36 ms·

You don't own your Kindle books, Amazon reminds customer

16 points by geekam 13y ago

shmerl 13y ago
Sure. Don't buy e-books from DRM afflicted distributors. There were enough stories that anyone should learn that lesson by now. And that applies to everything, not just e-books. By buying from them you only help proliferating that sickness.
marcus_holmes 13y ago
yes I do. I rip them off the device as soon as they download and store a copy on my PC.
- shmerl 13y ago
  That might help preserving the backup, but that contributes to the bigger problem (since you are supporting those who proliferate DRM). Voting with your wallet and avoiding distributors who insult users with this unethical garbage is a better approach.
  - betterunix 13y ago
    Yeah but then you are forced to make a choice: avoid authors who fail to provide non-restricted books, or download books illegally.
    - shmerl 13y ago
      It's even better that way, since you'll support sane authors and publishers who don't use DRM. I see no problem avoiding others. It's like global pollution. One can choose to avoid those who heavily contribute to it and prefer those who don't.
      - marcus_holmes 13y ago
        DRM isn't effective. Sooner or later the businesses involved are going to discover this. DRM doesn't actually inconvenience me (I'd be taking a backup anyway) so I don't mind publishers wasting their time pushing it. If DRM was effective and got in my way then I'd pirate their books; not really from an ethical stance, but purely because of convenience. Eventually the penny is going to drop and they'll realise that DRM causes piracy instead of preventing it and they'll stop using it.
anigbrowl 13y ago
This story is from October 2012. It's not very obvious from the NBC website, but if you follow the link to BoingBoing it is. I seem to remember there had been some change/improvement in Amazon's TOS over this issue sometime in the last 18 months, though I don't recall when exactly so I might be wrong. I understand old stuff getting posted because many websites recycle non-current stories automatically as 'you might also like...' linkbait, but it is worth checking the date of something before you post.
userbinator 13y ago
That reminds me of this which happened a few years ago: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/07/18/amazon_removes_1984_from_kindle/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/07/18/amazon_removes_1984_...
betterunix 13y ago
I have to wonder if the authors who demanded DRM from Amazon have figured out that this is the kind of behavior that drives people to download books illegally, or if they still fail to see the connection.
- shmerl 13y ago
  Probably most of the time it's not demanded by authors, but by legacy publishers. They have some distortion in their mind, which was already compared to Lysenkoism: http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/columns-and-blogs/cory-doctorow/article/50413-with-a-little-help-digital-lysenkoism.html http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/columns-and-blog...
  - betterunix 13y ago
    Perhaps, but then I am left wondering about newly written books -- why are the authors continuing to endorse DRM? Why are the authors continuing to do business with the publishers who demand it?
    - shmerl 13y ago
      It's not about new vs old books, it's about forward thinking vs backward thinking publishers. I.e. the story goes like this: When authors write books, and want to publish them, most of the time they has no means to do it. So they look for publishers to fund that. If publishers are thick-sculled and backward thinking (i.e. afflicted by DRM Lysenkoism), or otherwise somehow crooked, they demand DRM to be part of the deal. Authors might not like that, but they think they have no choice etc. If publishers are normal on the other hand, they don't care about DRM. Crowdfunding often helps to prevent all this mess, and it's starting to play a bigger role in publishing, not just for books, but for other media (video, games, etc.) which also is often afflicted by DRM because of the legacy publishers. Notably, practically no self publishing authors ever use DRM. As with many areas, old publishers for some reason most of the time are afflicted by DRM. Newer ones - less so. I can't explain the exact correlation, since DRM is really such a stupid thing than anyone with common sense would know that it's bad for business. More than often my feeling is that DRM is used for stupid (Lysenkoism) or side sinister and selfish reasons (covering one's incompetence, controlling technology progress, spying on users or what not).
coin 13y ago
-1 for nbcnews disabling pinchzoom on mobile devices, and rendering text on only the left 5/8 of the screen.
merryandrew 13y ago
Related: http://www.quora.com/Do-my-heirs-inherit-my-Kindle-ebooks-or-other-restricted-ebooks-when-I-die http://www.quora.com/Do-my-heirs-inherit-my-Kindle-ebooks-or...
- merryandrew 13y ago
  From the terms, here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=201014950 http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=2...
coned88 13y ago
This is one reason that while I do own two kindles I would never buy a book from amazon.
kzrdude 13y ago
Take that thing to the Consumer Protection Ombudsman in Norway
- jrockway 13y ago
  Seems like it was bought in the UK, from Amazon.co.uk, so what relevance would Norway have? They're not even in the EU. (If I import some random device from China, I don't complain to the FTC when it doesn't work.)

16 points by geekam 13y ago

Sure. Don't buy e-books from DRM afflicted distributors. There were enough stories that anyone should learn that lesson by now. And that applies to everything, not just e-books. By buying from them you only help proliferating that sickness.

marcus_holmes 13y ago

yes I do. I rip them off the device as soon as they download and store a copy on my PC.

shmerl 13y ago
That might help preserving the backup, but that contributes to the bigger problem (since you are supporting those who proliferate DRM). Voting with your wallet and avoiding distributors who insult users with this unethical garbage is a better approach.
- betterunix 13y ago
  Yeah but then you are forced to make a choice: avoid authors who fail to provide non-restricted books, or download books illegally.
  - shmerl 13y ago
    It's even better that way, since you'll support sane authors and publishers who don't use DRM. I see no problem avoiding others. It's like global pollution. One can choose to avoid those who heavily contribute to it and prefer those who don't.
    - marcus_holmes 13y ago
      DRM isn't effective. Sooner or later the businesses involved are going to discover this. DRM doesn't actually inconvenience me (I'd be taking a backup anyway) so I don't mind publishers wasting their time pushing it. If DRM was effective and got in my way then I'd pirate their books; not really from an ethical stance, but purely because of convenience. Eventually the penny is going to drop and they'll realise that DRM causes piracy instead of preventing it and they'll stop using it.

anigbrowl 13y ago

This story is from October 2012. It's not very obvious from the NBC website, but if you follow the link to BoingBoing it is. I seem to remember there had been some change/improvement in Amazon's TOS over this issue sometime in the last 18 months, though I don't recall when exactly so I might be wrong. I understand old stuff getting posted because many websites recycle non-current stories automatically as 'you might also like...' linkbait, but it is worth checking the date of something before you post.

userbinator 13y ago

That reminds me of this which happened a few years ago: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/07/18/amazon_removes_1984_from_kindle/ http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/07/18/amazon_removes_1984_...

betterunix 13y ago

I have to wonder if the authors who demanded DRM from Amazon have figured out that this is the kind of behavior that drives people to download books illegally, or if they still fail to see the connection.

shmerl 13y ago
Probably most of the time it's not demanded by authors, but by legacy publishers. They have some distortion in their mind, which was already compared to Lysenkoism: http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/columns-and-blogs/cory-doctorow/article/50413-with-a-little-help-digital-lysenkoism.html http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/columns-and-blog...
- betterunix 13y ago
  Perhaps, but then I am left wondering about newly written books -- why are the authors continuing to endorse DRM? Why are the authors continuing to do business with the publishers who demand it?
  - shmerl 13y ago
    It's not about new vs old books, it's about forward thinking vs backward thinking publishers. I.e. the story goes like this: When authors write books, and want to publish them, most of the time they has no means to do it. So they look for publishers to fund that. If publishers are thick-sculled and backward thinking (i.e. afflicted by DRM Lysenkoism), or otherwise somehow crooked, they demand DRM to be part of the deal. Authors might not like that, but they think they have no choice etc. If publishers are normal on the other hand, they don't care about DRM. Crowdfunding often helps to prevent all this mess, and it's starting to play a bigger role in publishing, not just for books, but for other media (video, games, etc.) which also is often afflicted by DRM because of the legacy publishers. Notably, practically no self publishing authors ever use DRM. As with many areas, old publishers for some reason most of the time are afflicted by DRM. Newer ones - less so. I can't explain the exact correlation, since DRM is really such a stupid thing than anyone with common sense would know that it's bad for business. More than often my feeling is that DRM is used for stupid (Lysenkoism) or side sinister and selfish reasons (covering one's incompetence, controlling technology progress, spying on users or what not).

coin 13y ago

-1 for nbcnews disabling pinchzoom on mobile devices, and rendering text on only the left 5/8 of the screen.

merryandrew 13y ago

Related: http://www.quora.com/Do-my-heirs-inherit-my-Kindle-ebooks-or-other-restricted-ebooks-when-I-die http://www.quora.com/Do-my-heirs-inherit-my-Kindle-ebooks-or...

merryandrew 13y ago
From the terms, here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=201014950 http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=2...

coned88 13y ago

This is one reason that while I do own two kindles I would never buy a book from amazon.

kzrdude 13y ago

Take that thing to the Consumer Protection Ombudsman in Norway

jrockway 13y ago
Seems like it was bought in the UK, from Amazon.co.uk, so what relevance would Norway have? They're not even in the EU. (If I import some random device from China, I don't complain to the FTC when it doesn't work.)