Audible.com

Audible.com is a lesson in paranoia as much as they are audiobook sellers. They are the inventors of the much-hated ".aa" audio file, useful for their ability to remember the place you last stopped, but otherwise impossible to import, convert, rip or burn. Hackers everywhere are still trying to solve this mystery, since every other type of audio file in existence can jump from ogg to mp3 to wmv without a qualm.

You must use the provided software to listen to it: attempts to import into iTunes or other media players are thwarted by a password or unable to obtain a codec.

The aforementioned software is also a huge piece of shit; prone to crashing and randomly freezing up every damn time you do fucking anything while the program is running.

The .aa's lack of conversion ability prevents the files from being burned to CD, except with Nero. Currently, even if you have an older version of Nero, you must download the new version 7 30 Day Trial, then roll-back to your previous version, which will somehow leave the ability to burn your audiobooks...at least, that's what it seems like you have to do.

Drama was created recently when conversion software by River Past provided an aa-to-mp3 ability in their Audio Converter. Audible.com had a hissy fit, and River Past removed the offending code from their next release.

All this just to keep you from committing suicide from boredom at your dead-end job.

Fun fact: you can totally convert them the old-fashioned way (i.e. line-out, line-in), but I guess no-one thought of that.

Funner Fact: just google .aa to .mp3, but I guess in 2014 people are still too asspie to use a search engine.