I have books printed 100 years or so ago too. They are so fragile that to open them is to risk destruction and if you were to be so stupid as to dog ear a page the corner falls off. I can obtain digital copies of these books for nothing and while they do not have the same sentiment they're easily transportable, not fragile at all, and as new media comes out I can transfer them to the newer storage.
I have so many paper books I no longer buy them anymore. Instead I buy or obtain digital copies and I can carry hundreds of them in my pocket without a second thought. I have them stored on multiple devices too, loss is the last thing I'm worried about with regards to digital...
Yes, they are heavy which is why I no longer buy paper. Imagine ALL of those books being carried around on a USB stick, it's possible now and quite feasible. You'd have more worries of losing the silly thing than you would outright failure...
Starting a fire with just paper might be tough, need to light it. The battery in some of these devices though can be made to burn with just some physical impact:-)
I believe one of the linked articles mentioned that Amazon's costs for paper books is 40% of the cover cost, if they sell at cover they would get 60% profit. I think that may be where that assertion came from but I've not ever bought a book at cover price.
I'll admit, I've not looked in awhile. Frankly I was so pissed at the outright price gouging that I swore off looking. The last book I tried to buy was about 8 years old and cost as much as the hardcover copy of the same book, this was about a year ago. To say I was angry was an understatement, paying $14 for a book that old was crazy and thus no sale was made. It was a niche enough book that it couldn't be found elsewhere too.
IMO there's NO excuse for paper books being the same or higher than eBooks. The idiot publishers seem to think that having an eBook somehow imparts greater "value" and thus should cost more. Never mind that it cannot be lent like a real book and that it cannot be resold . Really the situation is pretty crazy and if the publishers want to try and pretend there's competition here then I'm popping some corn and snuggling in to watch the court case, it should be a real laugh riot!
Were it not for Amazon and a few other sites going the publisher route you wouldn't be able to find books at a dollar. The big publishers didn't like the idea of a $9 ebook and colluded together using the new iPad in order to raise prices. Had they not colluded we'd have competition, instead they all agreed to raise prices above what Amazon USED to be able to sell books for. I wonder why this model isn't being used for paper books too since they claim it was so necessary?
While the price of one book that you desire isn't influenced by prices of other books you don't care about the price of the book you desire is most certainly influenced by all of the publishers getting together and agreeing to raise prices across the board!
BTW do some research on how much Amazon and other publishers pay authors vs the big publishers that the DOJ is now questioning. The big boys take nearly all of the cost of a book when it's sold, Amazon and the others pay the authors MUCH better! You can start your research here -> http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/
Ding! Ding! You must work for McMillen, they actually had the brass to say as much in their blog! We price our ebooks high to support this dying paper model because you know printing presses cost a bunch of money even though the product you bought never used one. Morons.... Their desire to sustain a model isn't my problem.
How much of an advance exactly do you think authors get? If you think it's enough to live on while writing a book think again, that's only true for a few very popular writers.
I would bet that if you asked authors if those unsold books cost a bunch they would say that they do after looking at their complicated and barely legible sales reports from the publishers. If you then asked those same publishers if those books cost a bunch they would claim that no they don't that it's all this complicated editing for epub and sales promotions (lol) they run that cost a bunch. Depending on who's asking the question, much like Hollywood, the answer will change. Like Hollywood they're full of crap too....
Just an FYI, if you all share an Amazon account books can be loaded to multiple devices with no charge. It's a hassle in that you will see other's purchases but overall it's pretty seamless.
That said, I too strip DRM from any books I get although magazines have caused me issues. I just want to be able to read them on other devices is all and liek you do not want to be dependent on some service not going under or changing how they do things.
How about back catalog? You know those books that are no longer printed? Big publishers hold onto these "rights" like they're gold and refuse to publish books. When an author wants them back they often refuse and the book is in limbo. Physical stores can only hold so many books and have only so much display space, not so electronic books. Back catalogs is where existing authors have a TON of opportunity, it's also where big publishers screw up and try to charge sky high prices for books that have been paid for multiple times over.
Konrath is just such an author. He has been publishing his catalog of REJECTED books and making more money on that and self published stuff than he has ever gotten from his "big publisher" deals. He has been posting stories by other authors and encouraging authors to go it on their own for a year or three now. His posted numbers and tales of getting screwed ought to open any author's eyes. http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/ My personal favorite is how publishers talk about advertising budgets and then authors end up having to arrange all of the book signings themselves as well pick up the travel expenses. The big publishers are fast on their way out and it can't come soon enough. They are as bad if not worse than the music industry IMO.
No, I don't think they "charge" for hosting. Instead they take a portion of the sale. Did you really think that the publishers are PAYING Amazon etc. to place books in their storefront?!
Correct, they tried unsuccessfully to fight this but since all of the publishers had banded together - which is what this suit is about - and were using Apple as their secondary outlet\lever Amazon knuckled under. I don't blame them for this but it really pisses me off when I've looked for books that are YEARS old and found that the publishers have priced them as high as hardcovers. F that, I'll do without or find them elsewhere. I had to truly laugh when McMillon posted to their blog that you know printing presses and warehouses are really expensive to maintain and thus eBooks have to be priced high (paraphrased). What a bunch of complete clowns! About a year ago I wanted to buy a book that had just come out, the author is one I really like and I was willing to pay the premium. Nope, they had windowed the title and Amazon could only sell it as an eBook in the UK while the US site couldn't offer it. The author wasn't happy and I ended up finding it "elsewhere". A month later Amazon finally had it, how silly of the publishers to pull this shit. Read the blog I posted earlier, SO many authors are waking up and moving away from big publishers - it's just a matter of time before they begin getting REALLY desperate. Bad enough they try to claim rights for back catalog stuff they don't even print and make it impossible for authors to reclaim rights on older books but they even go nuts if authors go through Amazon on non-competing book titles. They act liek they do authors a service while robbing them blind, they remind me so much of the music industry it's disgusting. It's really nice to see so many authors starting to self publish!
Profit is one thing, a monopoly is another. When Amazon resisted agreeing to this Agency model proposed by Apple the book publishers threatened to window titles and not distribute to Amazon.
This site http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/ has some interesting things to say about eBooks from the stance of an author who has been abused by the big publishing houses and now sells via Amazon and others instead. He farms out cover art, editing, and other things - he also reveals the numbers for all to see. There's no reason why big publishing houses need to be taking more than $50 of the cost of a book sale other than to support top heavy overhead IMO. They are holding onto their position and holding down authors much like the music industry has tried to do. They secured a sweetheart deal using Apple as a lever against Amazon and it is now FINALLY blowing up in their face - but not without eBook piracy having gone rampant and many early adopters such as myself no longer buying overpriced books.
I'm happy to see this finally coming home to roost but I feel it's pretty late in the game having taken YEARS to come about. The big publishers have had it fat for awhile now, their house is about to come tumbling down and I will stand and applaud when it does. Who knows, when prices are finally sane again perhaps I'll consider buying books again much liek I am back to buying music from Amazon....
Books on Kindle are VERY easy to get. They are also WAY too expensive! I'm one of the original Kindle owners and I still remember prices back when Amazon used to be setting them, before Apple helped the industry with this "Agency Model" which is a load of crap. Prices used to be $9.99 or LESS for most any book I wanted. I used to be able to get e-books for LESS money than hardcovers. Then the new model came along and prices shot up quite a bit. I was finding that books I wanted cost more than their hard copy versions and that books that are YEARS old still cost a pile of cash. I stopped buying them and sadly my amount of readong - which had been growing by leaps and bounds - has dropped quite a bit. I can, if I choose, download an author's entire set of works in minutes. Why would I pay more for a DRM laden ebook that has so little publisher overhead than I would a hard copy book that can be resold and lent easily? The book publishing industry is in the process of learning the same hard lessons the music industry did. What's more interesting is that their lesson will likely be harder. Books aren't "listened" to over and over like music is and are way smaller to download. Authors are starting to self-publish a great deal and I see an entire infrastructure springing up to support them that I haven't witnessed for music. I cannot wait for the day that the book publishers wake up and find themselves replaced. I'm also looking forward to seeing where the lawsuit against the publishers and Apple goes for this disk move - they forced Amazon into this new pricing model.
I'll agree on the TV shows for sure. SD TV shows are reduced down from HD caps usually and are higher picture quality than SD broadcast IMO. I'm not watching them as soon as they come out but I can see where being able to get them prior to air time on the West coast would be possible. I'd pay a reasonable fee to be able to do this and if the studios actually allowed it. As it is I continue to pay for cable when I sure as heck don't need it for TV just to give something back....
Okay, I've been asked about this a few times. I'm also pretty long winded when it comes to describing it and I'm a bit of an evangelist on some of the software I use. So, rather than pouring out a description here again about how I do things I wrote a journal entry about it so that the discussion can occur out of this thread:-)
Feel free to comment away or make suggestions. What I have works for me, it may not work for others. It suits my particular needs well though and I'm fairly picky when it comes to media playback I think:-)
I could have GoT on my drive in minutes if I really wanted it - in HD would take a bit longer. I have at least two sources I could go through and neither of them would shower me with spam or anything else unseamly. Sure, I won't get the DVD extras but I seldom watch those. When I rip a BD I do save off the director's sound track though and if it was a DVD I store it lock stock and menu which my front-end plays without flinching. I can peruse tons and tons of media without getting off the couch. I can stream it to my portable devices anywhere, and I can stream media from my portable devices to my TV.
Do I still prefer store bought media? Yup, I prefer it because I process the video myself with my settings for the best picture. I then throw it in a box in my storage space never to see it again unless someone wishes to borrow it. why in this world have that stuff out where thieves can see it and where I must pore through it looking for it when I want to watch it? Even binders didn't work well for me, I'm way happier with everything ripped and ready to go!
XBMC here with unRAID for storage. Multiple TB worth of disks, cheap ION computers for front-ends, I have built them for several friends, and it just works! I have very little physical media laying around except in boxes for backup and everyone just uses the remotes to browse.
Like you I see very little reason for having the media around. I had my CD collection stolen from the car several times in my youth and when some workmen came in to my home they took a looooong look at my extensive DVD collection oohing and aaahing and I realized what an attractive target I'd become. ALL of it is now stored out of sight, my servers are hidden away, and my little computer front-ends cost peanuts. Problem solved!
With the cost of WDTV down in the weeds and devices like the aTV available I only see this growing. Drive prices have slowed adoption but at least once a month I talk to someone interested in duplicating what I've done and I've helped at least several people do it. What's not to like? Crawling on the floor to look at DVDs on the bottom of the rack is no longer a PITA in my household:-)
Yes it's true you COULD use email. But frankly that sucks. Something like DC++ that allows you to browse the files on the other sides and pick\choose what you want and vice versa makes way more sense than email. It requires NO coordination once the encrypted tunnel is setup and so long as machines are on it moves data in chunks like bittorrents do. In theory, and I've YET to look but will in a moment, this system will provide similar access with the addition of PGP crypto certs.
The trick is to stop having to swap HDD physically and be able to more easily get what others have stored away. I know several people who have multiple TB worth of files that I might be interested in and they want files I've got but moving them and being able to selectively grab them is the trick. DC++ is a PITA to setup IMO and thrashes my drives too much, perhaps this thing will be better - fingers crossed!
They make it ever harder to get content and then wonder why people are sharing more and more. I have pretty much ceased downloading MP3 because I can easily and cheaply get them from Amazon. I have pretty much ceased BUYING E-books because publishers jacked prices through the roof and I can download them in SECONDS. I download and save TV shows for later viewing often even though I have a couple of TiVO and record many of the same shows. That saves me the EFFORT of pulling them off my TiVO, editing them, compressing them, and copying them. If the transaction is easy ala Amazon's MP3 (which even copy to cloud storage!) then the sales will come. Perhaps it won't be at the astronomical prices these idiots dream of but it sure beats a lost sale doesn't it? Their idea is to bottle things up such that everyone is FORCED into their business model - I'm sorry but that's not going to ever happen. Make the transaction friction-less, have an extensive easy to use catalog, and make it cheap enough I'll buy it like some throwaway app in an app store and "content" will sell like hotcakes.
Now then, I'm off to download and check out this new program. It will sure beat having folks over with portable drives for swap parties or participating in huge Torrent clouds!
Umm, if this was a.US website then I might find the seizure of the domain to be okay - but it was.COM which isn't specific the to US. While the US has some control over that via Verisign which happens to be BASED in the US I don't agree that the US Govt. can claim ownership of the entire.COM TLD.
I'm sorry but I disagree. The site should NOT have been taken down simply because a citizen decided to break the law and use the site if indeed they weren't supposed to. The site itself shouldn't have to police users to the extent that implies, suppose some state or country somewhere had a law that stated gambling could only occur on Sundays - would they be expected to follow that too?
Skyrocket the moment they think supply is threatened and then fall back down glacially while waiting for the next disaster or crises. Supply may increase as production ramps up but I'm betting that the middle men and manufacturers will keep prices high for as long as they can. Some manufacturers apparently didn't suffer the same losses but jacked prices up too so this should be no surprise at all...
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I have books printed 100 years or so ago too. They are so fragile that to open them is to risk destruction and if you were to be so stupid as to dog ear a page the corner falls off. I can obtain digital copies of these books for nothing and while they do not have the same sentiment they're easily transportable, not fragile at all, and as new media comes out I can transfer them to the newer storage.
I have so many paper books I no longer buy them anymore. Instead I buy or obtain digital copies and I can carry hundreds of them in my pocket without a second thought. I have them stored on multiple devices too, loss is the last thing I'm worried about with regards to digital...
Yes, they are heavy which is why I no longer buy paper. Imagine ALL of those books being carried around on a USB stick, it's possible now and quite feasible. You'd have more worries of losing the silly thing than you would outright failure...
Starting a fire with just paper might be tough, need to light it. The battery in some of these devices though can be made to burn with just some physical impact :-)
The scanning process is automated, plans for scanners and the software to handle the conversion of text are freely available.
I believe one of the linked articles mentioned that Amazon's costs for paper books is 40% of the cover cost, if they sell at cover they would get 60% profit. I think that may be where that assertion came from but I've not ever bought a book at cover price.
I'll admit, I've not looked in awhile. Frankly I was so pissed at the outright price gouging that I swore off looking. The last book I tried to buy was about 8 years old and cost as much as the hardcover copy of the same book, this was about a year ago. To say I was angry was an understatement, paying $14 for a book that old was crazy and thus no sale was made. It was a niche enough book that it couldn't be found elsewhere too.
Well, that didn't take long -> http://www.amazon.com/Devils-Gate-ebook/dp/B0052RDHM4/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1331299138&sr=1-1
Here's another, it's cheaper than the hardcover but still $15! http://www.amazon.com/The-Storm-ebook/dp/B0074VPJLS/ref=pd_sim_kstore_3?ie=UTF8&m=AG56TWVU5XWC2
Another $15 eBook -> http://www.amazon.com/Locked-On-ebook/dp/B005P4YED0/ref=sr_1_1?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1331299311&sr=1-1 One of the hardcover sellers is selling the hardcover for $10 less!
The new Steve Jobs bio, $15 but $12.90 in hardcover by one seller and a bit higher by Amazon.
Another Clancy book at $9 with paperbacks at $5... http://www.amazon.com/Teeth-Tiger-Jack-Ryan-ebook/dp/B001QEAQOY/ref=pd_rhf_se_shvl4
Ender's Game is $6 for Kindle, cheap right? Same price as hard copy from Amazon and one seller has it new for $3. http://www.amazon.com/Enders-Game-ebook/dp/B003G4W49C/ref=sr_1_9?s=digital-text&ie=UTF8&qid=1331299621&sr=1-9
IMO there's NO excuse for paper books being the same or higher than eBooks. The idiot publishers seem to think that having an eBook somehow imparts greater "value" and thus should cost more. Never mind that it cannot be lent like a real book and that it cannot be resold . Really the situation is pretty crazy and if the publishers want to try and pretend there's competition here then I'm popping some corn and snuggling in to watch the court case, it should be a real laugh riot!
Were it not for Amazon and a few other sites going the publisher route you wouldn't be able to find books at a dollar. The big publishers didn't like the idea of a $9 ebook and colluded together using the new iPad in order to raise prices. Had they not colluded we'd have competition, instead they all agreed to raise prices above what Amazon USED to be able to sell books for. I wonder why this model isn't being used for paper books too since they claim it was so necessary?
While the price of one book that you desire isn't influenced by prices of other books you don't care about the price of the book you desire is most certainly influenced by all of the publishers getting together and agreeing to raise prices across the board!
BTW do some research on how much Amazon and other publishers pay authors vs the big publishers that the DOJ is now questioning. The big boys take nearly all of the cost of a book when it's sold, Amazon and the others pay the authors MUCH better! You can start your research here -> http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/
Ding! Ding! You must work for McMillen, they actually had the brass to say as much in their blog! We price our ebooks high to support this dying paper model because you know printing presses cost a bunch of money even though the product you bought never used one. Morons.... Their desire to sustain a model isn't my problem.
How much of an advance exactly do you think authors get? If you think it's enough to live on while writing a book think again, that's only true for a few very popular writers.
I would bet that if you asked authors if those unsold books cost a bunch they would say that they do after looking at their complicated and barely legible sales reports from the publishers. If you then asked those same publishers if those books cost a bunch they would claim that no they don't that it's all this complicated editing for epub and sales promotions (lol) they run that cost a bunch. Depending on who's asking the question, much like Hollywood, the answer will change. Like Hollywood they're full of crap too....
Just an FYI, if you all share an Amazon account books can be loaded to multiple devices with no charge. It's a hassle in that you will see other's purchases but overall it's pretty seamless.
That said, I too strip DRM from any books I get although magazines have caused me issues. I just want to be able to read them on other devices is all and liek you do not want to be dependent on some service not going under or changing how they do things.
How about back catalog? You know those books that are no longer printed? Big publishers hold onto these "rights" like they're gold and refuse to publish books. When an author wants them back they often refuse and the book is in limbo. Physical stores can only hold so many books and have only so much display space, not so electronic books. Back catalogs is where existing authors have a TON of opportunity, it's also where big publishers screw up and try to charge sky high prices for books that have been paid for multiple times over.
Konrath is just such an author. He has been publishing his catalog of REJECTED books and making more money on that and self published stuff than he has ever gotten from his "big publisher" deals. He has been posting stories by other authors and encouraging authors to go it on their own for a year or three now. His posted numbers and tales of getting screwed ought to open any author's eyes. http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/ My personal favorite is how publishers talk about advertising budgets and then authors end up having to arrange all of the book signings themselves as well pick up the travel expenses. The big publishers are fast on their way out and it can't come soon enough. They are as bad if not worse than the music industry IMO.
No, I don't think they "charge" for hosting. Instead they take a portion of the sale. Did you really think that the publishers are PAYING Amazon etc. to place books in their storefront?!
Correct, they tried unsuccessfully to fight this but since all of the publishers had banded together - which is what this suit is about - and were using Apple as their secondary outlet\lever Amazon knuckled under. I don't blame them for this but it really pisses me off when I've looked for books that are YEARS old and found that the publishers have priced them as high as hardcovers. F that, I'll do without or find them elsewhere. I had to truly laugh when McMillon posted to their blog that you know printing presses and warehouses are really expensive to maintain and thus eBooks have to be priced high (paraphrased). What a bunch of complete clowns! About a year ago I wanted to buy a book that had just come out, the author is one I really like and I was willing to pay the premium. Nope, they had windowed the title and Amazon could only sell it as an eBook in the UK while the US site couldn't offer it. The author wasn't happy and I ended up finding it "elsewhere". A month later Amazon finally had it, how silly of the publishers to pull this shit. Read the blog I posted earlier, SO many authors are waking up and moving away from big publishers - it's just a matter of time before they begin getting REALLY desperate. Bad enough they try to claim rights for back catalog stuff they don't even print and make it impossible for authors to reclaim rights on older books but they even go nuts if authors go through Amazon on non-competing book titles. They act liek they do authors a service while robbing them blind, they remind me so much of the music industry it's disgusting. It's really nice to see so many authors starting to self publish!
Profit is one thing, a monopoly is another. When Amazon resisted agreeing to this Agency model proposed by Apple the book publishers threatened to window titles and not distribute to Amazon.
This site http://jakonrath.blogspot.com/ has some interesting things to say about eBooks from the stance of an author who has been abused by the big publishing houses and now sells via Amazon and others instead. He farms out cover art, editing, and other things - he also reveals the numbers for all to see. There's no reason why big publishing houses need to be taking more than $50 of the cost of a book sale other than to support top heavy overhead IMO. They are holding onto their position and holding down authors much like the music industry has tried to do. They secured a sweetheart deal using Apple as a lever against Amazon and it is now FINALLY blowing up in their face - but not without eBook piracy having gone rampant and many early adopters such as myself no longer buying overpriced books.
I'm happy to see this finally coming home to roost but I feel it's pretty late in the game having taken YEARS to come about. The big publishers have had it fat for awhile now, their house is about to come tumbling down and I will stand and applaud when it does. Who knows, when prices are finally sane again perhaps I'll consider buying books again much liek I am back to buying music from Amazon....
Books on Kindle are VERY easy to get. They are also WAY too expensive! I'm one of the original Kindle owners and I still remember prices back when Amazon used to be setting them, before Apple helped the industry with this "Agency Model" which is a load of crap. Prices used to be $9.99 or LESS for most any book I wanted. I used to be able to get e-books for LESS money than hardcovers. Then the new model came along and prices shot up quite a bit. I was finding that books I wanted cost more than their hard copy versions and that books that are YEARS old still cost a pile of cash. I stopped buying them and sadly my amount of readong - which had been growing by leaps and bounds - has dropped quite a bit. I can, if I choose, download an author's entire set of works in minutes. Why would I pay more for a DRM laden ebook that has so little publisher overhead than I would a hard copy book that can be resold and lent easily? The book publishing industry is in the process of learning the same hard lessons the music industry did. What's more interesting is that their lesson will likely be harder. Books aren't "listened" to over and over like music is and are way smaller to download. Authors are starting to self-publish a great deal and I see an entire infrastructure springing up to support them that I haven't witnessed for music. I cannot wait for the day that the book publishers wake up and find themselves replaced. I'm also looking forward to seeing where the lawsuit against the publishers and Apple goes for this disk move - they forced Amazon into this new pricing model.
I'll agree on the TV shows for sure. SD TV shows are reduced down from HD caps usually and are higher picture quality than SD broadcast IMO. I'm not watching them as soon as they come out but I can see where being able to get them prior to air time on the West coast would be possible. I'd pay a reasonable fee to be able to do this and if the studios actually allowed it. As it is I continue to pay for cable when I sure as heck don't need it for TV just to give something back....
Okay, I've been asked about this a few times. I'm also pretty long winded when it comes to describing it and I'm a bit of an evangelist on some of the software I use. So, rather than pouring out a description here again about how I do things I wrote a journal entry about it so that the discussion can occur out of this thread :-)
http://slashdot.org/journal/279035
Feel free to comment away or make suggestions. What I have works for me, it may not work for others. It suits my particular needs well though and I'm fairly picky when it comes to media playback I think :-)
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/game_of_thrones
I could have GoT on my drive in minutes if I really wanted it - in HD would take a bit longer. I have at least two sources I could go through and neither of them would shower me with spam or anything else unseamly. Sure, I won't get the DVD extras but I seldom watch those. When I rip a BD I do save off the director's sound track though and if it was a DVD I store it lock stock and menu which my front-end plays without flinching. I can peruse tons and tons of media without getting off the couch. I can stream it to my portable devices anywhere, and I can stream media from my portable devices to my TV.
Do I still prefer store bought media? Yup, I prefer it because I process the video myself with my settings for the best picture. I then throw it in a box in my storage space never to see it again unless someone wishes to borrow it. why in this world have that stuff out where thieves can see it and where I must pore through it looking for it when I want to watch it? Even binders didn't work well for me, I'm way happier with everything ripped and ready to go!
XBMC here with unRAID for storage. Multiple TB worth of disks, cheap ION computers for front-ends, I have built them for several friends, and it just works! I have very little physical media laying around except in boxes for backup and everyone just uses the remotes to browse.
Like you I see very little reason for having the media around. I had my CD collection stolen from the car several times in my youth and when some workmen came in to my home they took a looooong look at my extensive DVD collection oohing and aaahing and I realized what an attractive target I'd become. ALL of it is now stored out of sight, my servers are hidden away, and my little computer front-ends cost peanuts. Problem solved!
With the cost of WDTV down in the weeds and devices like the aTV available I only see this growing. Drive prices have slowed adoption but at least once a month I talk to someone interested in duplicating what I've done and I've helped at least several people do it. What's not to like? Crawling on the floor to look at DVDs on the bottom of the rack is no longer a PITA in my household :-)
Yes it's true you COULD use email. But frankly that sucks. Something like DC++ that allows you to browse the files on the other sides and pick\choose what you want and vice versa makes way more sense than email. It requires NO coordination once the encrypted tunnel is setup and so long as machines are on it moves data in chunks like bittorrents do. In theory, and I've YET to look but will in a moment, this system will provide similar access with the addition of PGP crypto certs.
The trick is to stop having to swap HDD physically and be able to more easily get what others have stored away. I know several people who have multiple TB worth of files that I might be interested in and they want files I've got but moving them and being able to selectively grab them is the trick. DC++ is a PITA to setup IMO and thrashes my drives too much, perhaps this thing will be better - fingers crossed!
Having never heard of this software before and hearing about it now I'm betting that usage is again about to shoot up! :-)
The "content providers" really need to get a clue. this comic says it all IMO -> http://theoatmeal.com/comics/game_of_thrones
They make it ever harder to get content and then wonder why people are sharing more and more. I have pretty much ceased downloading MP3 because I can easily and cheaply get them from Amazon. I have pretty much ceased BUYING E-books because publishers jacked prices through the roof and I can download them in SECONDS. I download and save TV shows for later viewing often even though I have a couple of TiVO and record many of the same shows. That saves me the EFFORT of pulling them off my TiVO, editing them, compressing them, and copying them. If the transaction is easy ala Amazon's MP3 (which even copy to cloud storage!) then the sales will come. Perhaps it won't be at the astronomical prices these idiots dream of but it sure beats a lost sale doesn't it? Their idea is to bottle things up such that everyone is FORCED into their business model - I'm sorry but that's not going to ever happen. Make the transaction friction-less, have an extensive easy to use catalog, and make it cheap enough I'll buy it like some throwaway app in an app store and "content" will sell like hotcakes.
Now then, I'm off to download and check out this new program. It will sure beat having folks over with portable drives for swap parties or participating in huge Torrent clouds!
Umm, if this was a .US website then I might find the seizure of the domain to be okay - but it was .COM which isn't specific the to US. While the US has some control over that via Verisign which happens to be BASED in the US I don't agree that the US Govt. can claim ownership of the entire.COM TLD.
I'm sorry but I disagree. The site should NOT have been taken down simply because a citizen decided to break the law and use the site if indeed they weren't supposed to. The site itself shouldn't have to police users to the extent that implies, suppose some state or country somewhere had a law that stated gambling could only occur on Sundays - would they be expected to follow that too?
Skyrocket the moment they think supply is threatened and then fall back down glacially while waiting for the next disaster or crises. Supply may increase as production ramps up but I'm betting that the middle men and manufacturers will keep prices high for as long as they can. Some manufacturers apparently didn't suffer the same losses but jacked prices up too so this should be no surprise at all...