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Ask HN: can I transfer a $6,000 Kindle book onto PC, DRM-free?
After spending some time on Amazon and googling a little bit, it appears all my books I buy for Kindle will disappear once I throw the device away in 2 years. [inevitable fate of all portable electronics]
I'm very disappointed but as a last resort decided to ask allmighty HN community if this is true.
If so, I am astonished, frankly... Books aren't MP3s, I actually do want many most of them to be around forever. So can I transform Amazon books into PDFs? Or maybe into some other standard ebook format? (I have never owned an ebook before).
Also, maybe there are other big book stores that sell DRM-free books? (although I'd prefer to hack Amazon's - it's just too damn convenient)
Imagine buying a book for $6,400 and loosing it only because your Kindle breaks and Amazon decides to ditch the product a year later.
BTW yes, $6,400 Kindle book exists:
http://www.amazon.com/Selected-Nuclear-Materials-Engineering-ebook/dp/B001QTVXAK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=digital-text&qid=1240809725&sr=1-1
- marcusbooster 17y agoCan't the new Kindles read pdf? I'm sure there are conversion tools out there.
- jpd 17y agoKindle DX can handle them natively; On K2, they have to be converted first, a service which Amazon provides.
- nick007 17y agoanything you buy on your kindle remains in your amazon.com account, and you can redownload it anytime (e.g. if you get a new kindle). http://qzip.in/n9 http://qzip.in/n9 i don't think you can put it on a PC unless you hack it.
- weaksauce 17y agoI think he is referring to the notion that amazon could in theory discontinue the ebook/kindle line of products leaving him stranded without the books he paid for. This is not as far fetched as it seems. Look at a few examples from the music business: Microsoft discontinued support for their music download service. Walmart did the same thing to their DRM laden music. Now anyone that purchased music with DRM from those two is sol if their computer/OS goes down and they need to reinstall. since they cannot authenticate to the DRM servers the music stops. Solution to the music: use providers that do not want to cripple you. (Amazon MP3 download is the way I have been getting all my music.) Solution to the E-Book: You could probably strip out the drm from the kindle protected books. It is probably against the law in some countries though.
- Raphael 17y agoAmazon is a book store, so their ebook service shutting down would be like Microsoft discontinuing Windows. Not too likely.
- weaksauce 17y agoThey do indeed discontinue windows just different versions of windows. What happens when XP suits you just fine but Microsoft decides that it costs too much to keep the activation servers running and you want to activate your legit copy of xp on a new machine. You are then forced to either: 1) Break the law and crack it. Doing this you will not be eligible for the updates that are there. In cracking it you are going to run a program that probably contains a virus/rootkit/trojan/whatever. 2) Reinstall the os every 30 days to bypass activation. 3) Need to buy/install a newer OS because you are at the mercy of a corporation with respect to DRM.
- nop 17y agoAmazon itself could shut down. If the recession has taught us anything it should be that we can't expect companies to be immortal.
- omarchowdhury 17y agoIf Amazon shuts down it means we've all been dead for weeks.
- pclark 17y agowhy do you think Amazon will ditch the kindle?
- old-gregg 17y agoMost products eventually disappear, particularly electronic gadget types. But that's not the point here. The point is that I want to own my books, there are many reasons all of us should want this. For one, ebook market is growing and Kindle isn't even close to being "iPhone of ebooks": there are some interesting models from Sony, plus I'd like copies of my books on my computers and on my iPhone. I don't want some cheap disposable device to have full control over (eventually) thousands of dollars of my books, that's just silly.
- pclark 17y agoand I want to own my iTunes music, but I didn't for a long time - welcome to the digital age.
- Rickasaurus 17y agoYou can still own your music if you buy Amazon mp3s.
- Kadin 17y agoA lot of people, myself included, kept far away from the iTMS for this very reason until recently. Ironically it was Amazon that was providing the alternative to the DRM-laden product in that instance; I wonder who'll figure out a way to be the Good Guy w/r/t the Kindle now that Amazon has decided to take a crack at the DRM game?
- jrockway 17y agoThe files are in a standard format (mobipocket with the extension changed to azw). They do have Amazon DRM on them, but you can still back them up over the USB connection. You can of course also break the DRM; the program to do that is here: http://www.mininova.org/tor/1412688 http://www.mininova.org/tor/1412688.
- deleted 17y ago[deleted]
- jrockway 17y ago"My friend that's not from the US" claims it works. I would never try something like that, of course, since it's illegal and I'm a Good Citizen. Yeah...
- spkthed 17y agoIt's really simple. Amazon may make things convenient, but, they're also holding you to their beck and whim with these devices. Hold out until you can can own drm-free software and products so you can actually own things. If you don't, you're leasing something from Amazon and stealing it if you break the DRM. Support fair business practices. DRM isn't.
- old-gregg 17y agoJesus... Looks like I'm sticking to laptops + PDFs. From product reviews: "... if your Kindle 1 breaks or you purchase a Kindle 2 all your Newspaper and Magazine issues will be UNREADABLE on the replacement or new device ..." Here is one more, seems like committing to electronic formats you're asking for trouble even when upgrading to another version of the same product: "... I have a tremendous volume of Kindle content (public domain and Amazon). I discovered that I could not directly transfer from my computer backup for Kindle 1 to the new K2 ..." Another one: "... Although Amazon says it keeps you content on their server, I found many instances where I could not download my books to my computer because the item THAT I PAID FOR was not available for download to my new Kindle2..."
- mapleoin 17y agoBut really... There are other ebook readers besides the kindle.. iRex let you use open formats, and the software is also opensource and in continuous development: http://www.irextechnologies.com/ http://www.irextechnologies.com/
- Zev 17y agoA lot of the Kindle's source is Open Source as well, under a GPL license. http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?ie=UTF8&nodeId=200203720 http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?ie=UTF8&...
- erlanger 17y agoHm, wonder why that book has no reviews...
- tlrobinson 17y agoAnd the "customers also bought" section isn't exactly relevant...
- mcantelon 17y agoI'm pretty amazed that noone has released a cheap, open e-reader with an e-paper screen. Seems like such a beast would be an easy sell.
- jonknee 17y agoIt's because the reader is only as good as the content and an open reader has limited content.
- latortuga 17y agoThat's just simply not true - Project Gutenberg (http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page) begs to differ.
- jonknee 17y agoAmazon's offerings dwarf Project Gutenberg to a degree that it's not even worth discussing. The iPod wouldn't have gone anywhere if it could only play out of copyright music. Sure, there are a few dorks out there that would go for it but the vast majority of the public has no interest.
- tptacek 17y agoLet me help you figure this out: ----------------------------------------- The Project Gutenberg "Top 5": The Outline of Science, Vol. 1 (of 4) by J. Arthur Thomson (531) Manners, Customs, and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period by P. L. Jacob (453) Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen (324) Illustrated History of Furniture by Frederick Litchfield (303) Searchlights on Health by B. G. Jefferis and J. L. Nichols (270) ----------------------------------------- The Kindle "Top 5" The Last Olympian by Rick Riordan Liberty and Tyranny: A Conservative Manifesto by Mark R. Levin First Family by David Baldacci The 8th Confession by James Patterson Dead and Gone (Sookie Stackhouse, Book 9) by Charlaine Harris
- ptomato 17y agoThere is also the fact that you quite simply cannot do a combination of "cheap" and "e-ink screen" right now. Manufacturing is still too expensive, even in volume.
- TweedHeads 17y agoHTML is the answer, it is future proof, it is 100% portable. Now we need a solution to move all ebook formats to html.
- silentOpen 17y agoHTML utterly fails at typography. Books need typography. Therefore, HTML should not be used for books.
- TweedHeads 17y agoWhy you say html fails at typography?
- pookleblinky 17y agoAlthough, not every book is a House of Leaves.
- TweedHeads 17y agoInteresting book, html6 should be able to display it exactly as intended. Even showing text upside down, and divs floating in the middle of two columns. If not, we're not doing the right thing.
- TweedHeads 17y agoIf html fails at typography (as you pointed out without any further explanation) then we should evolve html. I insist, html is the answer.
- silentOpen 17y agoChanging html to support more exact and more advanced typographical features is a possibility. Problem: diversity and noncompliance of interpreters. XHTML maybe? Some XML dialect? I can see these working if the toolchain (generators, interpreters, transformers) is tightly controlled or harshly forces compliance. Even still, I'd like my books to always look correct even if made by Microsoft eBook Publisher 2013. Layout failure on the web is a minor annoyance. Layout failure for a e-book I paid $20 for is completely unacceptable.
- gojomo 17y agoYour concern is legitimate, but I think you can count on one (and probably both) of two things happening to protect you: (1) Amazon or others will sell replacement devices or software that support the same DRM'd formats, so you will have continuity of access. (For example, since iPhones can also read Kindle books, and presumably Android phones too at some point, there will be multiple reading platforms.) (2) The progress of time and mores will render the DRM effectively inert, as with all other DRM formats used on popular/mass content. There is a bit of faith required, but not much -- that one or both of these occur fits a trend as strong as Moore's Law.
- j2d2 17y agoMoore's law broke a little while back.
- miles 17y agoIn my opinion, the Kindle is not as useful as an eBook reader (due to DRM, etc), as it is a text-based web browser with free Internet access: http://tinyapps.org/weblog/misc/200904300700_kindle_free_web_browsing.html http://tinyapps.org/weblog/misc/200904300700_kindle_free_web...
- chaostheory 17y agoyou may be interested in this: http://www.foxitsoftware.com/ebook/ http://www.foxitsoftware.com/ebook/
- ramchip 17y agoAmusingly: Selected Nuclear Materials and Engineering Systems (Part 4) (Kindle Edition) What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item? 20% buy The Holy Bible English Standard Version (ESV) 3.6 out of 5 stars (24)
- trapper 17y agoI don't find that amusing, just scary!
- tptacek 17y agoAs my friend Adam points out, at $6,400, they should just throw the Kindle in for free.
- jemmons 17y agoI'll likely get downmodded for this, but someone has to speak truth to poster: There's no way to read Amazon-protected content without using an Amazon-approved device (Kindle, Kinde for iPhone) or cracking the DRM. Cracking the DRM is illegal. I don't care how justified you think you are in doing it, ethically the situation is a simple one: play by the rules or don't play. Is that really so hard? Remember, not only is purchasing-then-cracking DRM against the law and morally ambiguous, it also gives the sponsors of the protected content artificial financial incentive to continue in their DRM ways -- a situation I think we all agree we would like to see end sooner rather than later. If you're really so indignant about not being able to backup your $6000 investment or whatever, the only winning move is not to play.
- quoderat 17y agoNo matter what, I don't do DRM. Won't do it. If that means in 20 years I'm alone in a cabin with a bunch of old books, so be it.
- oomkiller 17y agoFoxit Software (my choice for PDF readers) is coming out with something called the eSlick which reads any kind of PDF you can throw at it. Check it out http://www.foxitsoftware.com/ebook/ http://www.foxitsoftware.com/ebook/
- mitechka 17y agoYou should have thought about this before buying an over-hyped DRM-riddled gadget. This is EXACTLY why DRM schemes are BAD.