Take a look at digital distribution stores for games that give people a fuss-free experience. Access a well organized catalog & help pages, discussion forums, wikis, etc. Keep track of your library, always get latest version, download anytime anywhere in the world from fast servers any number of times. That really made a huge impact on game piracy.
What a typical "illegal download site" that tries to bombard you with ads, puts a bunch of silly restrictions on you and then starts to nag for money to lift those restrictions.. what a pain.
Books aren't games. Books have a way smaller file size, so fast downloads aren't as attractive. They aren't software, so there is a severely reduced security risk. Something like offering the 'newest version' just doesn't apply, most books have a few errata at most. If you think there is some equivalent service you could provide for books, I think you have to give some examples specific to books. In regards to organized catalog: why wouldn't people use the catalog and then just pirate it anyway?
And are you really arguing that 5 books a day or 1 MB per second (when most books are less than 10 MB) are a limiting restriction and that people would actually buy more than 5 books a day? Hell, there are even other sites without these restrictions. Genesis library as far as I know only shows ads. If you think this is even remotely a pain, I think you're pretty out of touch with the average consumer.
Books are different, therefore you can't offer people an easy, simple, convenient ebook store that doesn't screw you over with excess prices and proprietary windows-only software and DRM? Yeah, with that kind of attitude it's kinda hard to compete with Z-lib or whatever. Just like with games. Torrenting used to be too damn convenient compared to all the legal offering, because the legal offers were just crap.
The problem isn't that illegal channels are too easy, the problem is that the legal channels are (seemingly deliberately) terrible. That's exactly what prompted the blog post we're commenting on, and that's what also keeps me from buying e-books.
What? It was you who was explicitly mentioning additional services (e.g. always getting latest version) which just don't apply to books.
If your argument is convenience tops everything: again, the best possible, most convenient book store would be just like genesis library, except that you'd have to pay (and maybe see a single ad banner less).
> most convenient book store would be just like genesis library
Great! So let's start there. That's already 100% better than what the current bookstores are doing (a few small publishers aside). That alone would solve my and the OP's problem, and I'd be open to buying ebooks, but I guarantee people will also enjoy the additional features once you get them to use the platform. I would certainly like to browse a curated catalog with tags, user reviews, a discussion section, thematic sales, etc. Just as with games. As with digital storefronts for games, you could always go find similar resources outside the platform, but having it all in one place is incredibly convenient and engaging.
We all know that it doesn't have to be that way.
> DRM and other protection instruments are widespread in digital media and I don't think a good answer to this problem has been found yet
DRM is the easiest of problems to solve: just remove it.