So Greg Leed of Wizards of the Coast was nice enough to grant an interview that was posted on enworld.org. You can read it here. In a nut shell, Wizards believes that PDF piracy is out of control and they are discontinuing the sales of PDFs immediately.

We just talked about this in our last podcast, which should be up later tonight! I've stolen some ideas freely from the Lords and Ladies of Tyr.

My response to Wizards is this... in a nut shell.

<nutshell>

This is a digital age. There is no going back. Consumers want things digitally. We want to own those digital things completely. We do not want a hassle about it, and we don't like companies and organizations that like to sue their own customers. Companies that want to thrive and survive as we move further into the digital age must adapt to this or suffer loss and pain.

</nutshell>

Now just because Wizards is discontinuing PDF sales doesn't mean they have given up on digital distribution. Greg says, "We do not have any plans to resume the sale of PDFs, but are actively exploring other options for the digital distribution of our content – including older editions. We understand that digital content is important to our customers."

Wizards has had a distincly poor technology track record. Everything from their etools failure, to their too often broken website, to the abomination of Gleemax, to the D&D Insider vaporware, gives me the impression that in general Wizards just doesn't do this stuff very well. That is not to say that those things are easy either.

So when I hear Greg saying they are "actively exploring other options" I am both happy and scared at the same time.

Here are some pieces of advice for Wizards from someone who is both a technologist as a profession and a player.

1. People have been copying your product and giving it to others since the game was first created in the 1970's. Digital has nothing to do with it. Guess what? All the people that I know who got a "copied" book became a customer later on. Some people may be"pirates" now, but they will be customers later. Be careful how you treat your potential customers.
2. Make it open. Whatever incarnation your digital strategy becomes, make it work across lots of different operating systems, browsers, mobile devices. Don't make it proprietery. Don't stick people with only one access method. 
3. Do not saddle us with DRM all that ridiculous baggage. DRM does not work. It has never worked. When someone buys something, they should own it. Not borrow it. If Wizards, God forbid, ever went out of business, my hard copy books will still work. So should digital ones.
4. Your books are NOT worth the cover price. They are NOT even worth what Amazon sells them for. That means that a cheaper digital alternative should cost LESS THAN what I can purchase your books for at Amazon. No one in their right mind is going to pay you even the full Amazon price for a digital book.
5. Don't try to do this on your own. You make great games. That is what you do. Continue to make great games. Work with some other companies that have experience with this type of thing. I'd like to tell you to work with Amazon, but frankly, a Kindle is not in my future so don't bother (see No. 2 and 3).
6. Make it insanely great. Make it so I can't resist. I buy maybe 4 books per year which adds up to about $92 or $7.66 per month. So let's round things up, because I know you would anyways and give me access to your entire 4E library for a monthly fee of $7.95 ($95.40 per year) on top of the base D&DI subscription. Allow me to download and keep forever 4 books per year as long as I pay for the year in advance. There could be different levels available as well. Perhaps a lower option for online access only for $5.95 per month, and an all you can eat option for $14.95 per month that includes ALL aspects of D&DI. Meaning that all the tools and all the books would be available online and all the books to own and download locally as well.

   That works out to $179.40 per year for the all you can eat version until 5E comes out in 8 years or so? That is a lot of cash floating out there for Wizards.

   The key here is that it is tied to D&DI so you will get more subscribers (its worth the current fee just for the Dungeon and Dragon magazines), and that it allows me to use all the information I need digitally (no need to pirate anything) and I can also acutally OWN the digital books that I want to have locally regardless of whether I still subscribe to D&DI.

   People are used to subscriptions for things like this. Especially all the MMORPG players you are wanting to attract.

7. When someone buys a hardcover book, given them a 1 month coupon/discount for D&D Insider! If they buy the leather bound editions give them 2 months! Again, tie thigns back to D&DI
8. Create an open API for all of your D&DI services. Trust me on this. If you want lots of community interest and lots of buzz, let people mess with things! They are still using your service. You still have to sign up and pay, but people can innovate on top of all the great information you are providing. Look at all the amazing things that can happen when services release their api. This is web 2.0 people! Let people do cool things with your amazing content! (talk to Google, Facebook, Amazon, etc...)

   The D&D community is a strong and dedicated technological group. They will make amazing things for you for free that other subscribers can use just because they love D&D and they want to improve on something.

Hmmm. Well I had hoped I would be able to pop out 10, but I'm sick of top 10 lists anyways! The bottom line is that we love Wizards and we want them to succeed. We just want to start seeing them success on the digital end without it being "in spite of themselves". Instead I want them to success "because of themselves".

Just do what I say word for word in the above list and I will gladly pay you for... wait a minute. If you do what I say word for word above, I want the service for free OK? Better yet just hire me to adise you, or just give me 50 cents per month for every user that signs up. :)