Why DRM Isn’t Good for Authors

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Why DRM Isn’t Good for Authors

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When I started researching this post I was pretty much okay with DRM, at least from a consumer point of view. Except for an annoying incident a few years ago involving a song I had purchased from the Zune Marketplace—I know, I know—DRM has pretty much been invisible and painless for me. I just never really thought about it.

The Reality of DRM

Here’s the thing though. As an author, I want my work to be available to the widest possible audience. On the other hand I don’t want it to be stolen. And this is the fundamental principle that drove the creation of Digital Rights Management or DRM. But guess what, that principle doesn’t hold water because DRM is so easy to crack, all it succeeds in doing is inconveniencing honest consumers.

As I explained, the problem with DRM is that it does absolutely nothing to stop piracy—the very thing it was created for. People can happily search for DRM-cracking software all over the Internet. They can run their eBooks through these programs and end up with nice, DRM-free files that can be shared everywhere and with anyone. The music industry learned this painful lesson quite a long time ago but big publishing is still getting its head around it.

Hurting Honest People

What DRM does though is prevent honest people from taking the content they’ve purchased legally and doing things like, oh I don’t know, making backup copies for protection and converting it for other devices they own. Here’s an example.

Let’s say I purchased an eBook in the Kindle Store and I decide I want to read it on a different device. Now I could download the free Amazon Kindle app for the device. But what if I just bought the Kablooey 3000 and Amazon hasn’t written an app for that? I search and discover that the book is available in the Kablooey Store. But in order to download it to my device, I must repurchase the book.

Okay, that’s a little farfetched. Let’s say I would like to share the eBook I purchased in the Kindle store with a friend. If sharing has been enabled I can absolutely do that—once. What if I also want to share it with my wife, my children, the dog and that weird guy who’s been living in my kid’s tree house for the past six months? I cannot.

Hurting Authors

And this, for authors, is the fundamental problem with DRM. Consumers can purchase hardcover books and lend them to anyone they want as many times as they want. Not so with DRM-enabled eBooks. This is bad from a marketing perspective because what is it I wanted? All together now—to make my work available to the widest possible audience. And what is a great tactic for making that happen? Word of Mouth. And how do I get word of mouth? By granting a bunch of people I’ve never met access to my work so they can sing its praises.

There are two things I live by—right or wrong. First, most people are honest. Second, there will always be bad guys who want to steal my work. So why in the world would I encumber my work with something that doesn’t stop the bad guys from taking my work but does inconvenience the majority of consumers who happen to be honest? Well, I wouldn’t.

Tor Figures It Out

Take a look at the article “Tor Listens To Authors And Readers And Ditches DRM.” This quote in particular makes a lot of sense to me:

Our authors and readers have been asking for this for a long time. They’re a technically sophisticated bunch, and DRM is a constant annoyance to them. It prevents them from using legitimately-purchased e-books in perfectly legal ways, like moving them from one kind of e-reader to another.

So now, like Cory Doctorow, I believe that DRM needs to go. There, I said it. Take a look at what he said in the article “Why the death of DRM would be good news for readers, writers and publishers.”

Now that Tor has dropped DRM – and acquired a valuable halo of virtue among committed ebook readers, who’ll celebrate their bravery – it’s inevitable that the competition will follow. It seems we have reached the beginning of the end of the ebook format wars, which is good news for readers, writers and publishers.

I couldn’t have put it better. DRM is not only flawed but it hurts authors. Do you agree or disagree? Let me know.

If you are interested in this topic and want to learn more, check out these other articles.

Additional Sources

The Pros and Cons of DRM in E-Books

Pros and Cons of DRM

Another Reason Why DRM Is Bad — For Publishers

Hachette Tells Authors And Tor To Use DRM Because It Is Awesome Or Something

Hachette Draws Author’s Ire on DRM Mentality

What Amazon’s ebook strategy means

Why e-book DRM will die, and why this will make no difference to Amazon and Apple