Amazon removes books from Kindle Unlimited after they appear on pirate sites
torrentfreak.com
torrentfreak.com
A couple years ago, Amazon "upgraded" their Kindle Cloud Reader so that it now displays images of text, instead of the text itself. This is of course a huge step backward in terms of accessibility, and we heard from joint users who were upset to no longer be able to access their Kindle books in ways that were easy for them to read. For some people with disabilities, this move essentially 'bricked' their Kindle library.
My guess is that they did this for anti-piracy reasons. But how effective can this be? It's not like people can't use OCR to capture text from the new image-based platform. Hell, you can even point your iPhone at a computer screen and capture all the text. And once one person has pirated a book, it's game over. I don't understand how they think they'll 'win' this game of cat-and-mouse. Are they just doing this stuff to appease publishers? Are they willing to sacrifice accessibility for this Sisyphean attempt to quash digital piracy? I understand both sides of the argument from a theoretical perspective, but I don't get how this is supposed to work on a practical level.
1: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/beeline-reader/ifj...
In many cases, it’s not about the users you’ll lose, but the ones you’ll fail to gain.
I have minor accessibility issues. Kindle has been a godsend: large text, extra spacing, heck I could view one word at a time if I wanted.
Complaining about the Cloud Reader when you have an accessibility superstar in the tablet seems a bit weird.
But there are many other types of assistive technologies out there, including some that are life-changing for all kinds of readers with disabilities. By making the platform inaccessible to browser extension, Amazon has created a situation where their in-house accessibility options are the only ones that can be used. For someone who has accumulated a library over a long period of time, on the understanding that the KCR supports browser extensions, it's pretty lousy to have the rug pulled out with no recourse.
The original Hixie (former editor of HTML5) manifesto/proposal even included using WebUSB to talk directly to input devices!!
Flutter/CanvasKit[1] & Ian Hixie[2] are actively pursuing/shipping this. There's a blog suggesting Jetpack Compose goes this route[3]. Seems like interest is going to keep growing. These folks say they are just doing it so developers can build "pixel perfect" apps, but oh, it also coincidentally means users have no control or say in the pixel's as they'd prefer them. Not everything written will necessarily be as Lawful Evil/impedeing-basic-human-use as what Amazon is up to here, but it'll be up to each org & each dev what pixels on the screen are interactable how.
One huge nightmare/opaque infernally damned shitworld.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34527980
[2] "Towards a Moderm Web Stack" https://docs.google.com/document/d/1peUSMsvFGvqD5yKh3GprskLC... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34612696
Ironically, my plugin still works on Docs...but only on comments. The body text is untouchable.
I thought docs was working? At least in Mac's voice over on a laptop. There's also a menu setting to turn on more accessibility things. Not sure what that actually does though. But as of December VO could read the body text.
These efforts will, in some cases, have hacks & workarounds. The ARIA group is active building alternative imperative accessibility options for graphical systems. Every one of the folks involved ripping out the actual html web for their own developer-defined Canvas-powered stack realizes accessibility is a minimum legal requiremement. But it can still violate every norm & break every tool an accessobility user wants to use/has ever used, and tick this legal box. It can still be a nightmare hellscape for them. (It probably will be.)
And we get much accessibility by default from having DOM/HTML. It's quite possible that these "Modern" un-web apps have accessibility options in the framework, but that many developers botch up or dont spend the time to use these accessibility options, or they use them poorly. There's plenty of A11Y/ARIA concerns sites should consider on the current web, and fail to do great. But the baseline can be ok, & the user can refine the site/experience (since it's html/dom)!!!! Whether the baseline did-nothing experience stays the same/gets better/gets worse for users (assuming they happen to have compatible a11y tools, per above paragraphs) on these "Modern" un-web apps is very TBD, and I tend strongly towards believing it'll be worse. And it wont be as malleable.
Accessibility needs to be regulated. In UK accessibility is well regulated for public websites: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/accessibility-requirements-for-p...
If we do not do the same for all websites then people with disabilities will be kicked out of a normal live.
> But how effective can this be?
As you point out it will not stop pirates.My guess is that they implement the feature, piracy goes down the week it is released, and everybody gets a bonus. In less than a month piracy is up again as they develop new tools, and people with disabilities lost access to it. But it is too late.
Accessibility in websites need some kind of evolutionary pressure to exists. Otherwise change after change it disappears. And the population that needs this features to have normal lives is not large enough to create an economic incentive.
Years ago, I worked for a university. We were implementing Netscape/iPlanet/Sun email for students. The webmail was not accessible. The director of our disability services office was blind, (she was both a full-time staff member and a part-time student) and she complained it was unusable for her. Sun told us “accessibility is coming in a future version”. What did we do? We gave her a shell account with Pine, and told her we’d offer the same to any other student who couldn’t use the webmail due to disability. She was happy with that outcome.
Similarly, suppose someone like Amazon provides a non-accessible privacy-resistant service, and then offers users with proof of disability an alternative service which is more accessible but less privacy-resistant - depending on the details and the jurisdiction, that might comply with disability discrimination laws.
Personally, that doesn't bode well for my deteriorating eyesight, which is still very far from disability, but already at a level where audiobooks are easier than real books.
There are limits to what contracts are allowed to legally do. And the idea that a contract can be broken, to the detriment of one side, due to the actions of a third party that neither has control over, and that the contract isn't primarily about, seems highly suspect.
Obviously there are some legitimate reasons for contracts around third-party actions -- betting, derivatives, insurance policies, and so on. Which are either for entertainment or risk mitigation.
But what Amazon is doing here simply feels abusive. However I'm not a lawyer so I don't know if there's a legal term for this type of "abuse" in contract law.
It's been clear for a long time now that if you use a Kindle you don't "own" the content you read on it. Very, very clear. Ironically I think it all started when an Orwell book was taken down. It's hard to feel sorry for Kindle buyers when this stuff has been known for a long time.
This whole book takedown thing is another dumb move that probably happened because someone thought it was a good idea to zealously enforce an exclusivity contract without realizing what would happen -- especially not realizing the possibility that third parties might put books on torrent sites in order to hurt the authors and get their books removed from Kindles.
When big companies do dumb things, people have a tendency to vastly overestimate the amount of thought and intention that went into it. This was probably a dumbass move by some mid-level person who thought they were helping.
In the mean time, though, I do feel like I'm doing the "right thing".
Clearly there are already ways to remove the DRM, and the lifespan of a Kindle is decades so they will not easily be able to add new DRM to the old hardware.
In my opinion, it's roughly analogous to Steam but it moves at a glacial pace.
The revenue gained from those devices is likely greater than the revenue lost from people pirating content who would actually pay for it.
There are blu-ray players which support Amazon video and they can not be updated by Amazon.
1) The Terms of Service for usage of Kindle devices are not relevant to a contract between Amazon and an author whose work is published through Kindle Unlimited.
2) Kindle Unlimited is a "all you can eat" subscription service. Users of the service explicitly do not own the books they download and read through it, just like you don't own the music you listen to on Spotify or whatnot.
No, but it's definitely relevant for Kindle users who purchased a book only to see it disappear from their devices!
Amazon also removed an anime I purchased in 2019. For a while it said it wasn't available to watch in my location. As of today it's trying to sell it to me again!
This is a common problem with digital storefronts - people think they bought something from store X, but they actually got it from store Y or on a different account.
Amazon remembers every order you've ever placed - including digital ones. Check whether you can find the order in your order history - if you can see the order, but not the item, Amazon customer support will add it to your account again.
In the case of the anime, I have the order on Amazon and can follow the link to the item. I also know a bit about the production and release of this anime in different markets and can assure you I'm not mistaken.
It was amazing!
He tried to monitize by selling it digitally on Amazon music. Amazon figured out he was sneaking around Audible, and stopped it.
Now I can’t download those “songs” - in fact they don’t exist anywhere in Amazon’s system.
Users who buy a book in a foreign country have lost the book when they got home.
Amazon accused them of flouting jurisdictions and trying to buy something not for sale in their country.
In fairness, there’s an audiobook I really, really want that isn’t available in the US Audible store, but is available in foreign Audible stores.
I really really want this book - it’s a poem I really love recited by a voice actor I really love.
But if I purchase it on a trip, or use a VPN Amazon could kill my entire Kindle/Audible collection.
So I bought the audio cassette on eBay.
Actually, no, that's even more irrelevant.
I feel like I'm repeating myself here, but: Kindle Unlimited is a subscription service. It is not the same as purchasing Kindle-formatted ebooks through the main Amazon web store, nor is it the same as a Kindle device. (Kindle Unlimited doesn't even require Kindle hardware; they're just both marketed under the same brand name.)
technically you don't own any music (aside from one you made on your own I guess), just own some kind of license to use it
Not everyone reads tech news. As long as Amazon uses "buy" rather than "rent" or "subscribe" I don't think most people will notice.
This sounds like something some government somewhere could go after Amazon for, but I very much doubt that it'll happen any time soon.
The "1984" incident happened in 2009 - nearly 14 years ago.
Amazon modified their terms and conditions to make it difficult for them to do something like that again.
I'm not sure that one example means anything in 2023.
I hate to be "defending" amazon here, but I doubt that they're doing this intentionally. In other words, they're not trying to retaliate against authors that had the audacity to have their books on torrent sites. Their behavior in this case resulted from a series of seemingly logical actions, at least when considered independently:
1. they have some sort of program which promises some sort of benefits (eg. higher royalties) in exchange for exclusivity
2. to enforce the above, they created an enforcement team to scour the internet looking for infractions
3. some worker was tasked with some vague task like "can you find this book on an alternate distribution platform?", and they were able to turn up some instances. Maybe it's not obvious to them that it's an unauthorized site (I don't pirate ebooks but some pirate streaming sites look plausibly "legit"), or they do but they don't give a fuck (the backoffice interface has a yes or no checkbox, and they're too lazy to draft an email to management informing of this edge case), so they flag that book as violating the agreement.
"Amazon is aware of the complaints and informs TorrentFreak that it’s working with the people involved to find an appropriate solution."
That's PR speak indicating they won't be reversing this policy and re-adding everyone banned. So now it's an official policy endorsed at a high level and can be criticized as such.
And with regard to the short time since publication, I don’t think the clock starts when there’s negative PR about an issue, nor when they are informed about an issue. The clock starts at the point where, if the system were well-run, they would have become aware of the issue. That is, neither ignoring an issue nor cultivating silos of ignorance should garner any sympathy.
You can see the full breakdown here: https://kdp.amazon.com/en_US/help/topic/G201541130
You can usually get Amazon to put the books back up, but it tends to take a while and is very disheartening having all your work removed. It's been a problem for years, but Amazon basically owns the market so there's not much you can do.
Also, contract law varies a lot by country. What is allowed in the US may not be allowed in France for instance, adding an extra layer of complexity.
Isn't this actually an incredibly important part of every contract? Surely I would want any contract I'm part of to be clear about what happens if one of the relevant parties gets injured, or is unable to fulfill their obligations due to any reason beyond their control.
the question that has to be settled by the courts (if ever) is whether or not "buy" button is a bait-and-switch if Amazon reserves the right to rescind your purchase at any time without a refund.
which means you could go after the third party for getting the contract broken, but it's likely that what Amazon has in the terms allows them to do this.
And here it is free for H N. [2] feel free to kick me of your monopolistic website.
[1] https://www.amazon.com/Understanding-SEO-Systematic-Approach...
If Amazon is truly worried about exclusivity violations, the KDP Select program should focus its policing efforts on legitimate platforms (Apple Books, Google Play Books, Smashwords, Wattpad, etc.) where the vast majority of readers who don't use a Kindle may be expected to seek out ebooks. There should also be some mechanism for screening out excerpts that might appear on blogs, PR channels, and the like.
FWIW, there are new authors who run afoul of the exclusivity terms because they don't understand what this means or why Amazon wants exclusivity. This in turn follows from the fact that self-published authors are often tricked into signing up with KDP Select, following the dark patterns scattered throughout the KDP UI and not understanding how the program works, or even that they will lose control over pricing and ebook distribution rights.
Piracy will never end and the only way for businesses to meaningfully reduce it (to an extent) is to provide a compelling option that competes with it.
Much like Steam caused reduction of video games piracy. Piracy is a service problem
There's some software out there that's like $7/month per book I think, that's supposed to help find and help issue Cease and Desists for this stuff, that my wife is seriously considering getting to at least point to in case hers gets taken down to show she tried to do something about it. Problem is, for each book she releases, that's an extra $7 a month she's paying. Feels like mafia extortion money almost.
There's even been some anger lately because of pirated books that keep getting uploaded on Scribd, who now have an ebook subscription service, so Scribd is making subscription money off of pirated ebooks.
It's one of the stupidest things I've ever heard of, that Amazon punishes authors for this. If they carried process over to tv, movies, music, etc, they'd have to take down their entire catalog because all of that has pirated copies out there somewhere.
As for pirates on Amazon itself, or other major marketplaces: That's a different story. I have a registered trademark on Amazon Brand Registry and do use it to find bogus copies and copyright violations (usually in the marketing copy or cover images) to get them removed, with about 60 or 70% success.
Almost all of her income is from KU, not book sales, so it would crater her revenue.
I'm in a similar bind.
Only reason I didn't mention it by name in my earlier comment is I forgot what it was called, I had to ask her.
And to be clear I don't think MUSO is a bad company or anything, just that it's insane to me that authors have to feel like they have to get this service just to maybe hopefully keep their books on KU (or maybe hopefully facilitate getting them back on if they do get removed).
https://www.muso.com/piracy-protection-for-digital-first-aut...
That sent me over the edge, I had purchased and paid to be able to view this and it had been taken from me. Something inside of me snapped and so now my house sails under the flag of the jolly roger, because it's the only way to really own something anymore.
So yo ho ho and a bottle of rum, me hearties.
Amazon has no problem selling fake goods. Ive received fake batteries, fake baby shampoo, etc.
Amazon has no problem selling pirated books.
But if pirated books are available outside of Amazon, Amazon stops selling the original?
Something like this is what I've used before https://thecrowleycompany.com/digitization-products/large-fo...
Since I didn't I can still give free copies to anyone I want, because I'm the copyright owner.
Kindle Unlimited pays authors out of subscription fees, based on pages read. There's a price per page read. [1] A pretty obvious fraud would be to get paid for reading (or at least skimming) by taking books you found elsewhere, uploading them, and reading them (probably with a different account). It's not easy for an automatic system to tell whether an author wrote a book themselves. This runs up the number of pages read and lowers the price per page, effectively taking money from other authors.
So, this seems to fall under "business models that aren't very seller-friendly because fraud." Amazon, like most businesses, does tolerate some amount of fraud, but I guess there are limits?
When people pay for specific books then it might be used as a money-laundering scheme, but at least it's not taking money away from other authors.
First became aware of this issue on the fantasy sub last month (https://old.reddit.com/r/Fantasy/comments/106ebm3/sometimes_...) - read the first book of that series, liked enough that I would've read the sequels on KU but not so much that I'd pay for it (2nd book costs more than 2.5 times the KU monthly subscription cost where I live).
Saw a few more such cases on twitter after too. Just can't understand Amazon's stance here.
"1. Exclusivity. ...you give us the exclusive right to sell and distribute your Digital Book in digital format while your book is in KDP Select. During this period of exclusivity, you cannot sell or distribute, or give anyone else the right to sell or distribute, your Digital Book..."
That's not a warranty that no 3rd party will distribute it contrary to your rights, however, so there's no breach if someone else distributes without your permission.
However, it doesn't matter since:
"3. Period of Participation... We can end KDP Select at any time at our discretion..."
However, I can’t believe that’s the right move. I could probably pirate everything on Netflix pretty easily, but I pay for the convenience. If my favorite authors newest book was not on KU just because it was uploaded to another site I wouldn’t be happy.
The standalone services have already started making big cuts to their own original content, with HBO Max removing Westworld and Netflix planning to remove Arrested Development, as (profitable) physical media returns: most CDs sold since 2004 in 2022, DVDs returned to overtake Blu-ray, new cassette music releases, etc.
Then I briefly lived somewhere with unreliable mail, and they decided to close my account on a whim. My queue was lost. Honestly wouldn't mind something like that again, although maybe they could just send me little thumb drives or something, because I don't have any optical drives anymore.
How infuriating.
AWS is also crappy and has hidden costs everywhere with an aweful reporting experience and no simple cancellation process. just scum
On one side is a world where anyone can download any book for free.
On the other side is a world where all books, textbooks, and journals are available exclusively from Amazon/Pearson/Elsevier and can only be read with a crappy official app (or device) and an active Internet connection.
Either way, I suppose the big losers are authors.
A typical pro-piracy talking point is "these big companies are evil, so you should feel justified taking their product without paying them money", but some of these stories have other explanations.
Especially when it comes to smaller victims, like independent writers and smaller businesses, who typically are already abused by bigger companies, the "pirates" (glamourizing term) can be seen as further abusing from a different direction. And (in cases of DRM and invasive legislation, etc.) the pirates help justify and enable further abuses from the big companies.