Audible.com/Audible.co.uk – why you shouldn’t subcribe

An open letter to Aubible.com

Today my girlfriend, a non-techy, paid for and downloaded some audio books from audible.co.uk. Her hope was that she’d be able to listen to these on her mp3 player on a journey she’s soon to go on. It turns out that Audible have their own proprietary DRM encumbered file format (.aa – “Audible Audio” – even that name should clue you in to the notion that Audible are ran by idiots). Anyway, turns out that her MP3 player is not able to play .aa files. That turns out to be the case for most MP3 players, as it goes. So, I explained to her that her MP3 player couldn’t play the files, as her MP3 player can’t play that sort of file. “Well, can’t I just convert it to MP3?” she said. When I explained that wasn’t possible, she explained that she felt ripped off, and that was a very unfair business practice.

So, Audible, those with any technical knowledge steer well clear of you because of your DRM inflicted shit, and those that aren’t technical enough to be familiar with DRM encumberance and what it means end up feeling ripped off by you in a short period of time. Do you SERIOUSLY think this is a good business model?

Anyway, so now we’re burning the files to CD, which we’ll then rip back to MP3. So, all that effort that Audible go to in the name of DRM is totally flawed in any case.

Wankers.