Let me start with the obligatory assurance that I’m no fan of DRM technologies. That’s why I use (illegal) tools to break it if I want to buy an ebook from another retailer and read it on my Kindle(s AMZN). Yet I disagree with author and BoingBoing co-editor Cory Doctorow’s argument that DRM plays a big role in the ongoing dispute between Amazon and book publisher Hachette.

In a column in the Guardian Friday, Doctorow wrote that “because Hachette has been such a staunch advocate of DRM,” it hasn’t been able to take advantage of “a whole range of tactics” that would be available to it if it dropped DRM:

“Amazon’s ebook major competitors – especially Apple and Google – have lots of market clout, and their customers are already carrying around ebook readers (tablets and phones). Hachette could easily play hardball with Amazon by taking out an ad campaign whose message…