Day Against DRM
 

http://www.defectivebydesign.org/dayagainstdrm

"While DRM has largely been defeated in downloaded music, it is a growing problem in the area of ebooks, where people have had their books restricted so they can't freely loan, re-sell or donate them, read them without being tracked, or move them to a new device without re-purchasing all of them. They've even had their ebooks deleted by companies without their permission. It continues to be a major issue in the area of movies and video too."

What will you be doing for Day Against DRM (May 4th)?

Well, there is one (nasty) thing one could do against this...keep using paper books. If I cannot download it (after some form of payment/compensation) as a tangilbe file (PDF for a book, MP3 for music, anything else) I dont want it.
I never downloaded an eBook I coud'nt keep.
Paper...the most environment-friendly information carrier on the planet. Dont need it anymore? Recycle it and get new info on it...
Paper rules!

Thor

For me, every day is anti-DRMday. ;)

Even being able to download a file doesnt give you back the rights that you have with a hard copy (the right to loan, sell,give away, etc.).

I've got to disagree. Being able to recycle something doesnt make it environmentally friendly.

Paper has its advantages, but for long term storage and use, digital rules! The only problem with digital (aside from needing electricity and the reader) is the dumb rules/'licence' that many sellers of digital files have. Which is why I dont buy music files or ebooks from any of the major online retailers.

Well, I do agree...for the prices some of that stuff retails for (on 7digital, a song goes for E 0.99 sometimes) it would be silly to give it away or sell it...

Again, I agree...but the digital version puts power in the hands of the "owners" of the copy...digital makes it more "speadable" to the people.

I for one believe that the spreading of books (and reading) and thus "freeing them" from the tight circles of "scolars" was the true renaissance for humanity. Reading - and absorbing information - should be elevated as a basic human right, just like clean water, security and dignity...

1 euro a song isnt that good a price IMO.

I'm not sure if you've misunderstood what I was saying, so I'll put it another way.

I wasnt saying that a digital music retailers/distributors cannot give away tracks (though they typically dont), I was saying that once you have bought tracks/albums in digital formats they typically have all sorts of limits. 7 digital is just as bad as the others AFAIK. The "Terms and conditions of use" for 7 digital is all in legalese, and I am not a lawyer, so this is just my reading of the following-

http://www.7digital.com/termsandconditions

You cannot give away, lead, or otherwise 'transfer' the 'licence' you have to play songs you have 'bought' from 7 digital.

See? Already, they have put a silly limit on how you can use the 'content'.

BTW, notice the jump from (i) to (iii)? There would have been a (ii) point as well, but its been deleted for some reason. I wonder what point (ii) was?

You cant do anything with what you've 'bought'...and AFAIK the final point ('This excludes the downloading, copying and/or printing of pages of the website for personal, non-commercial home use only.') is actually not legal. The 'content holders' have no rights to say that you cannot 'reproduce' content for commercial purposes. I'm splitting hairs here, but the way that is worded people cannot buy tracks or books from 7 digital and then use a limited amout of lyrics/text in a commercial work. I'm not saying that you can 'reproduce' a whole book, or copy a song, I'm saying that the way that is worded it is possible that 7 digital could try to sue in the case that you use song lyrics or a reasonable, legally quotable section of text in some other commercial work. Or in the case that somebody else didnt like it (scattered thoughout the 'terms and conditions')

I'd love to keep ripping the 7 digital 'terms and conditions' apart, but that would be getting off subject. I'll just say this, with all the 'we can change this at any time, its up to you to check', 'we can delete everything whenever we want' and 'we are not liable' clauses I would not be using 7 digitals 'services'.

BTW, the 'No DRM' policy doesnt stop them from putting those limits onto the stuff they sell, and DRM doesnt automatically mean that you are limited. It is in theory at least possible to buy DRMed tracks that are freely transferable. I've never heard of that happening, but I could well have missed it. But even if that had happened, it still wouldnt make me a DRM fan.

Yes, digital anything is is more easily spread. That is the one of the excuses used for the limiting of your rights.

Its also one of the reasons why you are seeing more and more extensions to copyright in US law, and lots of other countries follow the US due to pressure of various kinds. The 'owners' of content want to keep the stuff forever, and keep making a profit off it.

If copyright expired in a reasonable timeframe, there would be more digital books, music etc. that was freely avaible. 'Freely' in all senses of the word.

I can see your point, and I sort of agree. But basicly, your 'true renaissance' lasted from the late 19th C in the west and is slowly fading away (literacy rates are falling in western coutnries AFAIK) and in many '3rd world' contries they have never got it, and probably never will.

I think that having digital copies of books is a good thing for literacy rates. Not many people carry around a hard copy book these days...I do pretty much always, and honestly I've been laughed at by kids for having a real book ("What on earth do you have that for? Cant afford a kindle? LOL"). Pretty much every kid these days has a mobile phone, at least in the west. As 'smart phone' tech gets cheaper and more common, more and more people are carring around 24/7 a way to read a digital book. Without the social stigma of actually owning and reading something (and the added weight of lugging around a book).

Sad but true, it takes a firm backbone to stand up in a rennaiscance. I believe it is the combined will of the masses to want to progress that sparked the rennaiscance to begin with. All nice and well to have books (available somehow) but if there's nobody to read them, the rennaiscance stops right there. I gather the global population to be in a lethargic state brought upon them by all the gloom around them. Before the mediastorm we know now, the only way to get "info" in the system was to read. Now, the human brain is too overstrung with all the stuff it has to absorb, there's no more energy to sustain the fruits of the rennaiscance of any kind...

By the way, I dont own a kindle either, it would prove impractical. I've got books all over the place here, next to my bed, in the bathroom, in the kitchen in the livingroom, the den...imagine that you've yet again lost the kindle...not practical...keeping track of one's glasses is hard enough as it is, let alone a kindle...

I've read the rules of 7 digital, and yes, they are stringent. But, I think they're meant to enforce "end-user-use" in that spreading is not allowed. A ringtone is...spreading. In belgium, sabam is such a "media police" (gestapo, dare I say?) that "guards" against illegal spreading. As a former shop owner, I was not even allowed any music in the store...
Those days were way-way before digital was around...

It all boils down to proper education, I guess. Far too often, enforcement is chosen over education as it is more spectacular and more damaging. Education lasts longer...