http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/370525/euro ... -on-ebooks

Good show, ebook prices are currently ridiculous, though conversion software pretty much makes a nonsense of the formats anyway

Once again the EU has to step in to save consumers from being locked into proprietary systems. I'm sure anti-EU types are somehow going to find a negative in this.

All for this. Does anyone want to argue digital music would have taken off without a common format i.e. MP3? This is the same. Until you can buy an ebook without worrying whether you can read it or not, ebooks won't achieve their potential.

Nope. Generally I'm anti EU, but I agree with this.

Ditto.

Given all the problems in the EU right now, should e-books really be a priority?

Consumer rights should always be a priority. If anything this could be useful - increasing consumer confidence can help stimulate spending in the economy.

you seem to be judging all anti-EU types as one.
Personally I'm against the way the EU is going and that is a massive EU state that will by large be totally unaccountable to the populations of the nations that make up the EU. As the EU will fudge or just plain ignore whole countries populations until they vote the way it wants to.

This is happening anyway. Mega-corporations are carving the world up into territories, imposing their own rules on how their products are used. One small nation in the corner of a continent is not going to be able to hold out against such advances alone. The EU is able to create enough weight and mass to bring such practices into check.

As a trading bloc yes but do we need a united states of Europe, where you have total political and financial unity?

I think I'm more concerned that the EU has a 'Digital Agenda' than I am about say, Amazon recouping their Kindle development costs by making it difficult to buy books in Waterstones to read on my Kindle/Kindle App. Personally, I don't find eBook prices ridiculous, though I agree that the VAT situation is absurd. I'd rather the EU did something about the geographical restrictions that publishers apply to their books (or that studios apply to their DVDs come to that) than sticking their oar in about eBook formats, especially when it's the proprietary DRM that's the real issue. Hey EU, how about making stripping DRM from content I've bought and paid for legal? No, didn't think so...

If you have a tablet or smartphone though, the chances are that there's a free App that will let you read titles bought from the bookseller of your choice, and if not then dedicated e-ink readers are getting cheap enough now to have more than one, if you really, really have to buy books form various sources. Or you can always stick to paper...

Cheers, Pete.

No, no we don't.

If anything, the last few months have shown that not only is a unified financial eurostate not a good idea, it may not even be something that would be sustainable in reality.

that wont stop them <dons tin foil hat>

I have to say, I struggle to think of a subject I could care less about.