They shouldn't have the right to confiscate stuff he already owns. Just as Best Buy can't repossess the TV I bought 5 years ago if subsequently I miss a loan payment on a stereo. The state is allowed confiscate property (after a trial, etc), but not other entities, unless they go through legal channels. It doesn't matter if he killed Bezos's grandmother, Amazon can't just take his stuff. Unless, of course, the stuff isn't really his -- which this makes clear it isn't. I think the Kindle will do to books what the iPod did to music: every day, a few hundred more will figure out how to get ebooks without DRM...
What the hell are you talking about? They didn't take anything away from him, they closed his account. Your Kindle is linked to your Amazon account. No Amazon account? No Kindle Store. He can still read anything he's already purchased since those are stored on the Kindle itself.
If you own a Kindle, don't close your Amazon account and don't do anything to get it closed like try to scam Amazon with tons of bogus returns. If the returns were legit, contact customer service and plead your case. That's what this guy did, and they re-opened his account.
@schtum: I think that's his point. The legal side of these things needs to be cleared up and fast because in this day and age services ARE products. It's really amazon's own fault that this happens too since they lock it down so hard that there's no other way to use it except with a kindle account.
Perhaps a better analogy would be that, if you pester Microsoft with Vista complaints too often, they could turn off your ability to save new MS Word documents. "Hey, no problem: you can still read all your old docs! What are you complaining about?"
If you're really worried about this happening to you, the thing to do would be to open up a separate account just for your Kindle. You might need a different email address to open a new account, but each Kindle has its own email address so that's easy enough. It's a small pain in the ass, but it should keep your Kindle working if your regular account is shut down for any reason.
I'm not actually worried, I was just trying to understand the principle. If I were actually worried, I'd just use Stanza on my iPhone to read ebooks that I torrented for free.
Actually, you can store a thousand books on the Kindle itself, but you can also archive items which are then stored under your account on Amazon. If your account is closed you lose access to those archived items.
For those looking for a device strictly for reading, the new Kobo is a nice little option. It's small enough to slip into a pocket, can do more with a PDF than the competition, and at $129, it's $10 cheaper than both the Nook and Kindle WiFi.
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It doesn't matter if he stole a car from Amazon.
They shouldn't have the right to confiscate stuff he already owns. Just as Best Buy can't repossess the TV I bought 5 years ago if subsequently I miss a loan payment on a stereo. The state is allowed confiscate property (after a trial, etc), but not other entities, unless they go through legal channels. It doesn't matter if he killed Bezos's grandmother, Amazon can't just take his stuff. Unless, of course, the stuff isn't really his -- which this makes clear it isn't. I think the Kindle will do to books what the iPod did to music: every day, a few hundred more will figure out how to get ebooks without DRM...
What the hell are you talking about? They didn't take anything away from him, they closed his account. Your Kindle is linked to your Amazon account. No Amazon account? No Kindle Store. He can still read anything he's already purchased since those are stored on the Kindle itself.
If you own a Kindle, don't close your Amazon account and don't do anything to get it closed like try to scam Amazon with tons of bogus returns. If the returns were legit, contact customer service and plead your case. That's what this guy did, and they re-opened his account.
@schtum: I think that's his point. The legal side of these things needs to be cleared up and fast because in this day and age services ARE products. It's really amazon's own fault that this happens too since they lock it down so hard that there's no other way to use it except with a kindle account.
@schtum
Perhaps a better analogy would be that, if you pester Microsoft with Vista complaints too often, they could turn off your ability to save new MS Word documents. "Hey, no problem: you can still read all your old docs! What are you complaining about?"
If you're really worried about this happening to you, the thing to do would be to open up a separate account just for your Kindle. You might need a different email address to open a new account, but each Kindle has its own email address so that's easy enough. It's a small pain in the ass, but it should keep your Kindle working if your regular account is shut down for any reason.
I'm not actually worried, I was just trying to understand the principle. If I were actually worried, I'd just use Stanza on my iPhone to read ebooks that I torrented for free.
Actually, you can store a thousand books on the Kindle itself, but you can also archive items which are then stored under your account on Amazon. If your account is closed you lose access to those archived items.