04-09-2010, 04:18 AM | #1 | |
Wizard
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Geo restriction protest to Tor
Just send the following mail to Tor. I do not expect to get a reply from them, but at least I got some frustration of my back.
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04-09-2010, 04:26 AM | #2 | |
Wizard
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04-09-2010, 04:31 AM | #3 |
Wizard
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That's the problem, Sony has them but not for me. I was fortunate enough to buy most of them at BoB just before April 1st. I believe that I bought DR at Kobo at the time. However, it seems that they are tightening the restrictions. So soon the usual tricks will no longer work, even if they will become available at the other shops again.
Please don't tell me you missed out on some books? |
04-09-2010, 05:26 AM | #4 | |
Geographically Restricted
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I do not understand the logic of why GR even exists and why they continue to keep such a archaic and restrictive practice in place full well knowing that people, frustrated at not being able to buy books they want to buy, turn to another means to obtain the ebook. But they obviously live on a different plane of existence or something.... |
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04-09-2010, 05:57 AM | #5 | |
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04-09-2010, 06:12 AM | #6 | |
The Grand Mouse 高貴的老鼠
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Even the agents are good guys - they're trying to get the most money they can out of publishers for their authors (& for their 15%). The problem is that the whole lot of them haven't fully understood what ebooks require. Exclusive regional contracts make sense for paper books, because paper is bulky and heavy, and expensive to ship around. So publishers in a certain area get an exclusive right to produce print versions of particular books. They're paying authors for that exclusive right, to be sure that they don't get stuck with a warehouse of expensive books, which could happen if the author could also give another publisher in the same country the right to print (say) a cheap paperback edition. But this doesn't apply to ebooks. There's no natural barrier to sales, except language. For ebooks, non-exclusive world-wide rights make a lot more sense. Or exclusive world-wide rights for a particular language, although the former seems a better idea to me. The problem at the moment is that publishers want to pay less for non-exclusive world-wide rights than they do for the current exclusive regional rights. And agents (& authors) want more for exclusive world-wide rights than for exclusive regional rights. As I said, I hope that all parties concerned see that non-exclusive world-wide rights make the most sense. Publishers don't like it, as it means that they'll be competing against other publishers in their 'home' market. Personally, I'd like to have the choice between the US and UK versions of (say) Harry Potter or Sookie Stackhouse. And competition would be good for consumers - not necessarily on price, but certainly on quality. I suspect it'll be some years before it all gets sorted. I don't see regional restrictions on ebooks lasting in the long term (10 years) though. |
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04-09-2010, 08:04 AM | #7 | |
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So yes, it seems they don't want to sell people books. |
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04-09-2010, 08:12 AM | #8 | |
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If TOR only have the publishing rights to sell an eBook in the USA, then they can't sell it to you if you live elsewhere. I'm sure they'd love to, but their contract doesn't permit it. |
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04-09-2010, 10:35 AM | #9 |
Wizard
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And who decided to make contract that way at first, if not the publishers ?
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04-09-2010, 10:47 AM | #10 | |
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Mr. Author writes a book, and sells the publications rights to Kewlbooks USA Inc. Kewlbooks prints 10,000 copies and sells them; Mr. Author is happy. However, Mr. Author's book gets noticed in another country. Kewlbooks doesn't have any factories or distributors in the other country; it could make them in the US and ship them over there, but the costs would be high and profits low. So Mr. Author talks to Megabooks UK. Megabooks would love to carry Mr. Author's book--but not if Kewlbooks is going to open a print-and-distribute factory there next month. So Mr. Author arranges the contracts such that Kewlbooks can only sell in the US, and Megabooks can sell in the UK. Maybe Megabooks distributes to Europe, and maybe he makes a third deal, with Continental Books, for that. This works fine for print books. Customers visiting the US can buy the Kewlbooks version; they can even order it & have it shipped to them. The problem with digital is that the "point of sale" is considered to be the *customer's* location, not the seller's location. Or rather, the location of the server the customer is identified as connected to, with a secondary check of the location of the bank issuing the credit card involved. (Not sure who decided this--don't know if it's a matter of legal precedent, author-publisher contracts, or agreement between publishers/ebookstores.) The way to fix geo restrictions is to consider the location of the sale as "location of the servers where the bookstore resides," rather than location of the customers. (And this would mean nationally-limited stores would be selling internationally, and competing with publishers who own the rights in their countries. I'm sure the publishers' and distributors' economists would get all up in arms over the idea; I'm not sure it'd make any notable difference in actual ebook sales from the publishers' perspective--except that it'd become apparent how many customers *want* ebooks enough to deal with money conversion issues to get them.) |
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04-09-2010, 11:02 AM | #11 |
frumious Bandersnatch
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The absolutely most stupid thing about geographical restrictions is the fact that the "place of sale" is the country where the purchaser resides (or wher he has some valid address, plus bank account, plus credit card...)
Different contracts for selling in different countries is OK, exclusive contracts for selling in different countries is OK, being able to buy something in some country and not in another country is expected... But being unable to buy an electronic file just because I live (or don't live) in some country is plain absurd. The "place of sale" should be the country where the shop is located, just as with physical goods, I would even be fine with paying an additional VAT, if needed. I can choose to buy American editions (of paper books) from amazon.com or British editions from amazon.co.uk, it should be the same with ebooks. |
04-09-2010, 11:46 AM | #12 |
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04-09-2010, 03:28 PM | #13 |
Wizard
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So, if the authors decided on regional contracts (somehow I doubt that though), who's idea was it that the 'place of sale' is the buyers location instead of the shops? Why is this different than in the physical world? Somehow I doubt that this was also decided by the authors.
In other words, who do we need to harass to solve this issue? Is it legal anyway, not only in the country of the shop but also in the country of the wannabee buyer? |
04-09-2010, 03:42 PM | #14 |
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It's "eCommerce" tax law, as I understand it - a matter of deciding whether or not taxes are payable on the purchased item.
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