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Comment by wrxd | Hacker News Reader

This was unexpected. They lost me as a customer when they stopped allowing me to download books I bought and I'm in the Kobo (+ BookLore) side now and I am not coming back.

I wonder how many books are actually DRM-free and are going to be affected by this change. I suspect relatively few, but I would be happy to be wrong

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For me it appears highly genre-correlated. High percentage of science fiction books come with a small statement "this book is drm free on request of publisher / author". Zero of my photography, music, computer science or graphic novels came with such a tag.

Yeah, Tor Books publishes without DRM, and they seem to be one of the bigger SFF publishers these days. John Scalzi, George R.R. Martin (though not the ASoIaF books), Robert Jordan, Annalee Newitz, Charlie Jane Anders, and a bunch of other SFF authors I recognize. I'm sure there are others, but all the once I've noticed have been from Tor.

Indeed, and I love Tor for this. Brandon Sanderson has also come out against DRM. I already loved the man's books, now I love the man too

same here.

I've also purchased some books that are available as serials on the web for free.

I would imagine those publishers would be aligned with making them .epub

I bought a Kobo for the same reason but when it came to buying books, none of the books I wanted to buy were on Kobo's store.

If you want to be part of Kindle Unlimited you have to give worldwide exclusivity to Kindle Unlimited, and can't have ever published your eBook on another platform.

Even if I wanted to join, Kindle Unlimited is not offered here. I can't even buy the eBook from Amazon.

It's not just that. E.g. Cooper and Hutchinson's edition of Plato's complete works, available on Kindle for $31.[1] Or on another tack, Yudkowski's recent If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies.[2] Neither book is on Unlimited, and I couldn't find either one on Kobo. I struck out half a dozen times in a row and finally gave up.

[1] https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00OZ4NMHU

[2] https://www.amazon.com/Anyone-Builds-Everyone-Dies-Superhuma...

While it's true I don't see that version of Plato's complete works (in fact, I don't see any Hackett Publishing books), the book on AI[1] is available.

[1]: https://www.kobo.com/ww/en/ebook/if-anyone-builds-it-everyon...

Oh weird, I'd just searched for it. I tried again with the US site and it came right up. Maybe their search isn't as good with typos or something.

My daughter wanted a book that was kindle exclusive in the US, and I found I could purchase an epub from another store by paying in euros and claiming to live in Europe. Needless to say I did this without a VPN and without leaving San Francisco. The book was still in English.

But I wonder if the reason for that little hoop was because of Kindle Unlimited.

But Kobo is bad too. Try refunding a book. Their website sent me in neverending circles and still I could not find a way to refund. Their stuff requires some specific reader or so. I don't quite remember the details, but I bought a book, thinking to avoid Amazon shit. Then I realized that their stuff sucks and I don't want to buy their blessed device or install special reader software. Also not DRM-free. So I wanted to refund, but couldn't. It is a very bad user experience. The only good experience you get from them is, if you go all in on their software/devices.

Since I couldn't refund, I had to pirate the book as epub/pdf from elsewhere. I decided to never again buy anything from Kobo.

It's not super easy to refund digital goods in general with few exceptions like Steam. I have done it with Kobo but IIRC you have to chat with a CS rep or least you did when I did it.

No where legit is DRM free for eBooks from the big publishers. You don't even have to use the Kobo app since they let you download the ACSM file and use it Adobe Digital Editions which could be used on a computer or ADE supported eReader like Pocketbook (or Kobo!). This has been the case since before they were even called Kobo! And if the publisher offers the book DRM free they just give you a DRM-free ePub instead of the ACSM file.

These days, with the Calibre DeACSM and DeDRM plug-ins you don't even need ADE. It's also trivially easy to remove the DRM from the Kobo desktop app or their readers. It's way easier than Amazon and a way better experience with multiple routes to a DRM free file.

This ACSM file fiddling was too much of a hassle. I used to DeDRM ebooks from Amazon (also using Calibre), but I didn't know about DeACSM. I just want an epub or pdf file. I don't want their reinventing the wheel to somehow gatekeep content bs file formats. This is a clear sign for me, that they do not have my best interest at heart.

Their website didn't guide me towards a callable phone number or give me an actual e-mail address I could write to. Instead I went back and forth between chatbot and docs and webpages, without success. It is obvious to me, that they want as little actual human in the loop as possible. Real shitty experience, while my money is already gone and I am trying to get it back. Easier to give up and just download an acceptable version elsewhere. Not going through all that hassle to use their platform, which doesn't value me as a customer anyway.

Using the Kobo desktop app is almost identical to Kindle with regards to DeDRM. You open app, you download book in app, you open Calibre, then here is where it changes, you click the Obok plugin on the Calibre toolbar, find book and import and get an ePub and you don't even have to convert it!

ACSM is Adobe's crap and the same thing you'd have use for Google Play Books and a few others. It's again another slight step change where you have to open the ACSM with ADE to get the book in the first place. WTF Adobe did it that way, IDK but they did.

Bad take. Kobo lets you know which books have DRM and which don't. And even with DRM, you can get them into Adobe Digital Editions and load them on to basically any e-reader. (Maybe not Kindle since it won't open DRM'd ePubs.)

I buy like 60% of my ebooks from Kobo and have never owned a Kobo-brand ereader.

In the end that's also shitty. I don't want to "get them into Adobe Digital Editions". I don't want to have to use Adobe shitware, and I don't want their special formats. Just give me the epub or pdf. Also their website treated me like shit and they have no good way to contact anyone visible on their website.

Kobo is not it. Maybe they once were, at some point before I tried using them. I am not gonna support them after my experience with them.

As I explained above, you can get the ePubs directly if you just used the free Kobo desktop app. I think you need to ask yourself why you were OK using the Amazon Kindle app for DeDRM but Kobo or Adobe's was a huge burden. Really Bizzare IMO.

Do you know the concept of time passing? Could it be possible, that my stance regarding ebooks changed over time, and that I have become more aware of the associated issues? Hmmmm.

What is bizarre here is you posting these comments, trying to invalidate my all around terrible experience with Kobo. Your account is green behind the ears and all your comments are on Kobo, Kobo, Kobo. Go figure.

I like eBooks, I've had eReaders from Sony, Kobo, Amazon and Boox, bought from Amazon, Kobo, Google Play, and several of the smaller players like Baen. Outside of the completely DRM-free places like Baen which are very limited in selection, Kobo is IMO the easiest to get a DRM-free file in the end. Your posts were IMO very off the mark that it got me to comment. I'd rather people try Kobo than keep feeding the Amazon machine.

If you don't like DRM, you definitely want to use Adobe Digital Editions. I'll leave it to you to find out why.

Why? It's still DRM. Pretty awful one IMO. Our local library used it.

Personally I just buy my books DRM free now. If that's not possible, then I get them from my friend Anna who has a nice library.

I said, "I'll leave it to you to find out why". This is a public forum. Just maybe look up some Calibre plug-ins which might help you "manage" DRM books.

I've used it and I found it the worst form of DRM. It required creating an "account" with Adobe despite having no relationship with them (It was to access books at my local library where I already had an account) and the software didn't even work on linux. Even getting it to work at all took ages of tinkering and I'm an IT expert. My parents who just wanted to simply check out a book out of the digital library during the pandemic would never have managed to figure that out.

And yes I have liberated all my DRM books from Amazon. But Adobe Digital I will never touch again (Nor buy books with DRM on it in the first place).

It's actually simple:

1. Install ADE on Windows (or a Windows VM (recommended))

2. Log in with Adobe account

3. Download ASCM files from Kobo or Google Play Books and open with ADE

4. the optional step I've been trying to hint at for like 3 posts now

5. Put it on your reader!

Really that is WAY too complicated for my folks. And for me I don't want accounts with big tech companies to do something local so step 2 was already a blocking point.

And as for removing the DRM (I assume that's what you're hinting at), yeah but that can be done with kindle's and kobo's too and in less roundabout ways. The existence of a hack for Adobe DRM doesn't make that a 'good' DRM.

OK, how do "your folks" break Kindle's DRM?

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