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Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

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Re: Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

#61

Post by Drakim »

nindalf wrote: post #36
londons_explore wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd also be fine with the T&C's saying "For any reason, we can terminate the services we provide to you, and we will refund any money's paid with interest". That way, the company can decide to keep the evidence to themselves and not need to go to court, but must forgo all revenue from your account.

I’ve bought 100 books on Kindle. You’re saying I could do something that would cause Amazon to decide to break the contract, and I’d get a refund of all 100 books with interest? Seems like a sweet deal to me, since I’m not reading the old books very often.

Amazon could take you to court instead for breaking the contract. What he suggested was that it would be up to Amazon.

Re: Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

#62

Post by 0x_rs »

evgen wrote: post #31
londons_explore wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd also be fine with the T&C's saying "For any reason, we can terminate the services we provide to you, and we will refund any money's paid with interest". That way, the company can decide to keep the evidence to themselves and not need to go to court, but must forgo all revenue from your account.

If you break the rules of the contract what makes you think you get your money back? If you want a refund you should be required to prove that the company was the one that violated the agreement.

"Semper necessitas probandi incumbit ei qui agit" The company refusing to provide a service and shutting your account down should be the one to prove an eventual violation of an agreement. Too often we are witnessing content and/or service providers refuse to acknowledge the cause of an account being blocked - most of the times I've read about because of false positives in automatic detection systems and the likes. There should be at the very least a middle ground, such as being able to access content already paid for and only that.

Re: Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

#63

Post by justinclift »

auggierose wrote: post #45
f1refly wrote: post #38

It's always a bit alienating to me when people suddenly wake up with their stuff taken away and are all like "how could this happen to me? why did noone warn me about this? how could amazon _do this to me_?" and then go off on their ways and "buy" the next movie from them (in addition to the amazon prime membership they already pay for that for some reason only includes the 480p version of the movie). It's not like t…

Yes, I also try to get it directly from the publisher. This has the advantage, that often you get the much better quality PDF version than the Amazon version with garbled math in it. I have bought maybe 5 books for Kindle that I couldn't get any other way. It sucks, because I cannot make these 5 books part of my Calibre library.

> It sucks, because I cannot make these 5 books part of my Calibre library.

Depending on a range of factors, this might be useful for solving that:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24685279

Re: Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

#64

Post by yreg »

javajosh wrote: post #2

Indeed, and this is why I still buy paper books, DVDs and CDs (and vinyl, when the mood strikes). Heck, I suspect that in the not-too-distant future, old software licenses and media will be valuable, perhaps extremely so if open-source tools are effectively blocked on the major platforms.

My 2013 1Password license ($19.99) proved to be a valuable investment.

Unfortunately I'll have to migrate to their subscription sooner or later, I already don't have access to their Safari extension.

Re: Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

#65

Post by f1refly »

Lammy wrote: post #57
f1refly wrote: post #38

It's always a bit alienating to me when people suddenly wake up with their stuff taken away and are all like "how could this happen to me? why did noone warn me about this? how could amazon _do this to me_?" and then go off on their ways and "buy" the next movie from them (in addition to the amazon prime membership they already pay for that for some reason only includes the 480p version of the movie). It's not like t…

I don't think victim-blaming is a great way to educate people on the existence and dangers of DRM. Convenience might even be worth it to some people, but I think it's more often a problem of ignorance. Any TV ad for a Kindle is going to focus on the broad selection and ease of use. Telling those people about the DRM isn't participating in the same conversation that sold them the device.

On the other hand, I dont think victim-blaming is an excuse for rampant and continuous ignorance either. At some point, after getting abused again and again, users are to blame. All this shouldn't suprise any of them, it's in the ToS after all. Some users read the ToS and made an educated choice, some didn't read them and decided to not participate in any business with a company that obfuscates its goals in a 50-page wall of legal damage control, and some just ignore it and use the service. The ones that ignore the ToS and that get caught by suprise later are absolutely to blame for their own neglectance of the contract conditions.

Re: Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

#66

Post by yesenadam »

greenyoda wrote: post #46
Animats wrote: post #33

Amazon.co.uk and its affiliates reserve the right to refuse service, terminate accounts, remove or edit content, or cancel orders at their sole discretion. - Amazon “If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face—forever." - Orwell

Ironically, the first highly publicized instance of Amazon deleting books from Kindle devices was its deletion of Orwell's "1984" in 2009: https://io9.gizmodo.com/amazon-secretly-removes-1984-from-th...

I clicked on that link (in Australia) and got "Sorry! Yikes! That story doesn’t exist on Gizmodo Australia, but we have plenty of other great content you can check out here. If you’re still hellbent on that particular story, you can access the US version of Gizmodo here." – I was automatically redirected to

https://www.gizmodo.com.au/amazon-secretly-removes-1984-from...

No, not still hellbent thanks Gizmodo, just wanted to go to the link I clicked on, geez, if that's OK. Although after that weird experience, I don't. I thought the story had been deleted, for a moment!

Re: Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

#67

Post by hrktb »

f1refly wrote: post #38

It's always a bit alienating to me when people suddenly wake up with their stuff taken away and are all like "how could this happen to me? why did noone warn me about this? how could amazon _do this to me_?" and then go off on their ways and "buy" the next movie from them (in addition to the amazon prime membership they already pay for that for some reason only includes the 480p version of the movie). It's not like t…

> how could amazon _do this to me_?

This is the main complain IMHO.

Most people trust amazon to be around in 10 years, and do not mind to be bound to a specific company. It would be fine if there was a recourse when getting kicked out of the platform.

This is similar to mail data on gmail, people are aware of the limitations, but are still pissed off when Google shuts down their account without any explanation.

Your point about DRM-free is another form of having a way out of the platform in case of dispute, but there could be other solutions as well I guess.

Re: Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

#68

Post by auggierose »

justinclift wrote: post #63
auggierose wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I also try to get it directly from the publisher. This has the advantage, that often you get the much better quality PDF version than the Amazon version with garbled math in it. I have bought maybe 5 books for Kindle that I couldn't get any other way. It sucks, because I cannot make these 5 books part of my Calibre library.

> It sucks, because I cannot make these 5 books part of my Calibre library. Depending on a range of factors, this might be useful for solving that: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24685279

Yeah, I've tried it once, but I couldn't get it to work quickly. Easier to just not buy books for Kindle.

Re: Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

#69

Post by underdeserver »

londons_explore wrote: post #27
underdeserver wrote: post #20

Honestly? I'm okay with this business model. I know it's not a popular opinion here - but as there's no reasonable way to prevent people from unrestrictedly distributing copies, the business model of licensing books sounds reasonable to me. What's not reasonable is the lack of transparency when you're suspected of abuse. I understand that there are many bad actors, but these companies are judge, jury and executioner…

I'd also be fine with the T&C's saying "For any reason, we can terminate the services we provide to you, and we will refund any money's paid with interest". That way, the company can decide to keep the evidence to themselves and not need to go to court, but must forgo all revenue from your account.

All money and interest is not enough.

If sign a contract that you will provide me a service and you back out of it midway, I'm usually worse off than if you had declined the engagement in advance. For example, if I contract you to build me a house, it takes six months, and three months in you decide to back out and pay me back with interest, I still have half a house I need to demolish or else I have to find someone who would continue your work (which I likely won't find), and I'm out 3 months' rent.

I would expect additional compensation.

Re: Amazon turned off customer’s Kindle account, blocking her from her books (2012)

#70

Post by throwaway_pdp09 »

Lammy wrote: post #57
f1refly wrote: post #38

It's always a bit alienating to me when people suddenly wake up with their stuff taken away and are all like "how could this happen to me? why did noone warn me about this? how could amazon _do this to me_?" and then go off on their ways and "buy" the next movie from them (in addition to the amazon prime membership they already pay for that for some reason only includes the 480p version of the movie). It's not like t…

I don't think victim-blaming is a great way to educate people on the existence and dangers of DRM. Convenience might even be worth it to some people, but I think it's more often a problem of ignorance. Any TV ad for a Kindle is going to focus on the broad selection and ease of use. Telling those people about the DRM isn't participating in the same conversation that sold them the device.

If people don't know I guess I agree, though with the question of: should they have known? If people do know but choose not to consider what may happen, they had that education you mention but disregarded it. I can't feel too sorry for them.

> I don't think victim-blaming is a great way to educate people

What would be a better way, specifically?

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