Re: ebook security

Hi Frank

That is some good advice. You are right to think about the user
as opposed to setting an adversarial relationship from the outset.
Brenna said that too and it will most likely be the most profitable
for the industry in the long run.  As you say, you would lend a 
conventional book easily enough-if Barnes an Noble said that you
couldn't then you'd stop buying there pretty quick.

My 'ebooks' are 'How To' books with very specific niche customers
and will be image heavy.  I expected most people to use laptops
or computers to view it owing to the nature of the viewing (zooming
in and studying photos and illustrations/video clips and audio
annotations)-basically using the digital format to include features
a book could never do.

Is this an eCourse instead of an eBook I wonder?  It certainly would
not just be a text book that happens to be in a digital format. It will
be created using InDesign instead of Word or NoteTab owing to the
amount of images.  Have any others done similar things?

Many thanks for the time and help you all share here. 

Kind regards

---
Stuart








________________________________
From: Erica Frank <[email protected]>
To: [email protected]
Sent: Sat, 27 February, 2010 15:37:49
Subject: Re: [ebook-community] ebook security

  
On Fri, Feb 26, 2010 at 11:10 PM, Stuart Bray <stuartbray@yahoo. com> wrote:
> Hi All
>
> Unlike a conventional book, and unsecured eBook (I like PDF)
> is easily transferred and copied. Great for the buyer who
> wants a backup. Also great from someone who wants to copy
> and sell your eBook as if their own to do so and thus profit
> from something you have made, perhaps leaving you out of
> pocket had the buyer simply unwittingly bought this pirated
> copy.

And if they'd bought a physical book, they can sell it, and the author
sees no royalties or profit from that. With ebooks, they have the
chance to keep a copy for themselves-- but they could do that with
pbooks as well; nothing prevents them from making a photocopy before
selling the book.

The idea that every reader is going to pay full-price for a book is
the problem, not "security." Books have never been mostly read by a
single person and then discarded (or kept to re-read.) They're loaned
to friends and family, given away, or sold.

> This place looks interesting: http://www.ebook- security. com/
> and I wondered if anybody has any experience with this system.

It requires an active internet connection to read the books. Means it
doesn't work on portable ebook readers (I read a *lot* on my Sony
PRS-505), and it's probably hell on dialup users. But hey, authors
don't need customers who'd spend $300 on a reading device, do they?
And people on dialup probably shouldn't be reading ebooks anyway. (I'm
on dialup.)

> I guess the simple fact is if you release an eBook, it will
> get copied and others may profit and this is just something
> you live with.

Same thing happens with pbooks. With those, the issue isn't so much
copies, as second-hand use--a book can change hands a dozen times, and
the author only gets paid once.

The weird thing about ebooks is authors & publishers have convinced
themselves that 1 purchase is supposed to mean 1 reader. Books have
never worked that way, and their attempts to force that model onto
books is inspiring a lot of piracy and DRM codebreaking.

If DRM were *transferable* --if you could send an email to Bookstore
and say, "pls transfer the DRM of [book] to the person at
[accountname] , and remove it from my account" they might get around a
lot of that. If Kindle users could transfer their kbooks to someone
else's kindle when they're done reading, they wouldn't be cracking the
DRM just to share a book with their sister.

-- 
"I follow Eris blindly in all things. That She is the Goddess of Chaos
simplifies this immensely."  -- Christian the Pagan

 

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]



------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------
Post a message:   ebook-community [[at]] *
Unsubscribe:      ebook-community-unsubscribe [[at]] *
Switch to digest: ebook-community-digest [[at]] *
Switch to normal: ebook-community-normal [[at]] *
Put mail on hold: ebook-community-nomail [[at]] *
Administrator:    ebook-community-owner [[at]] *

(* == yahoogroups.com)
-------------------------------------------------------Yahoo! Groups Links

<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ebook-community/

<*> Your email settings:
    Individual Email | Traditional

<*> To change settings online go to:
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ebook-community/join
    (Yahoo! ID required)

<*> To change settings via email:
    [email protected] 
    ebook-community-fullfeatured-hHKSG33TihhbjbujkaE4pw@public.gmane.org

<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
    ebook-community-unsubscribe-hHKSG33TihhbjbujkaE4pw@public.gmane.org

<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
    http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/