What's an e-book, you ask?
Well, if you have to ask, then obviously it hasn't--and likely won't--make much of a difference in your life.
Just for the record, here is the definition: An e-book is any kind of published work stored in digital form for access on computing devices. That's the easy part. Here is the totally commercialised, adulterated, profit-generating definition:
- An e-book is any kind of published work a publisher can store in digital form so as to cripple its accessibility with copyright-protection software and arrange it so that buyers cannot easily read it on just any computing device, nor print, copy, lend or exchange it with others without paying extra.
Some publishers must be thinking, "Hey, what a great way to save printing costs and totally prevent unscrupulous book buyers from avoiding further purchases from us whenever they want to lend or exchange the book we worked so hard to make available to these ingrates! We'll make millions back from them for all that they've already saved from abusing our paper book editions!"
Taint a great idea and turn it into commercial mush
It's not hard to see the benefits of having books in digital form for access on computers. After all, digitisation of information invariably leads to greater exploitation via information technology.
