I'm not objective at all about King. He was my first writer crush. Steve has a copy of On Writing, I'll try it again. I bought it at the airport when it came out, read about 80 pages on the plane and disliked it so much that I left it on the plane for the next person. I'm willing to try it again.

I'm not objective at all about King. He was my first writer crush.

Joins javachick in the King fandom corner.

He was the first writer I sought out when I started reading adult books, after my sister handed me a copy of Carrie when I was 11 years old and said that I might like it. I spent most of the late '70s gobbling up everything he wrote.

Yup, similar experience, minus the sister, Kathy!

I was let down by his use of the same incest theme over and over in the early 90's and stopped reading his books. Then he came out with "Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon" and I thought I'd give it a try since I love baseball so much. I only made it through 60 or 70 pages (if that) because I thought the voice of the child narrator was so off that my suspension of disbelief just couldn't handle it. I was bummed because I liked the premise so much.

I STILL think of King almost every time I stop at a stop sign! "California stop" was in one of his books, don't recall which one.

I used to be a detractor. Then I saw "Shawshank Redemption" and had to take it back. I admit it. But I'm not a horror fan really and at one time I aspired to be a snotty intellectual.

Ethical question: I have a lot of eBooks that I've bought on my Kindle. I have also, for my own personal backup, stripped the DRM from all of them, so they are now standard Mobipocket files (basically readable on any device and easily convertible to ePub for the devices that can't).

I would never distribute these books in a widespread, bittorrenty manner. But would it be unethical for to offer them for "lending" in the style of the B&N lending above? I trust Buffistas to actually remove the book after finishing it.

Frankly, the LendMe feature and library books feature are very compelling reasons to switch to a Nook and the B&N ecosystem, and I may be going there with my next eReader. I wish they didn't have the (IMO) tacky LCD screen at the bottom though. I prefer the simplicity of the Kindle look.

I'm not an author, but I would (selfishly) say yeah, go ahead, Gris.

It's not different than a library, as far as sales go, and I, for one, would be likely to purchase new books by an author I discovered through sharing, just like I would if I read a book at a lib or through a used dealer.

I buy beloved authors new, and ASAP, when I can, so I think this is acceptable practice.

YMMV.

I lend out books all the time. If that's not unethical I'm not sure how lending an ebook would be.

I think I am going to get my boyfriend a Nook or a Kindle. Gris, how do I strip the DRM from my Kindle purchases?

There's probably a difference between ethics and legality here. You may want to closely examine your terms of service. The act of stripping the DRM may be covered (as in, prohibited) by the DMCA. I would consider it analogous to musical file trading. Which asyouknowBob, I oppose. But we do here. Along with other acquiring of digital forms of existing media that makes us clear our throats a lot. So, you know.

Anyway, IANAL, but this board does not officially sanction the circumvention of copyright. Just so it's there.

I used to be a detractor. Then I saw "Shawshank Redemption" and had to take it back. I admit it. But I'm not a horror fan really and at one time I aspired to be a snotty intellectual.

The funny thing is, after seeing the movie a couple of times, I went back to the story. A lot of the movie was there, but there was so much that the movie invented, yet felt true to the original, I was a bit astonished. I still think that story is one of King's best, though.