Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/04/02/burning-libraries.html
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Ironic how late-stage capitalism (and private property grown rampant) is destroying the very notion of personal property.
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When will people learn? It always ends this way with DRM and corporations.
A feature and not a bug as far as the lords of our new Gilded Age are concerned.
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This is why I decided to settle on the Nook store for my ebooks. Some of them are still DRM’ed, but the DRM is so trivial to break that I don’t need to fear my library vanishing with the eventual death of Barnes and Noble.
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People won’t care. They won’t care because no one rereads books anymore. With a firehose of new books coming out 24/7/365, if people are going to read a book, they’re going to read a new one rather than one they’ve already read before. If they like a book seriously enough to want to own it, they’re going to want to own it in paper and ink. It’s a totally different artform from music. I could listen to “All Along the Watchtower” a hundred times; if I read a biography of Jimi Hendrix once, that would probably be enough.
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When the Apocalypse happens, ya’ll can watch Movies, TV and listen to Music on my Plex server! 
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Luckily I never boarded that particular train, but this reminds me that I need find a way to go back in and strip the DRM from my Kindle purchases.
Charge me a penny a book, and I’ll leave your DRM in place. Charge me what it costs for a dead tree version, and I’m going to do what I have to in order to keep it.
FTFY. I’m a person. I care.
I have a large physical library of books (and DVD/BluRay, CD, video game, etc).
I buy digital books for the convenience of not schlepping around a book everywhere – something I did all the time as a teen in the 80s. If I read a physical book that I like enough, and can get it in a digital format later on, I’ll do it. And vice versa. Same with movies, music, and games.
My eggs are in many baskets, but that doesn’t mean I’m fine with a basket disappearing on me.
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i just don’t know who i am anymore. or even what.
the truth - i guess - is not that, on the internet no one knows if you’re a dog. it’s that on the internet, no one knows themselves.
tldr. am i not people?
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What do you think that new Amazon blimp and all those drones are for?
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Late stage capitalism is very rentier. There’s nothing about capitalism that insists that everyone gets to have personal property, after all…
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As someone who sells (not rents, not licenses) a product, I’ve noticed a certain related trend. Some customers, usually young white males, don’t understand the concept of commerce. It’s an old fashioned concept - you buy something and then you own it. End of story. The vendor does not actually owe you anything more. But somehow periodically we get these customers who seem to think that if they buy something, then you owe them something - I swear they want emotional support more than anything. Or they can buy a consumable product, open and try it and then return it. Or they are King Yelp and try to convince you to give them free stuff or they’ll give you a bad review.
I truly think there is a whole generation who’s ideas of ownership are getting skewed by all rent-taking and licensing. We may be the last generation to really own things.
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I’m imagining a future when some final omnicorp goes under, and there’s a giant sucking sound as all our material goods dissolve and vanish.
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Per their FAQ:
If your original payment method is no longer valid and on file with us, you will receive a credit back to your Microsoft account for use online in Microsoft Store.
So you only get a refund if you haven’t replaced your credit card in the meantime, otherwise you get store credit.
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I want to take this opportunity to recommend Calibre as a DRM-free ebook manager.
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Dude, that’s a felony! I’ll bet the DRM cops are triangulating your post right now!
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But why take them back? Why not just leave them where they are?
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That’s not how DRM works.
Every time you want to access a DRM locked file, your device has to phone home to its DRM server.
When that server is taken off line, your files are forever locked.
Well, until you crack the DRM, but even discussing methods for doing that is technically a felony, so I would never do such a thing.
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Ah, thank you for the explanation. So, hypothetically the contracts with the publishers, creators, etc. prohibit unlocking them at this point.
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I’ll stick to my ancient Kobo and use Calibre to put ebooks onto it. Sure, I’ll buy the book, but I need to protect my legal purchases. Crack the DRM, copy it, read it, keep it.
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I’ve suspected I’m not not ‘people’ before this - now comes the proof.
I read a mix of paper and ebooks, and fairly often if I buy an ebook it’s because it’s an old favourite that I want to have with me all the time so I can dip into it at an odd moment.
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