5 ms·

> stark contrast between the sugary-sweet facade of “helping the libraries and readers” and the ridiculous amounts of money the company makes from these same li

> stark contrast between the sugary-sweet facade of “helping the libraries and readers” and the ridiculous amounts of money the company makes from these same libraries is quite depressing Is that Overdrive's fault? That's how the game is played. Why aren't more companies coming into this space if it's so lucrative?

helpfulmandrill 3y ago
It doesn't matter if its overdrive's fault or not. If we don't like the direction of travel as a society, we need to find ways of countering this tendency. It isn't about labelling certain companies as evil, its about appropriately regulating companies in general.
- brodouevencode 3y ago
  It's a small (but admittedly growing) minority that find this to be a problem. So even then, why begrudge anyone for offering a product or service that someone wanted at a price both parties considered fair? Users saw value in the service otherwise they wouldn't use them. Is there some sort of mandate that this type of service be used? (If Overdrive is breaking the law or defrauding customers then that's a separate issue.)
  - helpfulmandrill 3y ago
    > why begrudge anyone for offering a product or service that someone wanted at a price both parties considered fair? Because in the context of our quite dysfunctional laws around copyright, competition, DRM etc., this isn't a remotely adequate description of what's going on?
    - brodouevencode 3y ago
      Then that's a problem with the dysfunctional laws and not the company, UNLESS the company is using those dysfunctional laws to enable their market capture. Do you know if Overdrive is doing this? If so then it's fair to criticize their market capture because it was done with the power of the state (point of a gun). If they are not it's obviously some sort of derangement. I find the tendency to make private companies and people - those who are playing fair - the bad guys in these scenarios extremely abhorrent. Let's fix the laws.
      - phyllistine 3y ago
        You're right, we should fix the laws. The companies actions under the ownership of KKR should not be considered 'playing fair', and some corporate buyout laws should be changed to disallow this behavior, maybe by enforcing the anti monopoly protections that the US has on the books. Alternatively, we could make DRM illegal to make the market more competitive.
matwood 3y ago
> Why aren't more companies coming into this space if it's so lucrative? https://www.nyuengelberg.org/outputs/the-anti-ownership-ebook-economy/ https://www.nyuengelberg.org/outputs/the-anti-ownership-eboo... The publishers and libraries end up trapping themselves with DRM and other requirements that make it hard for other platforms to come in.
- brodouevencode 3y ago
  Is that an economic problem or a regulatory problem?
pipo234 3y ago
> Why aren't more companies coming into this space if it's so lucrative? I appreciate your optimism, but hasn't it recently become more clear that the world is full of wrongs that cannot, will not or for some reason are not yet fixed by good ol' rational market economics?
- polygamous_bat 3y ago
  I think it's been proven beyond doubt that free market evangelists will happily drown while claiming if climate change was such a problem free market would have fixed it already.
yaky 3y ago
AFAIK OverDrive has quite a bit of vertical integration - they provide the app for end-users, the hosting for books and audiobooks, and a marketplace platform for libraries to purchase publishers' offerings (which probably involved many contracts with publishers). By having all of this and being one the first on the niche market, competing with them would be difficult.

helpfulmandrill 3y ago

It doesn't matter if its overdrive's fault or not. If we don't like the direction of travel as a society, we need to find ways of countering this tendency. It isn't about labelling certain companies as evil, its about appropriately regulating companies in general.

brodouevencode 3y ago
It's a small (but admittedly growing) minority that find this to be a problem. So even then, why begrudge anyone for offering a product or service that someone wanted at a price both parties considered fair? Users saw value in the service otherwise they wouldn't use them. Is there some sort of mandate that this type of service be used? (If Overdrive is breaking the law or defrauding customers then that's a separate issue.)
- helpfulmandrill 3y ago
  > why begrudge anyone for offering a product or service that someone wanted at a price both parties considered fair? Because in the context of our quite dysfunctional laws around copyright, competition, DRM etc., this isn't a remotely adequate description of what's going on?
  - brodouevencode 3y ago
    Then that's a problem with the dysfunctional laws and not the company, UNLESS the company is using those dysfunctional laws to enable their market capture. Do you know if Overdrive is doing this? If so then it's fair to criticize their market capture because it was done with the power of the state (point of a gun). If they are not it's obviously some sort of derangement. I find the tendency to make private companies and people - those who are playing fair - the bad guys in these scenarios extremely abhorrent. Let's fix the laws.
    - phyllistine 3y ago
      You're right, we should fix the laws. The companies actions under the ownership of KKR should not be considered 'playing fair', and some corporate buyout laws should be changed to disallow this behavior, maybe by enforcing the anti monopoly protections that the US has on the books. Alternatively, we could make DRM illegal to make the market more competitive.

matwood 3y ago

> Why aren't more companies coming into this space if it's so lucrative? https://www.nyuengelberg.org/outputs/the-anti-ownership-ebook-economy/ https://www.nyuengelberg.org/outputs/the-anti-ownership-eboo... The publishers and libraries end up trapping themselves with DRM and other requirements that make it hard for other platforms to come in.

brodouevencode 3y ago
Is that an economic problem or a regulatory problem?

pipo234 3y ago

> Why aren't more companies coming into this space if it's so lucrative? I appreciate your optimism, but hasn't it recently become more clear that the world is full of wrongs that cannot, will not or for some reason are not yet fixed by good ol' rational market economics?

polygamous_bat 3y ago
I think it's been proven beyond doubt that free market evangelists will happily drown while claiming if climate change was such a problem free market would have fixed it already.

yaky 3y ago

AFAIK OverDrive has quite a bit of vertical integration - they provide the app for end-users, the hosting for books and audiobooks, and a marketplace platform for libraries to purchase publishers' offerings (which probably involved many contracts with publishers). By having all of this and being one the first on the niche market, competing with them would be difficult.