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Are Apple iBooks cross platform? I could live with Amazon Kindle ebooks even if they are evil with the publishers but it Apple wants to tie me to their ecosyste

Are Apple iBooks cross platform? I could live with Amazon Kindle ebooks even if they are evil with the publishers but it Apple wants to tie me to their ecosystem without a way to exit then that's an evil that affects me more directly. And if we are talking about dropping the ball lack of cross platform availability is as big a ball they could drop.

pooper 12y ago
Perhaps in a few years we will have a "Thoughts on books" similar to the "Thoughts on music". In my opinion, if the iBooks experience is really good, people who love Apple will continue to use iBooks even without the shackles of DRM. I think Apple can afford to sell books without DRM and will do so if publishers allow them. I don't think Amazon.com and Apple are evil. It is the publishers who increasingly find themselves less useful and are willing to sacrifice usability for the sake of temporary relevance.
- blinkingled 12y ago
  Great point about DRM free books - if they can do it that's one step forward but they'll still need to open up the formats and distribution so people can read them on whatever device they want. Problem is right now they have selection issues, no cross platform availability and they colluded to raise prices.
  - pooper 12y ago
    Instead of starting from scratch, we could build up on epub. It should already be possible to read DRM-free books on Apple's iBook app. It'd be nice if Amazon.com supported epub natively.
    - ClashTheBunny 12y ago
      Nook epubs and amazon .mobis are both easily decrypted. The key is your name and credit card for nook and your serial number for kindle. There is no lock in when you add calibre to the mix, it will convert anything to anything.
      - DanBC 12y ago
        It's easy to do, but it's circumventing a copy protection measure thus illegal in many places. Making format-shifting illegal is a hateful thing to do and there should be exceptions in law for this.

pooper 12y ago

Perhaps in a few years we will have a "Thoughts on books" similar to the "Thoughts on music". In my opinion, if the iBooks experience is really good, people who love Apple will continue to use iBooks even without the shackles of DRM. I think Apple can afford to sell books without DRM and will do so if publishers allow them. I don't think Amazon.com and Apple are evil. It is the publishers who increasingly find themselves less useful and are willing to sacrifice usability for the sake of temporary relevance.

blinkingled 12y ago
Great point about DRM free books - if they can do it that's one step forward but they'll still need to open up the formats and distribution so people can read them on whatever device they want. Problem is right now they have selection issues, no cross platform availability and they colluded to raise prices.
- pooper 12y ago
  Instead of starting from scratch, we could build up on epub. It should already be possible to read DRM-free books on Apple's iBook app. It'd be nice if Amazon.com supported epub natively.
  - ClashTheBunny 12y ago
    Nook epubs and amazon .mobis are both easily decrypted. The key is your name and credit card for nook and your serial number for kindle. There is no lock in when you add calibre to the mix, it will convert anything to anything.
    - DanBC 12y ago
      It's easy to do, but it's circumventing a copy protection measure thus illegal in many places. Making format-shifting illegal is a hateful thing to do and there should be exceptions in law for this.