So, I have a technical question which I've not been able to answer after hours of fruitless search:
If I buy an #ebook that uses Adobe ePUB #DRM -- is there any free, open source way of reading that on a tablet or a very old e-reader? Can Calibre display/convert it? Do I need an account of some sorts?
The only thing the internet will tell me is about Adobe Digital Editions, but I'm on Linux, have no Google account an the eReader is ooold and completely offline.
@Mr_Teatime I think this would help you: https://superuser.com/questions/1027608/how-to-read-an-acsm-file-on-linux#1531009
I was looking at this recently too, but my personal outcomes are somewhat bleak:
* I tried and gave up on the Linux workflow eventually (I think I am a superuser, but my patience with wine crap is bounded - if after 1-2 hours of work it just fails and I have an alternative, I won't waste more time)
* I discovered that there are (at least) 2 types of epub books available: text-based which read well on various readers and then a bundle of bitmaps (jpegs) in ePub container. I discovered that the first one typically does not have DRM on it, the second type is most of the Adobe DRM.
* now the thing is this: reading the bitmap epub ebooks on smaller (6") ereaders is a pain. It simply does not have text reflow, so you need to zoom and pan all the time. Experience on a modern tablet is somewhat better, but still not great. That is, even when you can decrypt the Adobe DRM-ed ebook and load it on your ereader, the experience will suck, so you don't really want to do it.
* since text-based ebooks are not (in my experience) DRM protected, you can load them just like that.
Okay, from this rambling I hope you get the message: technically speaking there are ways how to make Adobe Digital Editions DRM stuff work on Linux and your little old ereader, BUT you don't want to do it (unless you are a tinkerer), because there are other important reasons why it will not lead to an enjoyable experience for you.
Either way you decide, good luck there!
@Mr_Teatime Yeah, it's a bit dissapointing for me too. I mean, if I were in a general book market, OK. In this case, I wanted it for my young daughter and there even the number of books available as ebooks is limited. I was also surprised by how bad the whole experience is.
On a flip side, personally I root for audio books now. Almost everything I am interested in is available as an audio book, no special equipment needed (unlike with epub etc.), so for me personally this turned out to be a great solution.
@FailForward
Yeah, I find it weird how music and audio books can be had without physical media and DRM-free these days but books can't, plus the maze of formats... I'd love to get most books digitally because we move frequently. Except for photo books and some notable works I, don't care about lugging even more physical books plus heavy shelves around each time, and have them occupy even more space than they already do.
But it seems like the e-book market doesn't like me :(
@FailForward
Thanks! I think you may have just saved me many hours of tinkering.
Also, it completely sucks that so many book stores don't even oroperly explain which format they're delivering, and what's needed to run it. Probably because the compatibility lists would look scary and many are pushing their own reader but I'm not going to buy a different e-reader for each store, no way...
de-DRM-ing e-books also seems like hard work, so I guess it's back paper once more :(