Written by dgoldring on Friday, July 17, 2009

Kindle: Big brother Stole My Big Brother


So, the other day, my wife noticed an email indicating that Amazon had reimbursed us $4.95.  Hey, I am never one to quibble over free money, so I took it.  Well, maybe I should have looked a little closer.  Apparently, that rebate was for a book I had purchased, The Works of George Orwell, obviously by George Orwell, and published by Mobile Reference.  Unbeknownst to me, along with that rebate, Big Brother Amazon was automatically sneaking in over the Whispersync connection and automatically removing the book from my Kindle.  Say what now?  Lucky for me, I had turned off Whispersync in order to conserve power, so I still have the book for the time being. 

The question on everyone’s minds now is what the heck happened.  And what gives Amazon the right to essentially unsell me a book.  I mean, I know when I bought it I did not call “No Give Backs”…but I really did not think I had to do so.  And really, I cannot possibly be the only one who is struck by the absurd irony of doing this with the book 1984, a book in which Big Brother literally controls your thoughts and feelings.

There is a bit of conflicting information going around as to what exactly happened here.  Over at Mashables, they are reporting that the publisher, Mobile Reference, changed their mind and decided not to publish a Kindle edition of the book.  Cnet News, on the other hand, is quoting an Amazon source who stated that the book was improperly distributed without the permission of the rights holder. 

For Amazon’s sake, I certainly hope the second explanation is the truth.  While I do not like the idea of Amazon reaching in and grabbing books off my virtual bookshelf without my knowledge (note to Amazon, an email would have been nice) I can live with this action much better if this was intended to right a wrong, rather than just a wishy-washy publisher.  Then again, every six year old can tell you that two wrongs do not make a right.

Nonetheless, it seems like Amazon has heard the outcry from this one.  They have indicated that they are now changing their terms of service in order to ensure this does not happen again.  Still…it should not have happened in the first place.

I have to say, I love the convenience of the Amazon Kindle, but I am starting to get tired of Amazon’s shenanigans.  In addition to this move, since February, we have seen:

  • the on-again-off-again text to speech interface
  • prices on the rise
  • unadvertised limitations on downloads.

What could possibly be coming next?  The best thing Amazon has going for it right now is the almost complete lack of competition.  They can do whatever they want…and it shows.  Both Barnes and Noble and Borders have waded into the shallow end of the eBook phenomenon, but have both stopped well short of giving the Kindle a true run for its money.  Until that happens, I suspect we can plan on many more of these random and arbitrary moves from the eBook powerhouse.

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John D. Sheridan
Jul 18, 2009

The text-to-speech issue was bogus, and I don’t feel that was Amazon’s fault. The download limits I assume are intended to prevent or discourage piracy, but they should be disclosed up-front, which is Amazon’s fault. I sort of understand their wanting to pull the books that, for whatever reason, they did not have the proper rights to, but they shouldn’t have done it without any warning.

The Kindle is an amazing device, and while I don’t own one I may in the future, and I hope Amazon gets the bugs worked out of their service.


dgoldring
Jul 19, 2009

John, I can;t disagree with you at all. The Kindle is a great device. I use mine every day and love it. But I think Amazon suffers from a lack of real competition. That being said, one oftheir biggest problems is lack of communication both with their customers and their own employees.

On the text to speech thing, initially that was oneof the big selling points of the device. So, it felt to a lot of people like a sort of bait and switch. I know many people who were interested in the Kindle 2 mainly because of the text to speech promise. While its failure may not have been Amazon’s fault, they shoudl not have advertised it so heavily without ensuring they had the proper permissions.

The multiple download thing, I agree with you, could be related to piracy. But if you read the articles about it both here and at Gear Diary, the main complaint is that they are not clear about the policy. It would not be an issue at all if each book simply indicated the number of times it could be downloaded. But when questions, many of Amazon’s customer service employees were not even aware of the policy or how it worked. The secrecy was the real issue on that one.

This most recent one is also a communication problem. All they had to do was send an email indicating that the book had been published without obtaining the rights. And that they would offer a refund or give you a different book in exchange. But I think it was improper for them to reach out and remove something from my Kindle without telling me they were doing it.

So, yeah, lots of kinks in the system, but I still love mine. :)

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