digital rights management

The Good News Is DRM Free is Pirated at Lower Rate than DRM. Pirating Numbers Still High

From Slashdot: Developer 2D Boy has written that they are seeing an 82% piracy rate for everyone’s favorite DRM-free physics puzzler, World of Goo . . . The article also features a fascinating comparison with the piracy rate of another game that was shipped complete with DRM, at 92%.   Send to Kindle

DRM Hampering Library of Congress Efforts

The current copyright protection allows for libraries to copy “a work in their collections that is damaged, deteriorating, lost or stolen or whose format has become obsolete” three times. As Ars Technica notes, this means that no copying can be done until destruction or damage is actually underway. The Library of Congress has noted in(…)

Ebooks Does Not Equal Free Books

A friend of mine emailed me this past week asking me for information about how to buy her sister a gift of ebooks. Her sister had a Sony Reader and my friend wanted to buy books from Fictionwise because unless you had a Sony Reader, you couldn’t actually buy a Sony Reader compatible book. I(…)

O’Reilly to Sell Multi-format Bundles and Books without DRM

O’Reilly, a non fiction technological publication, is going to start selling a “select number of books as a bundle of three ebook formats (EPUB, PDF, and Kindle-compatible Mobipocket) for a single price — at or below the book’s cover price — starting in early July.” These books will be sold without DRM and it will(…)

Gizmodo Declares that DRM Is Dead as Sony Falls

Sony, the last major record label still encoding its songs with some type of DRM, has announced that it is finalizing plans to sell its music without DRM. That means you won’t have to authorize any device and that any song you buy can be played on any players you own. Basically, it means that(…)

Reason 510 DRM Is Terrible: Wal-Mart Ends Video Download Service

One reason I was so disgusted when Kindle debuted with its super proprietary Mobipocket format was because of the history of companies, both big and small, to stop supporting the proprietary format of the month, leaving its consumers high and dry. Wal-mart has announced that it will end its video download service after just one(…)

What MLB Fans Can Teach eBook Readers about Kindle and Other EReading Devices

moar funny pictures MLB Makes Fools out of Fans In 2003, Major League Baseball offered game footage for fans to download to their personal computers for $3.95 each. Red Sox fan, Allan Wood, took advantage of the digital offerings and purchased nearly $300 worth of digital video game footage. The video was downloadable to the(…)

Simply Audiobooks to Go DRM Free

It seems like every day we get more and more announcements of companies selling digital content without software locks on it. Last week, eMusic announced its intention of selling its audiobooks without DRM and now Simply Audiobooks, the second largest online retailer of digital audiobooks (behind Audible) will be offering DRM free audiobooks with the(…)

Amazon.Com Music Store Now Open, Selling DRM Free Music

Amazon’s new music store is now open and offering over 2 million songs from artists like KT Tunstell, 50 Cent, and the Rolling Stones. Every song and album is in the MP3 format, the most universal format for digital music, and can be played on nearly every device on the market from the iPod to(…)

eMusic Offers DRM Free Audiobooks

eMusic is the world’s largest retailer of indie music and the second largest digital music provider after iTunes. Starting today, September 18, eMusic will offer audiobooks in an mp3 format without DRM. The collection will include Blackstone Audio, Hachette, Naxos Audiobooks, Penguin and Random House. The costs are $9.99 for one book or $19.99 for(…)

Universal Strips Down and Offers DRM Free Music

Universal, the largest music company in the recording industry, is testing the DRM free waters with a portion of its catalog. From August 21 to January 31 of 2008, UMG will offer mostly its popular content DRM free. The format will be MP3 which can be played on nearly any music device including the iPod(…)

Amazon.com Announces DRM Free Music Store to Launch This Year

Amazon.com announced that later this year it will open a music store that will sell DRM-free music from more than 12,000 music labels. (I didn’t know that there were 12,000 music labels). Every song and album in the Amazon catalog will be in MP3 format and DRM free meaning that you will be able to(…)

With Rumors of Amazon Selling DRM Free Music, Will Books Be Far Behind?

With Rumors of Amazon Selling DRM Free Music, Will Books Be Far Behind?

I received an email this week from a reader who wanted to buy an ebook reader. She wasn’t very familiar with ebooks other than the epublished ones and didn’t know at all about DRM (digital rights management). She wasn’t aware that when you bought a Sony Reader, the books you bought for the Sony Reader(…)

EMI Is Playing Strip and Go Naked

In an interesting move which may have further industry implications, EMI is offering its entire digital music catalog available without restrictions (DRM). These DRM free songs will be at twice the sound quality as existing downloads for a little higher of a price. EMI tested out DRM free music with the sales of Norah Jones’(…)

Borders May Have Represented 2-3% of Amazon Sales

Borders May Have Represented 2-3% of Amazon Sales

Borders severing times with Amazon is getting alot of play in the business world. One analyst from Citigroup believes that Borders accounts for 2-3% of Amazon sales. I have real questions about the profitability of the digital download centers. Borders currently buys direct from the publisher at a 40% discount as do most bookstores. It’s(…)