David H. Rothman writes “Costly digital rights management does not merely jack up prices for book publishers, distributors and readers. DRM also threatens diversity of content, and libraries and their patrons could be among the losers.
Pamela Turner, head of the Content Reserve distribution unit of OverDrive, appears to blame DRM costs at least in part for OverDrive’s new charge on publishers, which will result in storage fees of $300 a year for one-book publishers. Ms. Turner’s solution? Take your book elsewhere. But with OverDrive dominating so much of the e-book business, that is a blow to the small guy. As I see it, ALA and consumer groups should ask tough questions of Microsoft, Adobe and other DRM perps and demand a federal anti-trust investigation to help keep DRM costs in line. Making all the price details pubic–and perhaps lowering the costs!–would be a good solution for DRM providers if they want to avoid federal action.
Ms. Turner’s statement circulated on the eBook Community List also makes an unwitting argument for a Universal Consumer Format. She alludes to the burden of OverDrive supporting four formats. One hopes that OverDrive president and CEO Steve Potash, president of the Open eBook Forum, will soon release at least a tentative schedule for OeBF’s development of a UCF. More at TeleRead.”
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