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Amazon's killing a feature that let you download and backup Kindle books

theverge.com

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Re: Amazon's killing a feature that let you download and backup Kindle books

#41

Post by kenmacd »

tene80i wrote: post #7
throwawaygmbno wrote: post #2

The simple solution is to stop buying eBooks from Amazon. Pirate all of your epubs and PDFs so you will always have an offline backup. If you enjoyed the book buy a hard copy for a friend, relative, book club, etc from a local book store. Amazon doesn't need your money anymore.

Your solution hurts authors more than Amazon. Just buy ebooks from somewhere else! Don’t be cheap and pretend it’s principled. I know you say buy a copy if you enjoyed it but that’s not really how commerce works and none of these authors agreed to offer you donationware.

> I know you say buy a copy if you enjoyed it but that’s not really how commerce works and none of these authors agreed to offer you donationware.

I'm all for also buying books, but my local library has all the books too, so it is sort of how the commerce of books works (at least where I live).

Also if people are still buying ebooks or kindles from Amazon after the whole 1984 fiasco I doubt they're going to care about downloads.

Re: Amazon's killing a feature that let you download and backup Kindle books

#42

Post by jrm4 »

paulcole wrote: post #36
throwawaygmbno wrote: post #2

The simple solution is to stop buying eBooks from Amazon. Pirate all of your epubs and PDFs so you will always have an offline backup. If you enjoyed the book buy a hard copy for a friend, relative, book club, etc from a local book store. Amazon doesn't need your money anymore.

Isn’t the simpler solution to not care? I’d rather just pay to read books from Amazon right on my Kindle than go through the rigamarole of pirating all my epubs and PDFs. In 16 years of Kindle ownership I’ve never once been like dang I wish I had an offline backup of that.

Very simple. Maybe the simplest comment I've seen on this site.

Re: Amazon's killing a feature that let you download and backup Kindle books

#43

Post by crest »

pclowes wrote: post #12

I am weary of corporations still trying to own everything they already sold me. Additionally sick of them trying to control speech and thought based on whatever ludicrous corporate nanny culture is in vogue. The people censoring books with “inappropriate language” have no understanding of precedent, history, or art. 1/100th as talented as the authors whose work they “update”. Their life’s greatest accomplishment is m…

I don't have a problem with changing the language in older works, but I have a massive problem with hiding the change or the previous versions. Sell a perpetual, transferable license to the work and make newer (aka "improved") versions of the document available after the sale. I will appreciate better layout, fixed typos, timestamps to match up with audio books etc, but if you try to whitewash history and erase notes taken on the old versions you deserve to drown in the shitstorm.

Oh you just wanted to change the deal and turn a book sale into a prepaid rent you can cancel or modify to maximise profits? Get fucked Amazon! Such short sighted greed will drive readers to put in the effort and actively search out pirated content instead of paying exorbitant unearned margins to you. That's how you sustain a pirate community you damn fools.

Re: Amazon's killing a feature that let you download and backup Kindle books

#45

Post by beej71 »

McDyver wrote: post #29
msp26 wrote: post #16

What are some stores that sell DRM free books? If it's easy enough to rip that's fine too.

Calibre lets you manage your library, convert formats and there are plugins to remove DRM

While true, I'd rather buy DRM-free books to support the concept. Cory Doctorow's books are like that. And I've seen some from the library, as well. It would be neat to see a DRM-free store.

Re: Amazon's killing a feature that let you download and backup Kindle books

#46

Post by jrm4 »

throwawaygmbno wrote: post #2

The simple solution is to stop buying eBooks from Amazon. Pirate all of your epubs and PDFs so you will always have an offline backup. If you enjoyed the book buy a hard copy for a friend, relative, book club, etc from a local book store. Amazon doesn't need your money anymore.

All the whiners in the thread. Now, as a lawyer I technically can't recommend this, but:

Consider someone who goes to the library, reads books, and then only buys them if they like them.

There is no meaningful moral difference between this and so called "piracy" + buying later.

Please, buy books and support authors. But also, don't pooh-pooh the entire point of the existence of libraries.

Re: Amazon's killing a feature that let you download and backup Kindle books

#47

Post by wintercarver »

nrook wrote: post #38
tejohnso wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Just buy ebooks from somewhere else! Where can I buy ebooks (epub) that give me access to download the file so that I can copy it to my other devices and keep it on my own backups and organize it in my digital library the way I want to? I want a good selection of anime / manga / sci-fi, and a little bit of the typical best seller stuff.

Honestly in most genres you're hosed, but if you're into Japanese nerd stuff, j-novel club sells light novels (and a few manga) with no DRM.

Wait WHAT?! I’ve been buying ebooks off BookWalker and it’s so annoying. Their reader app sucks and they have these faux-protective constraints like not permitting a “copy” function on any highlighted text and limiting a book to no more than 50 highlights. It’s so silly… Edit: damn, had assumed you meant maximum nerd mode and that these books were available in Japanese… looks like it’s all English translations. So it goes.

Re: Amazon's killing a feature that let you download and backup Kindle books

#48

Post by davidw »

I got a Kindle when I lived in Italy and it was so amazing being able to instantly get books in English with no shipping or import fees or any of that.

Now I regret how much control Amazon has over a substantial number of books I paid for, though.

Re: Amazon's killing a feature that let you download and backup Kindle books

#50

Post by [deleted] »

throwawaygmbno wrote: post #2

The simple solution is to stop buying eBooks from Amazon. Pirate all of your epubs and PDFs so you will always have an offline backup. If you enjoyed the book buy a hard copy for a friend, relative, book club, etc from a local book store. Amazon doesn't need your money anymore.

[deleted]
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