Kindle - Amazon Remote Deletion of E-Books

[Halivar]

As it turns out, Amazon didn't actually have the right to put the books on the Kindle in the first place. Because of our (as in, US) convoluted copyright system, the books were thought to have been in public domain since 1978, but because of various copyright extension acts that do funky math with publish dates and author death dates, the actual copyright on them does not expire until 2044. Amazon was liable for triple damages (and may still be), so the decision to remove the books was logical.

 

[Umbran]

This was not really a gaming discussion, so I have moved it to Off-Topic.

Do remember that the "no politics" rule still applies. Thank you.

 

[Asmor]

What's to stop WOTC from taking the same stance if they are to sell E-Books again?

Well, first and foremost, the fact that you should be buying PDFs with no DRM, so they don't even have the capability.

As a general rule, DRM is a completely bad thing and you should only accept it if you're getting something to make up for its significant and real drawbacks. For example, I'm okay with Steam's DRM because it's relatively benign (e.g. allows me to install on as many computers as I want), because I have a high opinion of the company behind it (Valve), and because it offers some significant bonuses (e.g. keeping track of my games so I don't have to keep track of discs and/or codes).

That said, I understand that in the end Valve has me by the short-and-curlies and could elect to screw me over at any time. There aren't many companies for whom I'd have the good will to accept such an arrangement. Blizzard and Google are the only other two that come to mind.

I'm lucky enough to be well-informed in the choice as to whether I will purchase something encumbered with DRM or not, however, and the vast majority of consumers are not. Thus, I'm a strong opponent of all forms of DRM. At the very least, I think any sort of DRM whatsoever should require clear, up-front communication with the purchaser and all encryption keys and such should legally be required to be held in escrow by a third party in the event something happens to the company in question.

 

[S'mon]

Does anyone remember the 1E Deities and Demigods with the Cthulhu and Melnibonean mythos? TSR discovered that Chaosium actually had the license to publish materials from both sources through the IP owners after they had already published the book.

This is actually highly dubious:

1. Moorcock has said he never intended to give Chaosium an exclusive license to his work, and was very annoyed they claimed to have one. He did give TSR permission to use his stuff.

2. Cthulu is (a) mostly public domain and (b) there is no clear licensing paper trail of any non-PD stuff to Chaosium, from what I can ascertain.

 

[tmatk]

The anonymous underground movements that have long sustained banned works will be a lot harder to keep up in the world of the Kindle and the iPhone.

No it won't, not a chance. It's still digital, they'll get it off the device to a PC, strip the DRM, and get it on the file sharing networks.

 

[Asmor]

2. Cthulu is (a) mostly public domain and (b) there is no clear licensing paper trail of any non-PD stuff to Chaosium, from what I can ascertain.

The stuff created by Lovecraft is in the public domain. I'm no Cthulhu scholar or even enthusiast, but my understanding is that Chaosium's added some of their own original works to the mythos, turning it into a veritable mine field where you've got to be careful which parts you use and which you don't...

Which is pretty sad, actually. From what I've read (i.e. Wikipedia), it seems Lovecraft would be turning in his grave at that. He was very happy to see other people use and expand the Cthulhu mythos, and actively encouraged them to do so.

 

[Whimsical]

An apology from Jeff Bezos

An apology from Amazon.com

This is an apology for the way we previously handled illegally sold copies of 1984 and other novels on Kindle. Our "solution" to the problem was stupid, thoughtless, and painfully out of line with our principles. It is wholly self-inflicted, and we deserve the criticism we've received. We will use the scar tissue from this painful mistake to help make better decisions going forward, ones that match our mission.

With deep apology to our customers,

Jeff Bezos
Founder & CEO
Amazon.com

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

There is a story going round today that an American user is suing Amazon over this.

He'd made some annotations to his copy of 1984 to assist him in his class, and now that it's gone all that work is gone with it. It's going to be used as a class action.

Personally, I wish him the best of luck.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

If Kindle had, instead, become obsolete that day, and was no longer supported, the Kindle users would have been just as out of luck as they are under the deletion, because there is no obligation for them to keep supporting old tech.

Otherwise, we'd have had successful consumer lawsuits over continued support of 8-tracks, reel-to-reel, Beta and other now-defunct media tech.

And I'd have been able to sue Microsoft when they stopped supporting a particular spreadsheet/WP program in favor of what is now known as Office...and didn't provide any way to convert the data into the new format. I lost years of personally generated data and my Father had to spend thousands in order to convert files for his business.

But no such victories exist.

While the impetus is different, the outcome is likely to be the same.

Amazon remotely deleted Kindle files of books they shouldn't have in the first place, and in at least most cases, refunded the money.

Look at it this way- if you bought a book that turned out to be stolen from a bookstore, that could be confiscated without recompense. Your only viable lawsuit would be against the thief. If you won, you'd get your money back...and nothing else.

Here, the Kindle users got their money back in exchange for their deleted files...the identical legal position to the person who successfully sued the thief over the confiscated stolen property they purchased from him.

My guess is that the lawsuits will go nowhere. They have no more recourse than I would if the Mods here deleted all the threads I've subscribed to...some of which contain my original creative work that I have never published anywhere else, nor copied onto my own hard drive via Word or a similar program.

The public relations nightmare, OTOH, may have longer legs.

IMHO, Amazon erred by doing what they did the way they did. They should have notified potentially affected customers ahead of time- ideally at least a month in advance- in order to let them make whatever adjustments they needed to before the deletion. Adjustments like transferring one's cribnotes to a physical copy, for instance.