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General discussionIs there a place to buy drm-free ebooks?(84 posts)(84 posts)
(84 posts)
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Posted July 26, 2021
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Magnitus: I mostly go with pdf because its supported by defaults on most platform (on Android for example, supporting a non-default format involves going through their app store and I personally find that to be a bit of a jungle... I find that too many of these apps are shady).

But yes, from what I heard about pdf (I was fortunate enough never to have to really work with the format so far), I don't have a hard time believing that epub is the better designed format of the two.
Personally I don't like PDF, which often has scaling issues, especially with an E-Ink reader, not so much with a tablet or phone, but they can display badly there too without the appropriate app, and some require a 10" tablet to display well at all.

If you are gonna have to use an app, might as well get one that supports EPUB as well as PDF.

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Magnitus: That's an interesting option.

I personally never went with that for 2 reasons:
- Experimenting with removing the drm on drmed format would have required that I purchase at least one drmed copy
- While I don't have illusions that it will make a difference (I'm going against the grain of most people's sensibilities here), I have such a high degree of animosity toward the practice of selling things as single-purchase goods and locking them that I don't want to give them a cent of my money to support that endeavour. If I could do so legally, I would actually pay significant money to make them lose money when a distributor adopt that practice
Well, there is another way to view that.
Any author who sells a DRM copy of their book, is not worth reading.
If you can forgive them that, by paying them for a physical copy you are essentially giving silent support for DRM.

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Magnitus: That's totally insane. It actually costs them more money to distribute a physical book than a ebook.
Indeed, there a lot more costs and risks with physical books, so an ebook version should be much cheaper.

P.S. And once you remove the DRM from an epub, it is easy to convert or even edit. Calibre has its own built-in editor or you can use the very similar free Sigil. I find some ebooks need correcting, even bought ones.
Post edited July 26, 2021 by Timboli
Posted July 26, 2021
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rtcvb32: But why would you want to do that? I mean other than say the Amazon kindle event where they retroactively deleted everyone's copy of Animal Farm and 1984 off their kindles....
Did they do that?:O oh isn't that against some laws?
Shows what kind of system they want to build if they think 1984 needs to be removed.
Posted July 26, 2021
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rtcvb32: But why would you want to do that? I mean other than say the Amazon kindle event where they retroactively deleted everyone's copy of Animal Farm and 1984 off their kindles....
Is that a confirmed fact? Did it happen to you?
And if so, what was the reason given?
Were customers reimbursed? Not that that is a good enough reason on its own.

I can think of a few scenarios where removal is legitimate. i.e. copyright transgression of some sort by the provider, for one.

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@OP - Of course another alternative is to just borrow an ebook from a library, not purchasing the ebook at all. That way of course, you can get to read many DRM ebooks without paying a cent ... except for the cost of your device.
Post edited July 26, 2021 by Timboli
Posted July 26, 2021
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rtcvb32: But why would you want to do that? I mean other than say the Amazon kindle event where they retroactively deleted everyone's copy of Animal Farm and 1984 off their kindles....
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Timboli: Is that a confirmed fact? Did it happen to you?
And if so, what was the reason given?
Were customers reimbursed? Not that that is a good enough reason on its own.

I can think of a few scenarios where removal is legitimate. i.e. copyright transgression of some sort by the provider, for one.

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@OP - Of course another alternative is to just borrow an ebook from a library, not purchasing the ebook at all. That way of course, you can get to read many DRM ebooks without paying a cent ... except for the cost of your device.
Oh it happened, i remember it making major news and backlash. Another thing about wanting to use free/open software so you know what you're software is doing, and if you can trust it.

https://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18amazon.html
Posted July 26, 2021
Faded Page is a Canadian website with over 6000 ebooks that can be downloaded for free. They add new ebooks almost every day, and they are available in multiple formats including epub, mobi, and html. These are mainly older books that are public domain under Canadian copyright law.
Posted July 27, 2021
It seems the site Gumroad also offers DRM free ebooks, but not all there are entirely DRM free. Some ebooks there come with a custom watermark in the first page that shows the email of who purchased it (Gumroad insists on their FAQ that it isn't DRM, but it is). I'm just not sure how to know which ebooks have this watermark and which don't.
Posted July 27, 2021
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mikebert: Faded Page is a Canadian website with over 6000 ebooks that can be downloaded for free. They add new ebooks almost every day, and they are available in multiple formats including epub, mobi, and html. These are mainly older books that are public domain under Canadian copyright law.
Faded Page, if I recall correctly is the Canadian version (sort of a mirror) of the Gutenberg Project, and it mostly deals with books in the public domain, so in most cases very old books.
Posted July 27, 2021
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SnowSlinger: So far I've been buying books for my ereader on google play, but it requires adobe drm to move them to the ereader or read them on pc. So is there a place to get legit ebooks (and not only underground or old reads) drm-free? I am talking the lord of the rings and other well known books. If not, i might just go back to paper, as then I will truly own them...
Here's a compilation of DRM-free ebook sources:
https://www.defectivebydesign.org/guide/ebooks
Posted July 27, 2021
Someone mentioned Smashwords, I have to second that one. I actually publish a few books there too. The problem they have is that they do not have EVERY book, you have less "big titles" compared to Amazon (which DOES provide a drm-free option for author, but almost no one uses it), but it does have more "indie" or less known titles. Overall, I think Smashwords is your best option. Some books are even published as a "pay what you want" model or even free.
Posted July 28, 2021
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Lifthrasil: Here's a compilation of DRM-free ebook sources:
https://www.defectivebydesign.org/guide/ebooks
Awesome. This should be in the OP now.
Posted July 28, 2021
Just curious to know why some people prefer to use ebooks instead of physical books? What are your reasons? It is interesting to know why. :)
Posted July 28, 2021
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BookCrazy: Just curious to know why some people prefer to use ebooks instead of physical books? What are your reasons? It is interesting to know why. :)
For a long time I was in the same mind-set of get all my books physical, y'alls! as well.
Now I enjoy both, depending on the availability and reading circumstances.

Advantages thereof were pretty obvious:
AVAILABILITY
- you can read them always, no need for electricity, apart from light to see, you can read in a power outage and under any circumstance, i.e. somewhere outside, indefinitely
- you can find almost anything as book, ebooks are not readily available for anything, especially older content
- you can buy them used, getting a large collection without spending a fortune
CHARACTER
- the smell and feeling of the pages, when bought used often there were scribbled notes and dedications in the front, telling a books history

However, when I hit a time in my life, were I needed to go to school/work by train on a daily basis, which required several hours(and this back and forth), I decided to start reading books on my smartphone as well.
I already had experience using Calibre Library on PC, to read some of those I've gotten from Humble Bundle earlier.

On my Android phone I use the app PocketBook Reader.
Pros here are:
- they are LIGHTWEIGHT - have a dozen books with me, anytime, and can switch on the fly
- the screen is always illuminated, you do not require an additional lightsource
- you can change the font, text size, colors, spacing and zoom to fit it to you're best readability pretty easily
- most apps support a dictionary or translate function, I have an offline dictioniary installed as well, to check unknown terms while reading
- the app tracks your progress automatically and you can add additional bookmarks and notes if so desired

STORES
I only buy ebooks DRM free.
For ebooks I use mostly the German store Thalia - they are mostly pretty upfront about what kind of DRM they use. Most ebooks I own are personalized, meaning you're user and mail is hidden encoded in the file, so it could be traced back to you, if you upload it elsewhere. Apart from that, no limitations or verification systems.
Many ebooks I got from Humble Bundle bundles.
I also started reading Warhammer - the Warhammer store also uses no DRM for his files.

Links:
https://calibre-ebook.com/ Calibre E-Book Software for PC
humblebundle.com Humble Bundle
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.obreey.reader PocketBook Reader on Google Playstore
https://www.thalia.de/ Thalia - Ebook store(German)
https://www.blacklibrary.com/the-horus-heresy Official Warhammer Bookstore, The Black Library
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Edited 2 minutes later: Fixed typos, changed formatting, added link for PocketBooker reader app.
Edited 10 minutes later: Found another typo. Wahwahwahwahwah.
Post edited July 28, 2021 by Midoryu
Posted July 28, 2021
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Midoryu: *Well explained reasons, pros, and cons for many circumstances
That gave me some more insight on the matter, Thank you! :) I can definitely see using book types for different situations and reasons, especially for a job or going into college!!!
Post edited July 28, 2021 by BookCrazy
Posted July 28, 2021
For comics specifically, Comixology even offers drm free backups as cbz or pdf of a lot of the independent publishers stuff.
Posted July 28, 2021
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BookCrazy: Just curious to know why some people prefer to use ebooks instead of physical books? What are your reasons? It is interesting to know why. :)
I usually like digital more because digital files don't "rot" as fast as paper, and paper rotting is specially bad where I live (too humid). Besides that, if I want to make a back up of digital contents, I can do so with no data loss or near none, just needing to compare checksums to make sure the copy was good. Meanwhile, a "backup" of a physical book is bound to have quality loss when scanning.

But for reading itself, either work fine for me.

But reading physical books will always have a big advantage over ebooks (image attached)
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Community
General discussionIs there a place to buy drm-free ebooks?(84 posts)(84 posts)
(84 posts)