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diff --git a/talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/en/ebooks-must-increase-freedom.html b/talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/en/ebooks-must-increase-freedom.html new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6abe5a9 --- /dev/null +++ b/talermerchantdemos/blog/articles/en/ebooks-must-increase-freedom.html @@ -0,0 +1,192 @@ +<!--#include virtual="/server/header.html" --> +<!-- Parent-Version: 1.84 --> +<title>E-books must increase our freedom, not decrease it +- GNU Project - Free Software Foundation</title> +<!--#include virtual="/philosophy/po/ebooks-must-increase-freedom.translist" --> +<!--#include virtual="/server/banner.html" --> +<h2>E-books must increase our freedom, not decrease it</h2> +<p>by <a href="http://www.stallman.org/"><strong>Richard +Stallman</strong></a></p> + + +<p><em>This essay was originally published by <cite>The Guardian</cite>, on 17 April 2012, +as “<a +href="//www.theguardian.com/technology/2012/apr/17/sharing-ebooks-richard-stallman">Technology +Should Help Us Share, Not Constrain Us</a>”, with some surprise editing. This +version incorporates parts of that editing while restoring parts of the original +text.</em></p> + +<div class="announcement"> +<p>Also consider reading <a href="/philosophy/ebooks.html"> +E-Books: Freedom Or Copyright</a>.</p> +</div> +<hr /> + +<p>I love The Jehovah Contract, and I'd like everyone else to love it +too. I have lent it out at least six times over the years. Printed +books let us do that.</p> + +<p>I couldn't do that with most commercial e-books. It's “not allowed”. +And if I tried to disobey, the software in e-readers has malicious +features called Digital Restrictions Management (DRM, for short) to restrict reading, +so it simply won't work. The e-books are encrypted so that only +proprietary software with malicious functionality can display them.</p> + +<p>Many other habits that we readers are accustomed to are “not +allowed” for e-books. With the Amazon “Kindle” (for which <a href="/philosophy/why-call-it-the-swindle.html">“Swindle”</a> +is a more fitting name), to take one example, +users can't buy a book anonymously with cash. “Kindle” books are +typically available from Amazon only, and Amazon makes users identify +themselves. Thus, Amazon knows exactly which books each user has +read. In a country such as the UK, where you can be <a +href="http://www.stallman.org/archives/2012-mar-jun.html#07_April_2012_%28Wrong_book%29">prosecuted for +possessing a forbidden book</a>, this is more than hypothetically +Orwellian.</p> + +<p>Furthermore, you can't sell the e-book after you read it (if Amazon has its way, +the used book stores where I have passed many an afternoon will be +history). You can't give it to a friend either, because according to +Amazon you never really owned it. Amazon requires users to sign an +End-User License Agreement (“EULA”) which says so.</p> + +<p>You can't even be sure it will still be in your machine tomorrow. +People reading 1984 in the “Kindle” had an Orwellian experience: their +e-books vanished right before their eyes, as Amazon used a malicious +software feature called a “back door” to remotely delete them +(virtual book-burning; is that what “Kindle” means?). But don't worry; +Amazon promised never to do this again, except by order of the state.</p> + +<p>With software, either the users control the program (making such software <a +href="/philosophy/free-sw.html">Libre or Free</a>) +or the program controls its users (non-Libre). Amazon's e-book +policies imitate the distribution policies of non-Libre software, but +that's not the only relationship between the two. The +<a href="/proprietary/proprietary.html">malicious +software features</a> described above are imposed on users via software +that's not Libre. If a Libre program had malicious features like +those, some users skilled at programming would remove them, then +provide the corrected version to all the other users. Users can't +change non-Libre software, which makes it <a +href="http://www.bostonreview.net/forum/protecting-internet-without-wrecking-it/root-problem-software-controlled-its-developer"> an ideal +instrument for exercising power over the public</a>.</p> + +<p>Any one of these encroachments on our freedom is reason aplenty to say +no. If these policies were limited to Amazon, we'd bypass them, but +the other e-book dealers' policies are roughly similar.</p> + +<p>What worries me most is the prospect of losing the option of printed +books. The Guardian has announced “digital-only reads”: in other +words, books available only at the price of freedom. I will not read +any book at that price. Five years from now, will unauthorized copies +be the only ethically acceptable copies for most books?</p> + +<p>It doesn't have to be that way. With anonymous payment on the +Internet, paying for downloads of non-DRM non-EULA e-books would +respect our freedom. Physical stores could sell such e-books for +cash, like digital music on CDs—still available even though the +music industry is aggressively pushing DRM-restrictive services such +as Spotify. Physical CD stores face the burden of an expensive +inventory, but physical e-book stores could write copies onto your USB +memory stick, the only inventory being memory sticks to sell if you +need.</p> + +<p>The reason publishers give for their restrictive e-books practices is to stop +people from sharing copies. They say this is for the sake of the +authors; but even if it did serve the authors' interests (which for +quite famous authors it may), it could not justify DRM, EULAs or the Digital +Economy Act which persecutes readers for sharing. +In practice, the copyright system does a bad job of supporting authors +aside from the most popular ones. Other authors' principal interest is to be better +known, so sharing their work benefits them as well as readers. Why not switch to a +system that does the job better and is compatible with sharing?</p> + +<p>A tax on memories and Internet connectivity, along the general lines +of what most EU countries do, could do the job well if three points +are got right. The money should be collected by the state and +distributed according to law, not given to a private collecting +society; it should be divided among all authors, and we mustn’t let +companies take any of it from them; and the distribution of money +should be based on a sliding scale, not in linear proportion to +popularity. I suggest using the cube root of each author's +popularity: if A is eight times as popular as B, A gets twice B's +amount (not eight times B's amount). This would support many fairly +popular writers adequately instead of making a few stars richer.</p> + +<p>Another system is to give each e-reader a button to send some small +sum (perhaps 25 pence in the UK) to the author.</p> + +<p>Sharing is good, and with digital technology, sharing is easy. (I +mean non-commercial redistribution of exact copies.) So sharing ought +to be legal, and preventing sharing is no excuse to make e-books into +handcuffs for readers. If e-books mean that readers' freedom must +either increase or decrease, we must demand the increase.</p> + +<blockquote class="announcement"><p> +<a href="http://defectivebydesign.org/ebooks.html">Join our mailing list +about the dangers of eBooks</a>. +</p></blockquote> + +</div><!-- for id="content", starts in the include above --> +<!--#include virtual="/server/footer.html" --> +<div id="footer"> +<div class="unprintable"> + +<p>Please send general FSF & GNU inquiries to +<a href="mailto:gnu@gnu.org"><gnu@gnu.org></a>. +There are also <a href="/contact/">other ways to contact</a> +the FSF. Broken links and other corrections or suggestions can be sent +to <a href="mailto:webmasters@gnu.org"><webmasters@gnu.org></a>.</p> + +<p><!-- TRANSLATORS: Ignore the original text in this paragraph, + replace it with the translation of these two: + + We work hard and do our best to provide accurate, good quality + translations. However, we are not exempt from imperfection. + Please send your comments and general suggestions in this regard + to <a href="mailto:web-translators@gnu.org"> + <web-translators@gnu.org></a>.</p> + + <p>For information on coordinating and submitting translations of + our web pages, see <a + href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations + README</a>. --> +Please see the <a +href="/server/standards/README.translations.html">Translations +README</a> for information on coordinating and submitting translations +of this article.</p> +</div> + +<!-- Regarding copyright, in general, standalone pages (as opposed to + files generated as part of manuals) on the GNU web server should + be under CC BY-ND 4.0. Please do NOT change or remove this + without talking with the webmasters or licensing team first. + Please make sure the copyright date is consistent with the + document. For web pages, it is ok to list just the latest year the + document was modified, or published. + + If you wish to list earlier years, that is ok too. + Either "2001, 2002, 2003" or "2001-2003" are ok for specifying + years, as long as each year in the range is in fact a copyrightable + year, i.e., a year in which the document was published (including + being publicly visible on the web or in a revision control system). + + There is more detail about copyright years in the GNU Maintainers + Information document, www.gnu.org/prep/maintain. --> + +<p>Copyright © 2012, 2015, 2016, 2017 Richard Stallman</p> + +<p>This page is licensed under a <a rel="license" +href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">Creative +Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License</a>.</p> + +<!--#include virtual="/server/bottom-notes.html" --> + +<p class="unprintable">Updated: +<!-- timestamp start --> +$Date: 2017/09/25 09:55:45 $ +<!-- timestamp end --> +</p> +</div> +</div> +</body> +</html> |