In a rare departure from the usual course of events, a significant number of folks are up in arms about a Terms of Service / EULA issue and I don’t think there’s any problem at all. Yes, I’m one of those rare creatures that pays attention to such things (heck, I even gave a talk about giving your rights away at Ignite Portland a few years back). And while some prominent writers feel that the terms of the license agreement for Apple’s new iBooks Author program are “so achingly awful”, they seem reasonable to me.
The Terms and the Disagreement
The portion of the license agreement in question specifies two things:
- Content created with iBooks Author and given away for free may be distributed via any means
- Content created with iBooks Author and sold may only be sold via the iBookstore (run by Apple and subject to a 30% commission)
Those objecting to the terms are objecting to the second; their argument seems to be that Apple should allow the content to be sold via any means possible and not restricted to the iBookstore.
My Response
Keep in mind that Apple is a for-profit corporation. They’re a corporation which has made several innovative moves that have pushed us forward, but they’re a corporation nonetheless. They aren’t offering iBooks Author and the iTunes textbook store purely out of the good of their heart; they’re doing it because they feel their innovation will move the industry forward and they will make a lot of money in the process.
From my first few weeks with my original iPad, I’ve felt that Apple could benefit by making some sort of toolset that easily allowed for content to be published for the device. Apple has now done just that. The resulting book can’t be sold for Android, or for PCs. Apple has provided a tool that allows content creators to better create content for Apple’s iPad device.
If the terms of iBooks Author are that horrible, textbook vendors (or any other ebook authors) are welcome to continue creating their content via other methods and distribute as they have in the past even through the iBookstore. The terms only apply to the authoring tool. No rights or abilities have been removed from anyone. Anyone can still create and distribute content for any platform, including the iPad, in all of the ways that they could 24 hours ago before iBooks Author was announced.
Exactly the kind of response we’d expect from an Apple fanboy…
Seriously, though, while I think they could be missing out on other potential revenue streams, this is totally in character for Apple. The company has ALWAYS made decisions that involve them maintaining as much control of their entire system/supply chain as possible. Shouldn’t be a surprise that they’d do the same thing here.
Think of it this way. If Apple were to create a program that allowed a user to easily create an iPhone app, and then stipulated that said iPhone app, created by the iPhone app creator, could only be sold…..wait for it…..on the Apple App store… would that be such a difficult pill to swallow?
One thing I’m not clear on is whether the “Content created” is specifically the iBook file or whether it encompasses the written content. For example, would the EULA prevent using the same written material, formatted differently by a different program and sold in a different format?
Apple’s EULA clearly defines the “Work”, to which the restriction applies, as “any book or other work you generate using this software”. It’s the *book* they care about, not the content within the book. I can create a photo book using iBooks Author, but I can still use those photos in other forms or other books.
In that case, I’m with you — I don’t see why it’s a problem.
Name another tool that generates content where the EULA restricts what you can do with the content.
You fall for the fallacious argument that the tool’s free and therefore they should have a say in how the content is used. I’ve no issue with them taking a cut of sales from the App Store. I have a huge issue with them restricting what I can do with my own content. This is also not like iOS apps which actually run on and access the devices. Content doesn’t do that.
This is also not in Apple’s best interests. Surely, it’s better for Apple to have a vibrant community of iPad content out there. But under these terms I can’t setup a store featuring content for the iPad and accept Author-generated content.
I thought I remembered a similar restriction in the XCode EULA that restricted iPhone/iPad binaries to only run on those (official, licensed) devices, but I cannot seem to find it now. It wouldn’t surprise me if there was also a similar restriction on the Kindle Development Kit (for generating Active Content on the regular eInk Kindles, not the Fire), but I’m not in that developer program and so do not have access to their EULA.
In the non-Apple realm, GitHub does not necessarily *generate* content, but it is a tool that works with content: allowing you to store, share, and collaborate on it. By default (i.e. without sending them a monthly payment), it restricts what you can do with the content: it must be Open Source. You cannot have a private repository with a standard GitHub account.