I’m seriously concerned that the direction of Ebooks at the moment will create a huge obstacle (namely IP rights) towards the dissemination of knowledge worldwide. Books are now available in stores worldwide or courtesy of Amazon ordering (a huge benefit of being one of your customers). While ebooks are simply not available where I live or where millions of other readers live. In other words, this is going to create a huge Wall of Rights that creates a huge gulf between those who can access the knowledge, and those who can’t. I believe Kindle accelerates the process towards that day with its closed system (akin to iTunes) and proprietary technology, and should be resisted if we are to provide knowledge to the millions.
It’s one thing to provide books that everyone can buy and read (at least it’s just economic exclusion… a country can just improve its way to purchasing more books or building more libraries) but using the system that you use prevents ME from buying ebooks on Amazon, and loads of other readers. It’s intellectual discrimination of the worst kind.