books in your electronic library after you bought them. Nobody can delete or 'revise' a good old-fashioned hardcopy of some book I have bought and that is sitting in my good old-fashioned wooden bookshelf.
I can well understand the why the move to electronic readers like the Kindle would worry authors and book publishers. It has hitherto been considerably more work to pirate a book than to do so with movies, software and music and if that changes, all the 'goodwill' authors and publishers get from people downloading their stuff for free using BitTorrent & co. still won't pay their bills. Those bills have to be paid in real world money, not pirate consumer's goodwill. I buy lots of books on subjects such as the history of automotive, aviation and electronic technology. These books sometimes get printed in runs of no more than a few thousand copies by small time speciality publishers. The move to "full digital" inevitably means an exponential increase in book piracy (YAY! we're getting even more stuff for free now) but it's also going to kill off that kind of small scale publishing which I don't see as a good thing. It would mean the death of all but the biggest publishing houses, the ones that are rich enough to be able to survive the piracy. That in turn would mean a considerable reduction in the variety of what is being published.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
To paraphrase: what? -- Not everyone has sigs turned on
You can't do that with a digital copy.
Actually, yes you can. Annotation is a key feature on the Kindle and it works pretty well, actually.
...why anyone takes Cory Doctorow seriously?
He's a political activist and passable young-adult sci-fi author who contributes to a geek blog. He's an expert on nothing. He has not formally studied anything. He mouths off about copyright all the time, but his grasp of law and legal history is laughable. Yet he consistently makes headlines for saying asinine things about subjects about which he has no expertise.
How do I get people to pay me for saying stupid things about fashionable subjects? What he does is way more glamorous and takes way less actual, you know, effort than what I do.
Stallman's essay with even more recent updates is here
=~ s,(.*),<sarcasm>$1</sarcasm>,g if any_point_you_wish();
If copyright was 10 or 15 years, I'd be OK with draconian DRM restrictions on the things that are under copyright, provided there was a way to break it when the items go into public domain.
Then you misunderstand the purpose of DRM. The main purpose of DRM is to do an end-run around copyright expiration - so works "protected" by it *never* go into the public domain.
Imagine you're a publisher, and you want perpetual copyright, even though you know the highest law in the land says you'll never get it. What's the next best thing? Complete control over the books you sell - so you can prevent anyone from copying them ever again, and can even "recall" them if you want to. And you lobby for a law that makes it illegal for anyone to talk about how to circumvent that control.
At it's core, copyright is the ability to say "you're not allowed to say that, because I said it first." It is (supposedly) a compromise between the public and authors. In order to improve our culture, authors are given a limited right to exclude others from exercising their right of free expression.
DRM is a betrayal of this compromise - the public fulfills their part, but the authors never have to fulfill theirs. DRM is the antithesis of copyright, and rather than making laws to protect DRM, any work that is "protected" should be immediately be stripped of its copyright status.
After all, if DRM really worked, they wouldn't *need* copyright law, would they?
This kind of stuff would have made Winston Smith's day job so much easier. Rewrite history then push it out so as to override previous copies. And the rulers of the Fahrenheit 451 world could simply revoke the digital certificate of ... every book or every book with ideas they want suppressed. Sound like the media cartels' wet dream? It is, it is. And that of would-be tyrants? Even more so.
I was getting halfway interested in the Kindle until the 1984 debacle. That shows that DRM has a much darker potential than its proponents will ever acknowledge. Fuck all that shit. (Not picking on Amazon; I like it and have had an account there for years.) Corporations cannot be trusted to have any interest in freedom of any kind for the public. No doubt their accountants would show it as a negative (if intangible) item on their balance sheets.
If you want your life to be different, live it differently.
I think it IS the paper, or at least the medium. (Marshall McLuhan?)
Since it's hard to toss a professor into your car without felony charges, the bound book is the delivery medium of the content, and the part I believe has "hardware value" much like Apple is up to. Rather than some behemoth press in NYC, I do believe the future is the DIY kiosk that takes content of your choosing and cranks it into the presentation medium. Once that process gets down under a minute I think we'll hit a plateau.
When studying moderately difficult factual material, self pacing is important for me, which is the chief flaw of audio editions. Digital only copies tie up the visual space on the computer. I'd accept a cheap disposable reader with stylus/type annotation ability that can then wirelessly email your custom copy to your standard email.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
The problem is, technology changes. We've seen it, we've experienced it, and we will run into it with digital readers.
This is my biggest problem. Being forced to buy into a device. Right now, there are so many different version of readers and the DRM protected content only works of a select few. This is my problem. Look the way that the floppy drive has gone. What will happen in 5 or 10 years? Is you reader still going to exist, let alone be in serviceable (usable) condition? Will Amazon/B&N/Sony/etc. continue to support all those "old" devices? Will you be able to take your content from old device and put it into a new differing device? READ: I like Sony's digital reader better than my Kindle, can I put my Kindle content on my Sony reader? Or am I at the mercy of what Amazon/Sony/other choose to support?
Look how difficult now it is to find a computer with a 3.5" floppy drive? How about a 5.25" floppy (SD, DD, HD). I can pretty much promise you that your electronic reader is going to go the same way. Just like your computer of 5 years ago. Just like the Nintendo 8-bit, or Intellivision. Heck, are there any CDs or DVD that you've burnt 5 years ago that are still readable?
At a Thanksgiving dinner this year, I held a first printing of Bram Stokers Dracula. It was really quite something. Over 100+ years old, it was in just as readable condition as it was when it was printed. Will your e-book reader be able to do the same?
This is more than just a reactionary response to change. Electronic != Better tends to be the slogan, but it isn't always the case. E-readers/DRM Content/etc fall into this category. All my college textbooks have gone to electronic format (not by choice either, I have to pay for the e-texts regardless and can only be DLed to 2 single computers. No Kindel, Sony Reader, etc.) and it drives me nuts. Four hours of reading content on screen gets tiresome really fast. Since this switch, I have purchased a print copy over every text that I've needed. Its quite sad, since most of the time I can get the used copy for less than the electronic.
As you argue, content is the most important. But an Audio CD (content holder) is completely useless without a CD player. A locked safe (content holder) is completely useless if you don't have the combination. An MP3 (content) is useless without a MP3 player. A physical book will always be accessible. Content that is not accessible is not content at all; let alone useful content.
So which do you fall under? Your missing the third option that looks at the appropriateness of the development and considers *IF* it is good and should be used. I personally fall into that third category
Cheers,
Xyst
Trash created pre-DRM like Mozart or Wagner just can't compare to the majesty modern DRM'ed works like Justin Timberlake or Britney spears.
Might there be a selection bias going on? We don't preserve everything from "back then"; we sure don't listen to all of it. I predict that in the future, people will still listen to, say, The Beatles. Or Elvis. Or rock out to that riff from Smoke on the Water. Maybe some Michael Jackson song will be preserved.
Not all old music was great. Not all new music is crap. Not even all good new music is worth preserving for ever. But some is.
The real problem is that record companies have shifted their function. It used to be that they discovered and selected talent; now they "produce" talent.
South Park tells a story about this too; see the Guitar Queer-o episode: "The next time you bring me some talent, make sure they're talented". And then in Fingerbang: "These are The New Boys from the Back Alley Zone. They're the new hit." (I'm paraphrasing the name.)
This is a good place to point out that Amazon unilaterally had all copies of 1984 deleted from all customer's devices, totally screwing many people up in the process. Sure the refunded the purchase cost. Big deal. They also apologized later for doing it. But this sent a very clear message that they cannot take back: They can trash your 'property' on a whim, and there is nothing you can do to prevent it as long as you abide by their DRM restrictions.
They say they won't do it again. Sorry, but once trust is lost, is VERY difficult to regain.
At least, it is for people who actually pay attention and think. What upsets me the most is that most consumers don't care enough to change their purchasing habits even after they've been bitten.
Except in very rare circumstances I avoid audio CDs, after what Sony did. I also don't buy Sony products anymore. Sony should have But when I see how many people still purchase Sony products, how PS3s are flying off the shelves, it makes it really hard to care. When the forementioned incident happened with Amazon, schadenfreude is the best description of how I felt. There have been SO many well reported incidents across SO many industries, that people have effectively waived their right to be outraged when such things happen to them.
Society at large flat out doesn't care. Those that know what's going on and care enough to do so will ALWAYS find a way to crack things like DRM so that they can at least protect themselves. Those that choose to ignore the damage that DRM causes, can go cry in their rooms because they should flat out have known better.
I can only hope that if enough people get hurt by DRM they will eventually complain loudly enough to stop this nonsense.
That's all well and good until dead tree publishers go out of business and books are no longer (or at least not as often) printed at all.
Then you don't get the second option.
What we need is a digital format we can be reasonably sure will stick around for the long haul, and if it doesn't stick around we need to know that it can be converted to new formats. If we have that, then we have something close to the security of a dead tree book.
Security is mostly a superstition... Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. - Helen Keller
My first run in with eBook "quirks" didn't take long to happen. I received a Kindle for Christmas, and having already scouted out some prospective books to purchase I had some novels in mind. The first book I read was Flood by Stephen Baxter - I just finished that last night. Flood is followed by its sequel - Ark (by the same author). However, upon trying to buy Ark I couldn't find it anywhere on the Amazon kindle store. I recalled seeing it when browsing before (that's why I bought this series first, because I noticed both books were available in kindle editions) - however now it was missing. Trying a few different things, I logged out of my Amazon account. Low and behold, the ebook appears for sale! Kindle edition and all - however I noticed a very small notice (almost fine print) below the "Buy with 1-Click" button that read: "Due to copyright restrictions, this title not available in the United States". WTF! It took changing my address to that of a Canadian friend of mine in order to be allowed to purchase this book - thankfully they still accepted by US-addressed credit card.
Copyright restrictions and such on sale of books/music/movies is extremely stupid in my opinion. In the end all it took was changing my address twice - once to Canada and then back - but it's the principle of it all. I'm happily reading my book now; a book that just to purchase I had to be dishonest about where I lived simply so I'd be allowed to purchase it.
DRM is another issue I'm worried about, however with the advent of tools to strip the Kindle and nook DRM, I'm not to worried about moving my books to a new platform once a better read becomes available.
everyday is another shooter.
When ever I think of the book being replaced by its digital equivalent, I think of a scenario 200 years from now after a war destroys a whole nation. The people coming in to see what they can find a library with eBook readers and paper books. The paper books are still a little dusty, but everything on that civilisation up to the first decade of the 21st century is documented and available. The eBook readers on the other hand are another story, with publisher no longer in existence and DRM still in place, the content simply complains that the book can't be read dues to "text license expiry". 200 years of information on this society has now been lost to the sands of time.
Certainly this scenario is a little negative and could occur for other reasons, but the point I am trying to make is that convenience makes for a shitty legacy, especially with DRM in place.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
is not having to pay for it. Once someone has it in digital form, without some restrictive DRM, it can be shared freely with the planet. That means I can get it for free, without paying. No money.
If Cory sees his financial future in people having his written works without paying for them, good luck. Freedom is nice, but eating is nicer. Freedom can be enjoyed a lot better with a full belly.
Now there is no reason a copy-limited work cannot be resold. There are ways to manage this that do not prevent resale or other transfers. The problem is that if you allow "loaning", "backing up", "format shifting" or anything else that allows multiple copies to exist at the same time you will also have "sharing". And once you have sharing, you will have redistribution. And redistribution means nobody has to pay.
Right now, any ebook that is pretty popular can be found on various sharing web sites. And do not for a moment think that my Kindle is somehow immune to displaying these "shared" ebooks because of something Amazon did. Nope, I can read these shared books on my Kindle.
Hope you like working for free Cory.
You don't need "publishers" to print books.
If this were otherwise, you would not exist as all of modern society and
our current lifestyle is dependent on a few pirates that copied any book
they could find BY HAND.
The only digital format that makes any sense is one that can be easily pirated.
Conflating the creation of books with megacorp publishing houses is a grand fallacy.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Actually I and O'Reilly profited from the physical-book sales of "Using Samba", which was shipped in electronic form with every copy of Samba.
Nerds, you see, buy physical books. They lose on searchability (unless the indexer actually does his job) but gain on size, weight, cost and readability-in-the-bathtub (;-))
--dave
davecb@spamcop.net
I read fifty (50) plus books a year, and have since about 1987.
I keep some, re-read some of my faves three or four times.
When I am "done" with a book, it gets donated to a local library or given to a friend with an interest in such books.
IMHO, DRM in combination with the stupid copyright extension act passed some years ago, to me means that more and more books (whether they are entertainment only, or text books or whatever) that should make it into the public domain may never be seen again in any form, of then than already existing books, which will deteriorate over time.
There should be a law requiring that any book published (real book, publication, etc. whether "real" or electronic), non-DRM protected electronic copies should be forwarded for safeguarding by the Library of Congress and at least 8 (if not more) of the major libraries in the country. That way, once the stupid extended copyright expiration happens, these can then be released to the public domain properly. In other words, make it possible for the books to made public domain, as opposed to being obliterated entirely from human knowledge.