

I have bought a copy of _One Piece_ , but I have to use some apps to read that
while I have bought it with a full-priced. For example, I bought a manga
online on some random online bookstore. The price for the digital version of
that manga is about $7, and for the physical version, it costs $10.

It's understandable/acceptable for the price, with $3 different, because
probably it was a cut-off from the printed cost which is come from the printed
version, the digital version is print-less...

However, why do I have to read manga on some apps that were used for reading
manga online? Why can they just give us, customers, the PDF version of the
manga?


CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-01T13:21:15.787
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2019-09-08T04:30:58.880
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question
manga-production
Why are there no online stores that sell manga in PDF format for the English translation?


As a PC guy that uses spare time to research on DRM, I can tell you that PDF
(Portable Document Format) sucks at protecting content in redistribution (in
any form including printing, copying, uploading, etc.). There are two reasons:

  * PDF is made for an easy exchange of document without worrying compatibility between different writing software 
  * there are no (as far as I know) universal DRM solution for PDF. Adobe DRM won't work on PDF-XChange Reader and vice versa. Some of them use customized PDF format which only specific application could read, thus limits the portability. 

In publisher's perspective, the second point is the thing that they don't want
to see: bypassing DRM protection. As PDF properties, it becomes the less ideal
media. To protect their revenue and IP, they're more willing to use a custom
proprietary format because the benefits it provides outweighs the drawbacks.

Source:

  * [The History of PDF (Paragraph 3, 2017)](https://www.prepressure.com/pdf/basics/history)

  * Adobe Digital Edition uses ACSM file (a customized XML) with resource IDs inside rather that actual content. Other application couldn't get the content except ADE. ([Adobe Digital Edition](https://www.adobe.com/solutions/ebook/digital-editions.html))

  * There are tools to remove ADE protection and convert them into plain PDF or EPUB. I won't post a link so please Google yourself.


CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-01T17:52:33.550
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2018-05-04T22:45:36.767
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Because in this way they can turn a product into a service. So they do not
sell you a product "a copy of manga XXX". They sell you a service "providing
access to manga XXX". When the company gets liquidated they will stop
providing the service to you. When they decide that something is not right
(e.g. there is a problem with the copyright of the original work), they can
stop prividing the service to you, etc. In this way they not only have full
control of the source material, but also of every copy.


CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-02T19:26:26.153
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answer