<i>Lastly, it’s important to point out that the Kindle does not support the popular, open and free ePub format, which means the Kindle will be unable to borrow from libraries that lend ePub titles.</i><p>This is disingenuous, and getting a little tiring honestly now. The Amazon Kindle can read ebooks in the .mobi format fine, which is based on the Open eBook standard [1] just as the EPUB format. (EPUBs may be technically superior to MOBIs, but that's a different issue altogether)<p>EPUBs can be converted to the MOBI format fairly easily. Inconvenient? Yes. Evil, locked in system? No.<p>[1] <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_eBook" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_eBook</a>
This is a silly conversation.<p>In either case it's a license. The difference is what the license is bound to.<p>Amazon kindle ebooks are bound to my Amazon account (I can read same book on my Android or Amazon Kindle device as long as I sign in with same account).<p>With a physical book, the material is literally bound to the pages of the book.<p>In neither case do I <i>own</i> the copyright. It's the same as owning a film on DVD or VHS.<p>You cannot make copies of the content of the book to sell it, you cannot take large excerpts of the book and sell those either. In short, you do <i>not</i> have full intellectual property rights to the book.<p>You have licensed a single copy for the purpose of <i>reading</i> the book.
O'Reilly sells their ebooks without DRM. I haven't read their licensing terms, but I suspect them to be very liberal. Their page says they trust you to do the right thing.
In the US you have the right to format shift [other] media for personal under the so-called "fair use" exceptions (7 USC 107, <a href="http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#107" rel="nofollow">http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap1.html#107</a>), don't you?<p>This creates an absurdity.<p>You can purchase the book and scan it, create your own EPUB and own that copy (but only use one copy at a time!) or you can purchase the EPUB (or whatever format) and have a much more limited license.<p>Of course scanning a book is hard work. You'll want to outsource that. So you buy a book of the shelf, the company scan it for you - your book, your format shift, hired help - and forward your copy of the book (now in EPUB format) and kindly dispose of the book for you.<p>You're now using paper as a digital transmission medium, wasting a whole lot of energy, producing a lot of waste and the result to the customer is the same as if the publisher just sold you the book in EPUB format at the regular books store price¹.<p>Of course I'm sure common sense will win out in the courts ...<p>--<p>1 - I'm assuming a book shop could scan the books and cover their costs in the usual retail margin by not needing a high street location and by selling the books on for pulping.<p>Aside I - In the UK there is no "fair use" but instead a far more restrictive idea of "fair dealing", see www.ipo.gov.uk/ipreview-doc-j.pdf for a recent comparison.<p>Aside II - Australia (<a href="http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ca1968133/s110aa.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/legis/cth/consol_act/ca1968133/...</a>) have a similar format shifting provision but it specifically applies to "videotape embodying a cinematograph film in analog form" which is messed up in more ways than one.
Since we do not own eBooks from Amazon, Apple and the like, maybe a Netflix-like service for eBooks needs to be created. I read 6-10 books a month, and if I could pay $10/month to read them like I do with movies at Netflix, it would be nice. Instead, Amazon and the like charge users to license each copy at $10/each and up, usually, which is such a ripoff. Amazon can sell virtual goods to us, but we can't resell them after we finish using them? Such a ripoff. At the most, Amazon should charge a small rental fee for their eBooks.
What happens to all those licenses when you die? Are they eternal licenses, lifelong licenses or what?<p>Granted, most of my books will probably just bore my kids by the time I die, but still, it bothers me a little that I might not even be able to pass on my library.
Even if you buy a book, you're still only getting a license to the one copy of the book as manifested in the stack of bound pages that you hold. You don't have rights to make and give/sell copies of your own.