Kindle the better travel books... all 1000 of them in one device!

any materials that the copyright has expired can also be put on a kindle for free. if you order it from amazon, they typically charge $.99 cents for public domain material because they deliver it over a wireless network. But if you plug your kindle into a computer you can put public domain materials on it. I often retrieve free, non-copyrighted books from The Guttenberg Project over the web and put them on my Kindle free of charge

But why would you bother, especially given Drew's revelations about Amazon's practices?

 

I have 3 different reader applications on my iPod Touch:

* eReader (which just takes Palm format books

* Stanza (which takes Palm, PDF and a few others)

* Wattpad (which uses its own format for a huge range of free books.

 

I can purchase books from eReader and Diesel books as well as getting free books from those two plus Wattpad.

 

To use the example from the Amazon incident, I can get "1984" for free on Wattpad which is legal in Australia because the copyright has already expired here.

But doesn't that make the point about how tricky this whole thing is. The quote from the NYT

"On the Internet, of course, there is no such thing as a memory hole. While the copyright on “1984” will not expire until 2044 in the United States, it has already expired in other countries, including Canada, Australia and Russia. Web sites in those countries offer digital copies of the book free to all comers."

If you were Amazon would you want to try to sort out where a copy of a book came from? I think deleting books that people legitimately bought is a bad idea particularly without notice and Amazon could have done a much better job. But what about the people who own the copyright to 1984; they legally own the copyright, should their interest just get squashed? There is lots of squealing and moaning when someone's pictures show up without attribution or actually get stolen, but isn't this the same thing?

Complicated questions and I am probably just grumpy about the bad viz yesterday at Anacapa.

Bill

I'd still buy a e-ink reader. Don't like reading from a back-lit source, especially for a long time.

A back lit source doesn't trouble me at all. I spend more than 10 hours a day in front of my LCD monitor and I've had no issues with reading novels on my iPod for hours at a time.

But doesn't that make the point about how tricky this whole thing is. The quote from the NYT

"On the Internet, of course, there is no such thing as a memory hole. While the copyright on “1984” will not expire until 2044 in the United States, it has already expired in other countries, including Canada, Australia and Russia. Web sites in those countries offer digital copies of the book free to all comers."

 

If you were Amazon would you want to try to sort out where a copy of a book came from? I think deleting books that people legitimately bought is a bad idea particularly without notice and Amazon could have done a much better job. But what about the people who own the copyright to 1984; they legally own the copyright, should their interest just get squashed? There is lots of squealing and moaning when someone's pictures show up without attribution or actually get stolen, but isn't this the same thing?

Amazon should have verified all this BEFORE they put the ebook up for sale through Kindle. They are the ones in the wrong not the people who bought the ebook in good faith. I don't know how things work in the US, but if it had happened in Australia, Amazon would have essentially been guilty of a breach of contract for canceling a sale after it had been completed. As for illegal use of pictures, it is the person or company that uses the pictures that we are upset about not those that view them.

If I attempt to buy ebooks from eReader, it determines whether I am allowed based on my location and what the publishers have dictated. If the publisher says the ebook can't be sold outside the US and Canada, I can't buy it. The same approach should be taken on ebooks where the copyright has expired in certain countries. i.e. I should be able to get 1984 for free (or for a nominal charge) because the copyright has expired in Australia.

That's why Amazon doesn't want to sell outside North America... gotta deal with too much legalese.

A back lit source doesn't trouble me at all. I spend more than 10 hours a day in front of my LCD monitor and I've had no issues with reading novels on my iPod for hours at a time.

 

 

Amazon should have verified all this BEFORE they put the ebook up for sale through Kindle. They are the ones in the wrong not the people who bought the ebook in good faith. I don't know how things work in the US, but if it had happened in Australia, Amazon would have essentially been guilty of a breach of contract for canceling a sale after it had been completed. As for illegal use of pictures, it is the person or company that uses the pictures that we are upset about not those that view them.

 

If I attempt to buy ebooks from eReader, it determines whether I am allowed based on my location and what the publishers have dictated. If the publisher says the ebook can't be sold outside the US and Canada, I can't buy it. The same approach should be taken on ebooks where the copyright has expired in certain countries. i.e. I should be able to get 1984 for free (or for a nominal charge) because the copyright has expired in Australia.

I agree that Amazon screwed up, I think they should have just paid the appropriate royalties to whomever owned the copyright and not removed a purchased book from your possession. My point about the pictures is that from the standpoint of the guys who own the copyright, a person buying a copy from Amazon is buying it illegally. If you look at some of the comment about the NY times lady who printed out pictures illegally, it certainly seemed that some people were worried about someone looking at them (at least hanging on their walls).

The whole copyright world seems to me to be quite a bit messier than say the patent world, where the lifetimes of patents are short and pretty much the same throughout the world. But then again lawyers need something to do.

Bill

I agree that Amazon screwed up, I think they should have just paid the appropriate royalties to whomever owned the copyright and not removed a purchased book from your possession.

I don't believe they had that option.

Amazon just dropped the Kindle price to $299.

Kindle is now international. I didn't notice it until I accidentally turned on my wireless and it downloaded books! Damn that was $1.99 down the drain. Anyhow it's great to know I can now buy books anywhere in the world.

Still loving my Kindle2 (non-international version). It's nice being able to read again while traveling!

Well I just looked at the countries... not anywhere in the world but good enough for me. I got my replacement Kindle 2 and they gave me an international version as warranty replacement... which is why I got nailed with roaming!

I'm still loving reading on my iPod Touch. I can't compare it to a Kindle, but I much prefer reading on the iPod than a real book.

I'm reading the Dirk Pitt (Clive Cussler) novels at the moment. Unfortunately, they are not all available as eBooks (although I do notice that Amazon has a couple in Kindle form that I can't get on the iPod). I'm up to "Sahara" at the moment, which I have to read as a paperback and I find it a real pain. It is so bulky, heavy and awkward to read in bed. The iPod is so much easier. I guess the Kindle would be better than a real book, too.

Update on Kindle 2 international. The licensing agreements limit what you can download if you are based elsewhere and buy a kindle. I just tried buying a few books and it stopped me due to my IP. I had to switch regions back to the US before it'd let me buy the books. Download is still free though

The difference in prices between countries for Kindle ebooks from Amazon is a little odd.

I recently did an exercise in comparing some prices for eBooks. It was not easy as Amazon (and others) don't make all eBooks available in Oz (publisher restrictions and other BS). Anyway, I can't work out why the exact same book costs more for Australians versus US people. I did the comparison signing on as me for Australia (and Amazon know I have an iPod Touch and as such would be downloading to it) and for choosing US (without signing on).

Example 1: The Complete Sherlock Holmes (Collection of all his adventures; 9 Volumes in one Book) (Kindle Edition). If I was in the US, I'd pay US$3.60. Here in Australia it is US$5.60. For the US version it says "includes wireless delivery via Amazon Whispernet" but for Australia it says "includes international wireless delivery via Amazon Whispernet". So they want to charge an extra $2 for sending over the public network? Or have they built the 3G charges into the cost of the book, even though I don't need to use 3G for delivery?

Now, all this work is out of copyright (as Arthur Conan Doyle died more than 70 years ago). I can download all 9 volumes via Stanza for nothing. There are a lot of similar examples.

Example 2: Twilight (Kindle Edition) by Stephenie Meyer.

US Price: US$4:24. AU Price: US$8.59 That's more than double for us Aussies. Why the markup?

Example 3: Mayday!/The Mediterranean Caper (Kindle Edition) by Clive Cussler

US Price: US$6.39 AU Price: US$10.84. Over $4 markup. Interestingly, I could get this book from Diesel eBooks for US$7.99.

Why aren't the prices the same? Could copyright make that much difference? If so, why a difference on works out of copyright?

I've been using the Kindle App on an iPhone for a couple of months now, possibly too small for some preferences, but I like it. Small, no extra gadgets to carry in addition to my phone, back lit and integrates quite well with the Kindle. Very handy for traveling.

I've been using the Kindle App on an iPhone for a couple of months now, possibly too small for some preferences, but I like it. Small, no extra gadgets to carry in addition to my phone, back lit and integrates quite well with the Kindle. Very handy for traveling.

There's also eReader, Stanza and Wattpad for the iPhone. All of these include free books. For example, with Stanza I was able to legally download the complete canon of Sherlock Holmes for free.

There are quite a few free books on Amazon. Mostly older stuff but still some goodies. What I hate most about Amazon is the purchase interface.