Enjoy Digital Ownership And Public Libraries While You Still Can
from the you'll-miss-them-when-they're-gone dept
Michael E. Karpeles, Program Lead on OpenLibrary.org at the Internet Archive, spotted an interesting blog post by Michael Kozlowski, the editor-in-chief of Good e-Reader. It concerns Amazon and its audiobook division, Audible:
Amazon owned Audible ceased selling individual audiobooks through their Android app from Google Play a couple of weeks ago. This will prevent anyone from buying audio titles individually. However, Audible still sells subscriptions through the app (…)
Karpeles points out that this is yet another straw in the wind indicating that the ownership of digital goods is being replaced with a rental model. He wrote a post last year exploring the broader implications, using Netflix as an example:
What content landlords like Netflix are trying to do now is eliminate our “purchase” option entirely. Without it, renting become the only option and they are thus free to arbitrarily hike up rental fees , which we have to pay over and over again without us getting any of these aforementioned rights and freedoms. It’s a classic example of getting less for more.
He goes on to underline four extremely serious consequences of this shift. One is the end of “forever access”. If the company adopting the rental model goes out of business, customers lose access to everything they were paying for. With the ownership of goods, even if the supplier goes bankrupt, you still have the product they sold to you.
Secondly, the rental model effectively means the end of the public domain for material offered in that way. In theory, books, music, films and the rest that are under copyright should enter the public domain after a certain time – typically around a century after they first appeared. But when these digital goods are offered using the rental model, they usually come wrapped up in digital locks – digital rights management (DRM) – to prevent people exiting from the rental model by making a personal copy. That means that even if the company offering the digital goods is still around when the copyright expires, this content will remain locked-away even when it enters the public domain because it is illegal under copyright laws like the US DMCA and EU Information Society Directive to circumvent those locks.
Thirdly, Karpeles notes, the rental model means the end of personal digital freedom in this sphere. Since you access everything through the service provider, the latter knows what you are doing with the rented material and when. How much it chooses to spy on you will depend on the company, but you probably won’t know unless you live somewhere like the EU where you can make a request to the company for the personal data that it holds about you.
Finally, and perhaps least obviously, it means the end of the library model that has served us so well for hundreds of years. Increasingly, libraries are unable to buy copies of ebooks outright, but must rent them. This means that they must follow the strict licensing conditions imposed by publishers on how those ebooks are lent out by the library. For example, some publishers license ebooks for a set period of time – typically a year or two – with no guarantee that renewal will be possible at the end of that time. Others have adopted a metered approach that counts how many times an ebook is lent out, and blocks access after a preset number. Karpeles writes:
Looking to the future, as more books become only available for lease as eBooks, I see no clear option which allows libraries to sustainably serve their important roles as reliable, long-term public access repositories of cultural heritage and human knowledge. It used to be the case that a library would purchase a book once and it would serve the public for decades. Instead, now at the end of each year, a library’s eBooks simply vanish unless libraries are able to find enough quarters to re-feed the meter.
The option to own new digital goods or to access the digital holdings of public libraries may not be available much longer – enjoy them while you can.
Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter, Diaspora, or Mastodon. Originally posted to Walled Culture.
Filed Under: audio books, digital ownership, libraries, ownership, rental model
Comments on “Enjoy Digital Ownership And Public Libraries While You Still Can”
Contingency plans…
This is why when I buy audiobooks, I buy them from libro.fm and Downpour. They’re DRM-free, so I keep them forever. For the literature in the public domain, there’s librivox.
I hope libro and downpour don’t go in the same direction Amazon has gone, but knowing those two, I doubt it.
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If tape recorders were will around, you could plug a tape recorder into the back of your computer and record the audiobok on to a cassette tape.
And no, that does break the DMCA because you are doing that for personal use and and not for financial gain (making money)
when music had DRM 20 years ago, I used to do that so I could my tunes in my car. I would just plug my taoe recorder into my computer and record the songs I wanted onto cassette tapes I could play in the car (when cars still had cassette players)
And I was not violating the DMCA when I did that because I was not doing it for any kind of financial gain. Recording it onto cassette tapes tpo play in the car is personal use and not financial gain.
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I could be wrong, but I believe it’s possible to use the computer’s input to directly record its audio output. No tape recorder necessary.
And that’s if there’s not some program that can’t do it directly without even messing with cables.
Re: Re: No, it's not legal.
While the ‘format shifting’ may be legal under copyright law’s fair use provisions, the DMCA contains no such fair use rights. Unless your activity falls under one of the very limited, and temporary, exemptions to the DMCA, ANY bypassing of the DRM is an offence, no matter what the reason. This is one of the big flaws in the DMCA, but it’s one that the publishers absolutely love, so don’t expect to see that change any time soon.
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It has to be for “financial gain”, in order for it to be a crime, and recording onto cassettes for the car did not fall under that
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Are you a library, archive, or educational institution? No? Then you violated the DMCA and could be seen as encouraging others to do so.
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Giving information does not break any laws
Second,I use VPN combined with Tor to mydelf untraceable.
This sounds like what she clowns in Usenet newsgroups said 14 years ago when I mentioned how is citizens living abroad could avoid the us travel ban on Cuba by avoiding a us connectimg city
Contrary to what they thought giving information on that did not break any laws
Being that I was loving in and running an online radio station out of Australia I could have never been caught
It was station policy to secure wipe the hard disks on station equipment before taking it abroad, so that customs in countries, particularly Australia, Britain, and the USA where your devices are likely to be searched could not find anything.
We did not break any laws in either Australia, Britain,or the hairbrush United States bye up my the hard disks on station equipment before entering those countries.
Companies with that policy are are not breaking any Australian, British or American laws doing so
Re: Re: Re:3
Also I posted from my phone, so all I have to.do is keep my.phone in insane cyip proof mode where they get at the content
If too many failed password attempts are made, the phone will wipe itself and reset, taking any evidence with it
I always do.that when on road trips in asset forfeiture states don’t my phone is taken, they will never get at the contents.
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And no, that doesn’t break the DMCA because you are doing that for personal use and and not for financial gain (making money).
It doesn’t matter what you were doing it for, it’s still circumvention of a technical measure, and thus a violation of the DMCA, as shit as that is.
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It is only a criminal offense if you do it for financial gain, meaning making money.
when I used to record my music onto cassettes for use in the car, it did not violate the DMCA because I was doing it for personal use, and not for making money.
That is why the financial gain rquirement is in the DMCA.
Taping my music onto casette tapes for the car was not for any klnd of “financial gain”, so I was not committing a felony doing it.
The felony provisions only apply if you do it for the purpose of making money (financial gain), and plugging a tape recorder into my computer and recording my music onto casette tapes for the car was not a felony offense because I was not making money doing it.
Just like the clowns I have argued with on here regarding listening to iHeart and YouTube music on road trips to Mexico.
Using my private home VPN when I am down there to bypass geoblocking does not break any laws in Mexico.
When I am in Mexico, the DMCA does not apply while I am down there. I only have to obey Mexican laws when I am in Mexico.
Re: Re: Re:2
Can you point out where it says that? I couldn’t find it.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/1201
Re: Re: Re:2
*It is only a criminal offense if you do it for financial gain, meaning making money.
Oh? The relevant legislation would beg to differ.
That is why the financial gain requirement is in the DMCA.
No, it’s not. It’s to create a lack of incentive for libraries, archives, and educational institutions making money by bypassing DRM for a fee.
Taping my music onto casette tapes for the car was not for any klnd of “financial gain”, so I was not committing a felony doing it.
That depends.
The felony provisions only apply if you do it for the purpose of making money (financial gain), and plugging a tape recorder into my computer and recording my music onto casette tapes for the car was not a felony offense because I was not making money doing it.
You could have been. Whether violation of the DMCA is a felony or a misdemeanour depends on how many copies you made after bypassing the DRM, not whether or not you sold them.
Just like the clowns I have argued with on here regarding listening to iHeart and YouTube music on road trips to Mexico.
You’re the only clown I can see. I’m a Brit, but I know this particular piece of US legislation better than you.
When I am in Mexico, the DMCA does not apply while I am down there. I only have to obey Mexican laws when I am in Mexico.
Do keep up, 007! (-_Q)
Re: Re: Re:3
Even if it were I could quickly get rid of evidence by sweeping ng a magnet over the tapes and degaussing them
No evidence = No CASE
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One thing not a circmvention of a technical measure is using a VPN to bypass geoblocking.
I do it all the time when I travel abroad, so I can still get iHeart or YouTube Music when I am abroad.
Unless I am in the United Arab Emirates I am not breaking any laws. the UAE is the only country in the world were circumventing geoblocking is a criminal offense
Re: Re: Re:2
One thing not a circmvention of a technical measure is using a VPN to bypass geoblocking.
No big content producer would agree with that assertion.
The alternative contingency plan
Bullshit like this will (continue to) make people go back to piracy.
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If only they knew about downpour…Downpour also has a subscription service, but each month you get one credit, and one credit is usually redeemable for a book, which you can download DRM-free. I prefer that “subscribe-to-own” business model over a “subscribe-to-rent” business model.
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I think that’s the idea that way they can justify even more stringent copyright measures like filtering and making ISPs monitor their users for evidence of copyright infringement.
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Some people never stopped.
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Even in the age of easily accessible games, comics and porn, some people truly stuck to their “guns” and went full “pirate” instead of paying for SOME of them.
Those people are not really customers, in a sense.
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The thing is that except for music and mostly older computer games from one or two sources, you can’t really “buy” anything digitally. The best you can do is pay for a non-expiring license to use it. And I’m not even sure if any of them let you keep accessing the content after you close your account.
There is at least one rare TV show on Amazon that there doesn’t appear to be any pirate copies of. For whatever reason, the pirates did the first season, but stopped short of doing the season finale, and then completely ignored the second season.
I’d gladly pay for it, if I could just download the episodes in a DRM-free format. But I can’t. Everything on there is protected and requires special software to view. Or special, third-party software to download, and since I have an outdated computer, I can’t use it.
There are many old TV shows that I would pay a fair price to get if they were actually available, but in many cases, they aren’t.
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I’d gladly pay for it, if I could just download the episodes in a DRM-free format. But I can’t. Everything on there is protected and requires special software to view. Or special, third-party software to download, and since I have an outdated computer, I can’t use it.
Are you a fan of Mystery Science Theater 3000? Then do I have the website for you!
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Or support creators that make their stuff freely available.
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Like Cory Doctorow?
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One of many.
Niche interest content creators tend to give most of their content out for free.
Or, it’s just the continuing removal of the purchase option from Play Store apps, like everyone else is doing, too.
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It’s exactly this. Google increased their cut from play store sales, and a lot of companies are removing their payment options from their apps. Amazon did the same thing with Kindle books as well. The option to buy is still there, it just has to be done through their website instead of their app. Their Kindle app that’s available through the Amazon App Store still allows purchases, and I would guess the Audible app available there allows them as well.
I still prefer the old dead tree based book format.
The cool thing about paper books is that once you purchase them you can keep them, give them away or do whatever you want with them… plus if you have bookcases full of them it makes you look smart.
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My bookcases make publishers gnash their teeth, as the books on them are mainly second hand.
Re: purchasing habits
If the ebook isn’t DRM-free, I usually purchase only the paper book from my local independent bookstore and also the audiobook from libro.fm (if there is one). If the eBook is DRM-free, that’s the option I usually take.
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If the ebook isn’t DRM-free, I download a “pirate” copy, or check it out of the library.
If the work turns out to actually be worth my time and money, enough that I want to support the author (who after all isn’t responsible for the publisher’s over-reach), then I gladly purchase the paper book from my local independent bookstore (the publisher has after all most likely added some value, both in editing and in making that physical copy available).
On the other hand, if I want a digital book and have already paid for hard-copy, I’ll download a “pirated” ebook version — with a clear conscience. Paying for value received is good, but being ripped off for simple format-shifting is price-gouging exploitation.
I don’t mind compensating the parties involved in publishing a book (especially the author). I also strongly support public libraries. But the way publishers have been abusing public libraries on the digital books front, makes me think of racketeering, rather than the book business.
Personally, I don’t care for being extorted, insulted, and/or ripped off. DRM is a glaring “F*** You sticker on the bookcover — an announcement that the publisher doesn’t care about, and has chosen to override by force, the reader’s/purchaser’s (ie. customer’s) legitimate interests.
‘If libraries were not already a well established part of society they never would have been allowed to be formed.’
Modern publishers: ‘Challenge accepted.’
I think you’re reading too much into this. Amazon also removed the ability to purchase books and comics through Kindle and Comixology Play Store apps as well at the same time. It has to do with not wanting to pay Google 30% of each purchase.
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Not really. Look at sales of physical media for movies and TV shows: Not only have such releases generally slowed down, stores where such media used to be abundantly stocked have now pared down their selections. (Hell, WWE used to put out lots of DVDs of its legacy content library, but now you can only watch that stuff through Peacock.) Streaming has replaced buying movies because…well, what kind of person would ever pay 20 bux for a single movie when they could pay 20 bux (per month) to watch a shitload of movies?
Maybe people will finally see the light when Netflix implodes and there are virtually no Blu-rays of its most popular original shows/movies to buy. I wouldn’t bet on that, though.
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Streaming has replaced buying movies because…well, what kind of person would ever pay 20 bux for a single movie when they could pay 20 bux (per month) to watch a shitload of movies?
And that’s why I don’t bother with streaming. Why pay £20 to watch a shitload of movies once when I can pay £20 to buy five or six movies to watch over and over? Pre-owned’s where it’s at. 😜
I already refuse to buy digital. Just what this article is about is the main reason why.
Doesn’t matter if it is music or an ebook, I refuse to support this model.
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And games. You have almost no control, and eventually they’ll get bricked or die.
This will backfire
We will get annoyed and stop buying. It’ll be another chord cutting kind of thing.
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Well the practical effect will be driving otherwise paying subscribers to the seven seas matey.
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Do you mean piracy? Because I’m already there, if you ask the big content producers. Between purchasing second-hand books, pre-owned CDs and DVDs, and downloading epubs and audiobooks in the Public Domain…
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It’ll be another chord cutting kind of thing.
Nah, I don’t like my music broken. 😉
Google did the same thing with their music platform a few years ago. They stopped selling music, and now it’s just another streaming service. If you had bought music on the platform(which I had a lot), you could download it or see it disappear.
A buddy of mine couldn’t even download his music library, so he lost at least 50 albums with various artists, and Google support was less than useless.
Nowadays, I exclusively use Qobuz and Bandcamp to buy music, unless an artist has it available digitally on their website(a rarity).
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This is why when I make my music available, I make it available however the listener wants to listen to it: Bandcamp, Spotify, Amazon, Apple Music/iTunes, TIDAL, YouTube, you name it. I even upload my music to the Internet Archive. The last thing I want to do is to deprive someone of my music.
I love streaming and why it absolutely sucks to the point I abhor streaming
I stream a LOT of content, TV shows, movies, music, books, it’s incredible to have so much content available to come zipping your way through the tubez, I love it.
I absolutely hate streaming, it sucks to the core. It’s about transport issues, like fast forward/rewind, or pausing, or simply trying to replay a few seconds because I missed something, or want to see it or hear it again. Some apps only allow for 30 seconds minimum replay, many don’t have a simple replay, even those that do I think 10 seconds is the minimum, and it will take about 7 seconds to do that FFS, sometimes longer. Many have almost no way to see how far you’re rewinding or FFing. Just pausing can end up taking a few seconds to restart, or sometimes a lot more! And freeze-frame, another function of ‘pause’ so you can get a better look at something ends up with a darkened screen with all kinds of graphics crap overlayed so you can’t see an effing thing. And they’re all different, HBO vs Netflix vs.. etc, all the aps behave a little differently, but THEY ALL SUCK! I’ve taken to ripping blurays just so I can use PotPlayer because even the transport on bluray/DVD players ain’t much better than streaming. I don’t know how anyone can stand streaming movies or TV, I can’t and still do it all the time because it’s all there is often enough.
Even for books, I can’t tell you how often I simply picked up my phone and lost my place, and since I’m usually driving, it can be a real hassle and dangerous trying to find my place again.
One other issue, a huge concern, they’re editing the content. I am only aware of one case but that’s enough to mean it’s likely common. There is a british show “Utopia”, it’s absolutely brilliant, incredibly original, the score the same, you can stream it on PrimeVideo, but what you get is edited, some scenes were cut out, one e.g. involves the implication of killing a kid, not the killing of a kid, just the implication. There is no notification of this editing. It used to be there was always explicit notification that something got edited when you watched a movie on TV. This should be unacceptable. {Note: Amazon produced an American version of Utopia that is way more horrible than you might initially think, avoid at all costs].
OK, venting over, I felt compelled to explain some of the BS we’re forced to accept in order to stream content, it’s a greatly diminished quality of the experience–both ease of use and capability of using the content the way you want to use it.
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Even for books, I can’t tell you how often I simply picked up my phone and lost my place, and since I’m usually driving, it can be a real hassle and dangerous trying to find my place again.
Extremely dangerous. Please stop using your phone while driving before you kill someone. ಠ_ಠ
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I only do it when I’m not dozing off.
Sadly for Netflixs
You can still watch in a browser and use a screen capture to record, and theres nothing they can really do to prevent that. Its a cludgey option but if you’re that determined to screw the system, just saying…..
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Please don’t promote violation of the DMCA. It’ll only make the maximalists double down and lobby for worse legislation.
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You’re already late to the party. People make backups of their CDs and void the warranties on their devices by seeking repairs all the time.
Hell, the government of Australia told their citizens to use VPNs to bypass region locks on content.
None of this will change course for maximalists. Being afraid of them doubling down, and subsequently compliant with them, is exactly what maximalists want.
Old ideals
Knowledge is power.
The idea is to spread knowledge and give experiences.
They are not supposed to DRM items that ARNT restricted by CR.
And unless they Have the Rights, they shouldnt be allowed to Apply DRM, if it wasnt there in the First place.
And now the crux of the matter and how to control the illiterate.
I’m confused. I just checked and except for the lowest option, all the other Audible membership options give credits equal to the cost of any book you want from the site. It specifically says these books remain in your library after cancelling.
Now don’t disagree that relying on a company to save your purchases does have risks, but the removal is due to Google demanding money for providing an operating system.
Ownership is so passé
I’ll admit this is a little side-tracked, but ownership is being put in jeopardy in the physical world as well.
From real estate where a few groups are trying to monopolize properties, to IoT devices that you “own” only as far as the always-online software allows you, to personal electronic equipment that can only be repaired or refilled at the manufacturer’s own stores…
Some of these behaviors are not fully implemented across their respective markets, but they are growing trends across multiple types of products as soon as electronic is involved, trends where your freedom to do with your “property” as you will is getting severely limited.
Welcome to a world of not-owning-anything, where you can enjoy whatever you want for a hopefully-reasonable monthly fee.
Then again, when you see some people going crazy over cryptos and NFTs, who cares if you actually own anything as long as you think you do?
The elephant and gorilla
There’s a end point to raising prices.
Eventually you hit the ceiling and that’s just that. The end.
We may have to suffer a few times but when the majority dig in and just refuse to continue to pay more prices drop again.
When Amazon, who generally used to let suppliers set channel rates, watched channels jack up rates and users fled prime, they cracked down. When $9.99 became $14.99 a month people cancelled. When 12.99 became 19.99 people fled. And Amazon now has caps on channel services.
Companies will run into a point where people refuse to pay. And today that no longer means not consuming, just leaving. Piracy goes up every time a service raises its prices. And goes down when they lower prices.
I’m all for physical and ownership. I still buy dozens of VHS and BETA tapes every year. DVDs. Etc. I buy hard copy games.
Streaming has it’s benefits. And I use multiple services. Prime channels, Netflix, Arrow, YouTube. Even some films from Steam.
There’s a place for digital and if done correctly… but nobody is going to be gouged. The fastest way to mark gram and gramps learn to be pirates is to charge $20 a month for their soaps.
I prefer digital books for two reasons. I can change the font and they weigh less. A whole library in my back pocket! In a font I can clearly read.
I don’t mind spending cover price for a new book.
But they wonder why people download textbooks. Seriously? $299 for 500 pages of text?
People wonder why SciHub has so much internal support from academics?
If you want 30 sales of a book you make it $10 and earn $300
If you want one sale you make the book $300 and everyone else rips a copy. Because 30 students chip in $10 each.
That’s just the reality of market value.
The article is about ownership. And I’m not honestly worried about that.
More important is perpetual access. I don’t really car anymore if I own or forever rent or perpetual license something. As long as it’s always there.
I think cost vs value is a much larger issue
A great content on this topic, Thank for posting it