What is it about DRM?

[Michael O'Gara]

I was wondering what it is about DRM (Digital Rights Management) that seems to "tick off" some consumers?   I would like to hear both sides pro and con as I am open minded about this.  I haven't applied DRM to my first eight eBook novels.  Was that a mistake?  What do you think?

[joss Landry]

I'm not sure. But wow, I was just asking that question from someone before I upload my book to kindle. They are asking me with DRM or without, and I can't gather enough opinions and here I am running into you. So I'm waiting...

[Grace]

The problem with DRM is that you're limited to using the books that you paid for on only one device.  If you read on a Kindle, an iPad, and a phone, you would have to either buy multiple copies or download software to illegally strip off the DRM.  I think it's better to go DRM-free because multiple devices are a reality for many readers.

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Books Without Any Pictures

[joss Landry]

Thank you so much for your  explanation. Some people were telling me that it is to prevent piracy. I think your explanation is excellent. Of course, people need to be able to read it on different kinds of devices. .

[Darryl Erentzen]

The "prevent piracy" argument is false. DRM creators make almost zero effort to make it uncrackable. DRM schemes are routinely broken within a couple days of every update. If it was really about preventing piracy, that wouldn't happen.

It's about forcing authors who don't know any better to lock in to a distribution channel by enabling DRM and giving the publisher (amazon, apple, et al) a legal (and partial technological) means of enforcing it.

Think about it; if your book is DRM-locked to the Kindle, then ONLY Kindle users get to see it, unless they're rather highly motivated to crack the lock, which is more work than the dollar value of a book...

[Richard Lee Byers]

But DRM or no, Amazon can't really restrict your product to the Kindle. You are still free to distribute other copies via Smashwords, iBooks, Barnes & Noble, your own website, etc.

[Darryl Erentzen]

Only after the 90-day exclusivity agreement required by KDP has expired, if you want to make it available that way.

... and a lot of authors don't really have the technical savvy to go shopping for multiple distribution channels successfully. Many are lucky if they can figure one out, and sometimes even that one channel requires them to get technical help.

LOL that's not really an argument against DRM, but why enable a crappy encryption scheme that only stops people who are law-abiding anyhow? Any script kiddie with an hour to kill can hack DRM.

[Richard Lee Byers]

I'm not a technological wizard, and I made my self-publshed ebooks available on Amazon, Smashwords, B&N, etc. without paying somebody to help me. It's not that hard. You just have to download the free instructions and follow them carefully. Anybody can do it.

[Darryl Erentzen]

lol I've met people on here who have trouble with some pretty basic stuff.

I agree it's not difficult, but once someone gets it in their head that they can't do something, they can't. You'd be surprised how often I encounter people who stare blankly when I say "right-click on the image and choose save", for instance.

... or maybe you wouldn't. I don't know.

Anyhow, we're heading down a rabbit hole with this.

Pick my argument apart however you will, it's difficult to argue that DRM does authors any good at all unless you buy the bogus "piracy" line they give out to explain it.

If you do, then we can agree to disagree. I kind of am a technical wizard though, at least I've played one in my day job since 1993, and DRM is too easy to crack to be taken seriously as an anti-piracy measure.

[Richard Lee Byers]

I'm not a fan of DRM. It just seemed to me that you were saying that authorizing DRM for your Kindle product would preclude you making other versions in other formats available. And I didn't think that was accurate.

[Darryl Erentzen]

Ah, I see. You're correct. That's really only the case if you agree to the KDP 90-day exclusivity arrangement.

[Darryl Erentzen]

http://craphound.com/content/Cory_Doctorow_-_Content.pdf

[Lisa LaVergne-Pottgen]

My opinion is that DRMis unfairly limiting to consumers. I have a nook. Say I buy a book from Amazon. Legally I can only read that book on a kindle device or app. I am of the opinion that, as long as I have legally acquired the book, it really should not matter what I read it on.