Lulu Introduces DRM 222
An anonymous reader writes "Print-on-demand publisher Lulu recently announced that they're offering 'eBooks.' Since they've always offered downloadable books as PDFs, that takes some decoding to figure out what part is new: it turns out that it means now they're handling more formats, they've significantly increased the share they take out of the purchase price ... and for an additional fee, they now offer DRM. I have a few items published through Lulu myself; nothing forces me to buy the DRM, but I'm considering taking my business elsewhere on principle. This isn't what I expected from the people who, when I first signed up with them, were solidly endorsing Creative Commons."
Philosophy versus reality (Score:5, Insightful)
Amusing to see what happens when "information wants to be free" collides with "your bills are past due".
Why complain about choice? (Score:5, Insightful)
As you say, you don't have to use the DRM at all. I don't see any benefit in punishing anyone that simply supports that as an option for authors that don't know any better (or think they do). If people want the rope for whatever reason, just shake your head and let them buy it.
Non issue (Score:5, Insightful)
So... a publishing company is giving authors the *Option* of using DRM? I'm sorry, but I don't see a problem with that. If the Authors are silly enough to want that, then it's in Lulu's best interest to offer their clients what they want.
This has nothing to DRM, everything to do with $$$ (Score:4, Insightful)
If you want to know why someone does something, follow the money.
Just to start us off with a car analogy... (Score:4, Insightful)
It's like threatening to not let a dealership sell your line of cars because they offer LoJack as an option on other models.
DRM is not the devil. It is a tool. The sooner we stop crying about buzz words and instead actually do something about how they are used, the better off we will all be.
Re:Just to start us off with a car analogy... (Score:3, Insightful)
Making customers pay for DRM? (Score:2, Insightful)
Note to self: Never use Lulu.
Does add cost though (Score:3, Insightful)
for no real added cost to themselves
Actually for Lulu the costs are very real and add up quickly:
1) Assume they need a DRM server, that must have 99.9% availability.
2) Need to test DRM to ensure it actually works
3) Need support staff to deal with authors and developers not understanding why they cannot access content.
I'm assuming they put a lot of thought into this, there must be a pretty compelling business case or else they would not incur this burden.
Re:Why complain about choice? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Just to start us off with a car analogy... (Score:4, Insightful)
Much ado about nothing (Score:3, Insightful)
As has been said many times in this thread already, you don't HAVE to use DRM. I guess there are a lot of people who publish on Lulu who don't want a free-to-spread PDF of their work roaming around the world, diminishing the profits from their hard work. Now they have an extra option to offer people their work and get paid for it. Most people don't care about DRM at all, so what is the problem?
Re:Does add cost though (Score:3, Insightful)
Is there a DRM that DOES WORK? I've found that anything a person could ever want is available on the web, already stripped of any restrictive code. Maybe I haven't looked hard enough. Maybe there are some schemes that really work. But, it has often times been pointed out that DRM only frustrates legal users.
Re:Just to start us off with a car analogy... (Score:3, Insightful)
Speaking of bad car analogies
No, not LoJack, it's more like you're buying a 2005 SUV especially because you know it has an OnStar system on board, and then a few months later, GM decides to change the format on you, and you basically have no recourse [yahoo.com] (and no one willing to buy that truck from you, because by now everybody knows about the discontinuation).
First generation Zune owners and Walmart DRM music customers should know basically what I'm talking about. You don't own the music you buy, and if you want to keep on listening to DRM music you've already purchased -- it means you may have to repurchase your same music again and again.
Re:Why complain about choice? (Score:3, Insightful)
And yet you buy from adidas, Coca-Cola, McDonald’s, DaimlerChrysler, Nestlé, Procter&Gamble and Siemens although they profit from torture, slavery, illegal medication trials on humans, political and social discrimination, destruction of resources and the environment.
And you do not actually want to hear that.
Source: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schwarzbuch_Markenfirmen [wikipedia.org] (where is the English equivalent? Don't they criticize globalization where it is due?)
Re:This has nothing to DRM, everything to do with (Score:3, Insightful)
Maybe they would like to say: "Look, you can put DRM on your books to try to protect your copies, you don't need to go elsewhere. But be aware that that make some legitimate users unhappy -- as it did with music -- and they will opt to non-DRM ... making you lose money."
If they wouldn't offer the option, they wouldn't be able to let publishers try out.
OTOH, I have no clue about ebook publishing ;-)
Re:Just to start us off with a car analogy... (Score:4, Insightful)
Not always.
Especially if your non-refundable purchase of DRMed material gets nuked because the company doesn't feel like holding up their end of the bargain.
You can't really "shop around" much if you've already been milked and burned.
Doubly so if they have a big enough army of lawyers to squash you like a bug if you try to complain.
Re:Just to start us off with a car analogy... (Score:4, Insightful)
Opposing DRM is not some kind of religion, it is not even a moral position,
Opposing DRM is most definitely a moral position, on any number of grounds, starting with the ones you don't want to acknowledge down to the less obvious ones, such as opposing anything that makes life more difficult without providing any benefit or opposing the conflation of 'buy' with 'rent', as you never actually buy anything with DRM, you simply rent it.
Feel free to pretend you aren't doing anything wrong when you say there's nothing wrong with DRM. Just be aware that that's exactly what you're doing -- pretending.
Re:Why complain about choice? (Score:5, Insightful)
I am very tired of people trying to write rules for life. There is no algorithm; there are no unassailable truths. Being totally consistent in all things does not actually make any sense, because there is no one right answer to be applied to all cases.
We like to think that a totally logically consistent pattern of behavior will yield better results, but it won't, for two basic reasons:
1) This idea is inherited from religious/magical thought and is, as far as I am concerned anyway, a crock of horseshit already, because it doesn't scale. You end up with fundamentalist Muslims killing people with rocks over petty shit, or evangelicals who believe that Jesus erases all their sins and that, therefore, even the most offensive crimes against humanity can be fixed with prayer and Kleenex.
2) This is actually part of the first reason, but these patterns don't exist in any objective way. They are applied after the fact by humans as shorthand. Religions made up simple rules to get people's minds off the big things so they could improve everyday life, and the cracks only start to really show when life is so good that we can take another look at those rules. Math doesn't exist. Numbers don't exist. Grammar doesn't exist (don't tell Chomsky). Ideas and meaning don't exist. They are all just tools to make our monkey lives better. We can't be frustrated when people's behavior is not logically consistent. It really shouldn't be.
So yes, you're right, it is logically inconsistent to call for the boycott of a company that uses slave labor, but not one which violates your geek religion's creed against DRM. But most people are smart enough to see that those things aren't even slightly similar, and only a crazy person would apply the same logic to both.
That being said, if you are living in the developed world (and if you're reading this, you probably are), guess what? Virtually every product you enjoy has slave labor tucked away in it somewhere. You can't live high on the hog without slavery. We've just gotten very good at hiding it so we can feel superior. There's always a slave. Always.
And that doesn't bother me. I don't like it, but I don't think it can be avoided, and to try to do so would make my life incredibly inconvenient.
Maybe there's logical consistency after all.
Re:Does add cost though (Score:3, Insightful)
From the user's point of view, that is a contradiction. The very purpose of DRM is to make things cease to be fully functional.
Yes, Kindle DRM (Score:4, Insightful)
Is there a DRM that DOES WORK?
The Kindle DRM works about as well as any can (for eBooks).
By that I mean, from the users point of view it doesn't get in the way, and from the authors point of view it's hard enough to strip that it appears to offer some protection.
Also from the policy side, Kindle books are actually very user friendly - if you purchased a book but decide you want to "return" it, you can. Yes there was that whole mess with 1984, but even there at least the people got refunds. Personally I am still very reluctant to buy any book with DRM whereas I have and will buy PDF's without much of a qualm. I still mentally consider any DRM purchase merely a rental, no matter how long the digital version might be owned by me I live knowing it could go away any time for a variety of technical reasons.
Re:Why complain about choice? (Score:3, Insightful)
Are you SERIOUSLY trying to equate DRM to slavery? Have you COMPLETELY lost your mind?
User friendly (Score:3, Insightful)
> Kindle books are actually very user friendly
I doubt this (well, maybe the first one is doable, I don't have any Kindles, myself).
All of this functionality might be expected by a reasonable consumer who isn't already thinking about why the publisher wouldn't want him to be able to do it.
Thanks to Cory Doctorow [craphound.com] from whom most of these examples/ideas [craphound.com] have been lifted.
Re:Making customers pay for DRM? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Just to start us off with a car analogy... (Score:4, Insightful)
Dude, try a substitution - "the police" are a tool to punish innocent people who annoyed those in power. Supposedly they prevent crime as well but there's always collateral damage on legitimate behavior.
DRM is only necessary because piracy is so widespread that it's impossible for humans to police it. If piracy was as rare as murder, then it'd be possible to have humans investigate every case and make a nuanced decision on whether it was legitimate and beneficial or criminal. This is an extremely sad state of affairs, but it's the reality in which we live.
Re:Why complain about choice? (Score:3, Insightful)
The free market only has problems when:
1) People are allowed to do unethical things
2) Monopolies or oligopolies are created
3) There's a moral hazard
None of these conditions exist here. The difference is a product with DRM vs. a product without it. It's like the difference between cereal with new, poor tasting marshmallows or without them. No one is being forced into anything, there's no monopoly, etc.
Re:Why complain about choice? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Why complain about choice? (Score:3, Insightful)
Ooo good. I love bad analogies. They're fun. Can I have a go too?
What if the objectionable thing B was manufacturing blue M&Ms, a colour you dislike - even if you don't purchase M&Ms. Does it suddenly become okay to continue the business relationship? I know there are huge differences in the offense, but the underlying argument is the same for both buying from someone who makes confectionary in an objectionable colour and a slave created goods provider.
Are you really surprised that people care more about enforced slave labour than a company that allows two people to enter into a contract which sets out on what devices they are able to buy a licensed product?
Re:Making customers pay for DRM? (Score:3, Insightful)
CC isn't for everybody. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Much ado about nothing (Score:2, Insightful)
Sounds like a good time to find a new business model for books. You know, there was a sweeping technological change over the past 30 years, and technological changes usually force the marketplace for affected goods and services to change in turn?
"Now they have an extra option to offer people their work"
No, now they have an extra option to restrict access to their work. Instead of making the work more available to their readers, DRM makes it less available. That is a bad thing for society, and authors who care about such things should actively resist DRM -- by refusing to have Lulu be their publisher.
"Most people don't care about DRM at all, so what is the problem?"
Most people do not care about the Bald Eagle, so what was the problem with DDT? Most people do not care about anything at all: complete apathy is the norm these days. Just pointing to the fact that most people do not care about a problem does not make it any less of a problem.
Re:Philosophy versus reality (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually, "Information wants to be free" is from an essay and it's only half the idea.
The basic concept is:
* Information wants to be free, because it's hard to keep a secret (or as the old saying goes, two can keep a secret if one is dead)
* Information wants to be expressive because knowledge is power
* The next century will be a struggle between these two forces.
This is still true and will likely always be true.
This struggle appears within all people. Even the strongest proponent of "information wants to be free" would balk if his/her privacy is violated, his/her identity is stolen, the paparazzi take intimate pictures from his/her closes family, and all his knowledge and his abilities are reproduced by Country X whose residents are so poor that they are willing to work 20 hour days for a bowl of gruel made with tainted water.
Re:Philosophy versus reality (Score:2, Insightful)
I see Lulu as in a very precarious position here. It's likely just as much a result of new competition in the market, and not just Lulu needing more money to pay the bills.
The self-publishing market is very small. Lulu cannot afford to give up business to competitors, as there may very well be not enough of it to go around.
Lulu sells or used to sell things via retailers Amazon.
However: recently, Amazon is now in direct competition with Lulu through Amazon Publishing Services and CreateSpace.
The new competition from Amazon and others has the potential to cut off Lulu's air supply.
In addition, Amazon has the Kindle, and their own proprietary file format, soon Barnes and Noble will too. They can publish eBooks for authors, and the authors then don't need Lulu.
With Amazon's services, authors can even get their books printed, in addition to making eBooks, so it is likely the authors simply take all their business to Amazon, which means, they no longer have a need to buy anything from Lulu.
If Lulu doesn't get new books, they don't get to take a cut from sales of new books, and then they die.
For many authors: DRM is considered essential or mandatory for eBook publication. Or at least, considered an advantage, extra protection for the author's work.
So.. any publication / distribution channel that doesn't offer an option to utilize DRM technologies could be seen to be at a substantial competitive disadvantage, while they are simply handing customers over to the likes of Amazon, who do offer DRM.
Re:Why complain about choice? (Score:3, Insightful)
You mean using DRM is not unethical? gee...
Not neccessarily.
Lets look at what it stands for: Digital Rights Management. It it is attempt to digitaly enforce the rights you buy when you enter into a contract. Whenever you buy a copyrighted work you are usually buying a single user licence to that work, sometimes it is transferable to another person, sometimes not.
Personally I have no problem with a licence being non-transferable if that is made clear to me at the start. If I have willingly accepted a non-transferable licence I have no issue with DRM being used to enforce that.
DRM does become annoying though when you extend it to try and enforce other things under the guise of stopping piracy. It is frequently used to restrict me to a single device (or a limited number of devices). I have at least 3 PC's (Office, Home, Second Home), a smart phone and a laptop: I want to be able to pick which of these is right for me to use at anyone time.
The biggest problem with DRM is that the really hard technogical problems like how I can buy a single user licence but still use it on a multitude of devices seems to have been ignored. Instead most implementations have tried to force me to buy the same copyrighted works several times for different platforms, sometimes I have caved in and done so for simplicities sake, but whenever I do I harbour a little more resentment for the company that forces me to do this, that does not make me a satisfied customer in the long run.
So the real point of my post, is that DRM could be great if it actually was used to impart some rights I am entitled to by contract in my direction as well as enforcing the purveyor of the copyrighted works rights. Currently though all the systems are designed to appeal to the copyright holder so maybe a open source DRM system designed to run on any platform would not be such a bad thing. A system designed as a cooperative effort between the copyright holders and the end user would hopefully be more balanced.
Please note that I have tried to keep this post away from mentioning any particular medium or format for a reason. We have now reached a technological stage where books, music and film can all be converted to data and shared around the globe. However we still live in a capitalist society where people require money in order to survive so there has to be a method of rewarding the creator of a work financially for the time they expended on producing said work.
Disclaimer - I am a rampant socialist who thinks a long term solution is changing society to move away from its current capitalist nature, but I acknowledge that will not happen overnight so until it does I have no problem with earning money, which I do.
Re:Why complain about choice? (Score:4, Insightful)
Eh? If they want to supply suicide sticks to others, that's fine with me.
Maybe they just don't believe you. Me, I figure they're both made with slave labor, and the Fair Trade schtick is just a way to get suckers to pay the slavemasters more, but I'm a wee bit cynical.
Re:Philosophy versus reality (Score:3, Insightful)