eBooks — with DRM from Amazon and without from Baen
published
eBooks, a subject a little more techy then I usually post here, but I think there is sufficient SF to justify a mention on The Core Worlds, and I have annoying hoops to jump through to post on my other blog due to personal life issues getting in the way of having my staging server connected to the Internet.
Amazon have just released their new eBook reader, and it isn’t as good as one might hope.
It costs a (relative) fortune and is heavily laden down with DRM, an issue which Mark covers in some detail (including some nice references to a couple of works of SF – see, I said it would be on topic for this blog).
I’ve been reading eBooks, on and off, for several years. Previously on my trusty old Palm OS machines, and more recently on a Nokia 770. My main source of material has been the Baen Free Library, which has a hefty collection of sci-fi and fantasy.
Giving away books doesn’t sound like a way to make much money, but having read a couple of eBooks, I promptly went out and bought as much of the two series they were from in paperback as I could. Another one I ordered for a friend one Christmas.
They might not have made money directly, but they made plenty indirectly, and they didn’t need DRM to do it.
If you want an eBook reader, then I encourage you to get yourself a Nokie 770, which can be found for under £100 these days, (or one of its successors) and pull some content down from Bean. 1632 makes a good starting point.
If you aren’t interested in eBooks, then you might want to get hold of a paperback copy of 1632 – it is a very good book.