Sales Increased 54% Going DRM Free

[ownedbycats]

When I was a kid, I had the horrible experience of having an the tape of an audio cassette literally snap in half while being played. It was a pain trying to get all the tape out from the innards of the player.

[Apache]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

They were before my time, but 8-tracks use magnetic tape, which do degrade and lose magnetization after a while, especially if they weren't stored right. I think that 8-tracks also had a reputation for being notoriously unreliable. But between those, I wouldn't be surprised if they had failed over the years.

Originally Posted by JSWolf

My Dad did have an 8-track tape player in the car and I had an 8-track tape player. I never once had a problem with any of the tapes. But I don't know how good they would be now if I still had them.

Originally Posted by j.p.s

I had friends with 8-tracks. Track changing in the middle of songs was really annoying.

Jon, you may have been the only person in the world who did not have problems with 8 Tracks. They were notorious for the following problems: 1) Tape Drag 2) Tape Player Eating tape 3) hearing parts of two songs at the same time and 4) The splice coming apart. Tape drag was caused by the tape getting too tight and slowing down. You could open the case and pull the tape out and rewind it. Sometimes it worked and sometimes you were out of luck. If the head got dirty, it could grab the tape and pull out the tape. Sometimes you could repair also, but sometimes it would stretch or break the tape. If the tape head or tape was out of alignment you would here parts of two songs. And a couple of times I had the splice come apart. 8 Tracks were popular, in spite of the inherent problems, because cassette tapes were very thin, and the sound quality was really terrible. Once the quality of cassettes improved eight track died a lonely and sad death.
Apache

[Apache]

Now I feel really old.
Apache

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Apache

Jon, you may have been the only person in the world who did not have problems with 8 Tracks. They were notorious for the following problems: 1) Tape Drag 2) Tape Player Eating tape 3) hearing parts of two songs at the same time and 4) The splice coming apart. Tape drag was caused by the tape getting too tight and slowing down. You could open the case and pull the tape out and rewind it. Sometimes it worked and sometimes you were out of luck. If the head got dirty, it could grab the tape and pull out the tape. Sometimes you could repair also, but sometimes it would stretch or break the tape. If the tape head or tape was out of alignment you would here parts of two songs. And a couple of times I had the splice come apart. 8 Tracks were popular, in spite of the inherent problems, because cassette tapes were very thin, and the sound quality was really terrible. Once the quality of cassettes improved eight track died a lonely and sad death.
Apache

Just lucky I guess.

[Aleron Ives]

Originally Posted by rcentros

They also explain how to use ADE in Wine for Linux users. And though I've never been able to get ADE working in Wine, it's still shows a more independent mindset than most booksellers have.

I can confirm that it's possible to use ADE on Linux, but it's definitely not as easy to set up as it is on Windows. It works well enough to get e-books from CloudLibrary to my e-reader, though.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by Apache

Jon, you may have been the only person in the world who did not have problems with 8 Tracks. They were notorious for the following problems: 1) Tape Drag 2) Tape Player Eating tape 3) hearing parts of two songs at the same time and 4) The splice coming apart. Tape drag was caused by the tape getting too tight and slowing down. You could open the case and pull the tape out and rewind it. Sometimes it worked and sometimes you were out of luck. If the head got dirty, it could grab the tape and pull out the tape. Sometimes you could repair also, but sometimes it would stretch or break the tape. If the tape head or tape was out of alignment you would here parts of two songs. And a couple of times I had the splice come apart. 8 Tracks were popular, in spite of the inherent problems, because cassette tapes were very thin, and the sound quality was really terrible. Once the quality of cassettes improved eight track died a lonely and sad death.
Apache

Great summary.

Of course, once cassette tapes became popular, discarded cassettes with the tape hanging out became a common sight along the side of the road.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Aleron Ives

I can confirm that it's possible to use ADE on Linux, but it's definitely not as easy to set up as it is on Windows. It works well enough to get e-books from CloudLibrary to my e-reader, though.

I know people do successfully use ADE in Wine but I've just never been able to get it to work. It might have something to do with my stable (but "trailing edge") Linux Mint installs. Since the deASCM Calibre plugin came out I don't really worry about it – but a quick look doesn't show it any longer in the Calibre plugin forum? (Something I'll have to look into.)

[Leseratte_10]

Originally Posted by rcentros

Since the deASCM Calibre plugin came out I don't really worry about it – but a quick look doesn't show it any longer in the Calibre plugin forum? (Something I'll have to look into.)

It's still where it ever was, but there was a ton of other posts in other plugin's threads in the last couple days (mainly by kiwidude who has updated a whole lot of plugins at once) so it got pushed to page 2 or 3 or so: [FileType Plugin] ACSM input plugin

(Also, sidenote, where does "ASCM" come from? I've seen multiple people call it that, while the file format (and the plugin's name) is and always was "ACSM" for "Adobe Content Server Message". Do I have a typo somewhere in the plugin or in my thread or do people just make that typo over and over again when mentioning the plugin?

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by Leseratte_10

(Also, sidenote, where does "ASCM" come from? I've seen multiple people call it that, while the file format (and the plugin's name) is and always was "ACSM" for "Adobe Content Server Message". Do I have a typo somewhere in the plugin or in my thread or do people just make that typo over and over again when mentioning the plugin?

I'd say it's a common typo.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Leseratte_10

It's still where it ever was, but there was a ton of other posts in other plugin's threads in the last couple days (mainly by kiwidude who has updated a whole lot of plugins at once) so it got pushed to page 2 or 3 or so: [FileType Plugin] ACSM input plugin

Thanks. I found the thread after I posted my message, but then I couldn't find my post to correct and assumed I forget to hit "Submit." I've done that in the past. For some reason I thought I was posting in the Kindle forum.

Originally Posted by Leseratte_10

(Also, sidenote, where does "ASCM" come from? I've seen multiple people call it that, while the file format (and the plugin's name) is and always was "ACSM" for "Adobe Content Server Message". Do I have a typo somewhere in the plugin or in my thread or do people just make that typo over and over again when mentioning the plugin?

I guess it's just a transposition of letters. Looks like I batted 0-2 on my post. Sorry. I'll try to keep it straight in the future.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by Apache

Jon, you may have been the only person in the world who did not have problems with 8 Tracks. They were notorious for the following problems: 1) Tape Drag 2) Tape Player Eating tape 3) hearing parts of two songs at the same time and 4) The splice coming apart. Tape drag was caused by the tape getting too tight and slowing down. You could open the case and pull the tape out and rewind it. Sometimes it worked and sometimes you were out of luck. If the head got dirty, it could grab the tape and pull out the tape. Sometimes you could repair also, but sometimes it would stretch or break the tape. If the tape head or tape was out of alignment you would here parts of two songs. And a couple of times I had the splice come apart. 8 Tracks were popular, in spite of the inherent problems, because cassette tapes were very thin, and the sound quality was really terrible. Once the quality of cassettes improved eight track died a lonely and sad death.
Apache

All true. But 8 track wasn't much higher quality if at all. Track width the same, but faster speed. Compact Cassettes invented/developed 1st in 1962 and only intended for voice originally. The 8 Track never got much support in Europe. It succeeded for a while in USA because one (or maybe two) car makers (autos) put them as standard. Being endless loop they inherently had bad wow and high tape wear. A two track head stepped up & down was used actuated by foil at the splice, so problem for putting an album in four parts rather than two. Inherently fast forward and especially rewind impossible. Home recorders did exist in "music-centers" but I only saw one once. Cassette quality exceeded 8-Track by late 1960s. The Lear Jet Stereo 8 was only released in 1964 and was hardly seen in Europe before 1969.
It was simply the big cartridge used for rented muzak systems cut down in size (those were about x4 bigger). RCA did have a 1/4" tape cassette in 1958 and later Sony revived the 1/4" faster tape as Elcaset, but it was too late and failed despite in theory 4x 1/8" cassette quality.

The 8 Track was really obsolete the day it was released and poor life for any music you bought. So slightly related to DRM, because if you played an album lots you had to buy it again. A Compact Cassette can last 100x more playings.

I've reel to reel tapes from 1960s and cassette tapes from early 1970s that still work.
The Lear Jet Audio 8 Track was the worst post-1960 audio format ever.

[Pajamaman]

If people are going to steal or loan books, DRM will not stop them. So why enforce such a restrictive system on purchasers? If I want to buy on one platform, and read on another, I should be able to simply drag and drop.

[ownedbycats]

Originally Posted by Apache

Now I feel really old.
Apache

The first time I felt old was when talking to someone online who had never before seen a floppy disk.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by ownedbycats

The first time I felt old was when talking to someone online who had never before seen a floppy disk.

I remember the single sided floppy disks and punching a hole on the edge of the disk to be able to hopefully use the other side. Most of the time it worked.

[Sirtel]

I've never seen a floppy disk. Not because I'm young, but because I bought my first PC as late as in 2009, in my late thirties. I was too poor to get it earlier. I used computers at work, of course, since 1995 or so, but I had no idea what storage they used.