

How DRM can hurt sales (Steve Bellovin) - alecco
http://www.cs.columbia.edu/~smb/blog//2010-07/2010-07-15.html

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teamonkey
Tired, anecdotal comments like this offer absolutely nothing new to the
DRM/piracy debate and don't really belong on HN.

We need experimental, quantitative evidence, with a data set large and broad
enough that we have a good reason to dismiss many of the variables as
irrelevant.

~~~
pavel_lishin
The plural of "anecdote" is "anecdotes", not "data".

( Source: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=246716> )

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motters
Well one thing is clear. If you put DRM onto your product then I, for one,
will not buy it.

~~~
wazoox
Ditto. I avoided buying DRM'ed CDs, use only public domain e-books, etc.

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bryanh
Well, I know from experience that even small time producers of digital goods
want some form of DRM, whether they know it or not. A common question I get
from my BitBuffet.com customers is "How do I know they won't share the file on
their website? Can't we lock it or something?".

I never really know what the best answer is for this; I try the diplomatic
"There certainly are technologies for this, but they are especially annoying
to your paying customers and the tech isn't foolproof" but I really doubt
there is enough demand in most cases to warrant an effort on combating piracy.
It is difficult to convince them otherwise when its their hard work.

~~~
wazoox
> Well, I know from experience that even small time producers of digital goods
> want some form of DRM

Not all of them; only those who didn't yet understand that DRM won't help
sales (on the contrary, for small players it certainly hurts much more than it
helps).

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dpapathanasiou
This is terrific.

I'm going to send it to every author that chose not to publish with us b/c our
marketplace is DRM-free (and the reasons he enumerates is exactly why we're
DRM-free as a matter of policy).

~~~
pavel_lishin
Are you talking books, or software?

I don't think any of the e-readers lock a book to a specific device.

