3 ms·

Pushing back on drm from the seller and/or publisher end feels like a lost cause at this point. There are tools that allow you to strip drm and convert to epub.

Pushing back on drm from the seller and/or publisher end feels like a lost cause at this point. There are tools that allow you to strip drm and convert to epub. If you buy another copy of the book it seems perfectly ethical to do this as a workaround.

pierat 3y ago
Cracking DRM is illegal with the DMCA. So is piracy. So instead of paying the privilege of being illegal, just pirate and save your money. XKCD called this hypocrisy out ages ago. https://xkcd.com/488/ https://xkcd.com/488/
- themadturk 3y ago
  The only thing wrong with this is that piracy means the author gets no benefit. I have pirated very few books; but I buy and strip DRM, getting the best of both worlds.
  - komali2 3y ago
    You can usually send the author money directly. It may not be "click a button" convenient but lately rarely is doing the "right thing" so easy, annoyingly. But it's not so bad. I recently read Adrian Tchaikovsky. If I wanted to send him money, I google his name, end up at his website, and at the bottom is a contact page: https://adriantchaikovsky.com/contact.html https://adriantchaikovsky.com/contact.html there's his agent's address at the bottom, where I can easily mail cash. This works for most authors. In the past I've emailed small creators, such as authors or music producers, and simply asked them for their cashapp, paypal, or venmo, and sent them money that way. Many small producers already have this info on their website or instagram for this exact reason.
  - marcus_holmes 3y ago
    The author chose to publish with DRM. They could choose not to, as others have done. They could choose a publisher that doesn't add DRM. They could argue with their publisher that DRM is hurting their sales because so many people are pirating their books instead of buying them because of the DRM. Authors are not powerless victims here.
    - komali2 3y ago
      > Authors are not powerless victims here. Perhaps not entirely powerless, but nearly so if they want anybody to actually read their book, or to make any money on it. Doctorow has written extensively on this: https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/25/greedflation/ https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/25/greedflation/ https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/31/seize-the-means-of-computation/ https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/31/seize-the-means-of-comput... > I won't let my books be sold with DRM, which means that Audible won't carry my audiobooks. My agent tells me that this decision has cost me enough money to pay off my mortgage and put my kid through college. Big authors like Sanderson and Doctorow can pull it off, small and new authors, if they want to build an audience, really can't.
      - marcus_holmes 3y ago
        Exactly. Authors have some power here. Up to them whether the money matters more, exactly as Cory Doctorow says.
        deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
- jerbear4328 3y ago
  Yeah, it is. However, if you have to break the law, the ethical way that supports the authors is the better choice.

pierat 3y ago

Cracking DRM is illegal with the DMCA. So is piracy. So instead of paying the privilege of being illegal, just pirate and save your money. XKCD called this hypocrisy out ages ago. https://xkcd.com/488/ https://xkcd.com/488/

themadturk 3y ago
The only thing wrong with this is that piracy means the author gets no benefit. I have pirated very few books; but I buy and strip DRM, getting the best of both worlds.
- komali2 3y ago
  You can usually send the author money directly. It may not be "click a button" convenient but lately rarely is doing the "right thing" so easy, annoyingly. But it's not so bad. I recently read Adrian Tchaikovsky. If I wanted to send him money, I google his name, end up at his website, and at the bottom is a contact page: https://adriantchaikovsky.com/contact.html https://adriantchaikovsky.com/contact.html there's his agent's address at the bottom, where I can easily mail cash. This works for most authors. In the past I've emailed small creators, such as authors or music producers, and simply asked them for their cashapp, paypal, or venmo, and sent them money that way. Many small producers already have this info on their website or instagram for this exact reason.
- marcus_holmes 3y ago
  The author chose to publish with DRM. They could choose not to, as others have done. They could choose a publisher that doesn't add DRM. They could argue with their publisher that DRM is hurting their sales because so many people are pirating their books instead of buying them because of the DRM. Authors are not powerless victims here.
  - komali2 3y ago
    > Authors are not powerless victims here. Perhaps not entirely powerless, but nearly so if they want anybody to actually read their book, or to make any money on it. Doctorow has written extensively on this: https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/25/greedflation/ https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/25/greedflation/ https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/31/seize-the-means-of-computation/ https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/31/seize-the-means-of-comput... > I won't let my books be sold with DRM, which means that Audible won't carry my audiobooks. My agent tells me that this decision has cost me enough money to pay off my mortgage and put my kid through college. Big authors like Sanderson and Doctorow can pull it off, small and new authors, if they want to build an audience, really can't.
    - marcus_holmes 3y ago
      Exactly. Authors have some power here. Up to them whether the money matters more, exactly as Cory Doctorow says.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
jerbear4328 3y ago
Yeah, it is. However, if you have to break the law, the ethical way that supports the authors is the better choice.