Public Service Announcement

[lebateleur]

For anyone who owns a kindle, some very unobtrusive fine print informed me today that amazon is sunsetting the "download and transfer via USB" option on February 26. Make sure to download the contents of your library to a non-kindle device before that, because once the option goes away anything you've paid money for will become wholly rent-to-never-own.

これで以上です。

Comments

[delphi]

Thanks for the heads up!

[lebateleur]

Of course; I hope it gives anyone who wishes a leg up on grabbing forever copies of their libraries.

[lirazel]

Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuck.

I have always used this option to keep library books on my non-wifi-connected Kindle for far longer than I otherwise would be able to. This especially comes in handy on trips, but I am going to miss it just generally.

[lebateleur]

On a more basic level it means that amazon will fully govern what happens to the content of your kindle whenever you connect to wifi to get a new book. If amazon wants to push an author's update that completely rewrites parts of the book you originally read (this has happened to me), it can. If it wants to delete a book from your library (which has also happened before), it can.

Kindle owners will be left with the choice of maintaining control over what's on their device at the expense of never adding new books, or ceding that control to keep buying or borrowing additional ebooks. I'm not a fan of those tradeoffs.

[lirazel]

You're so right. I was thinking primarily about how this affects my own use, but the larger implications are really dire and infuriating.

If amazon wants to push an author's update that completely rewrites parts of the book you originally read (this has happened to me)

O_O What was the book???

[lebateleur]

It was Charlie Holmberg's The Paper Magician, which is still one of my favorite indie fantasies for its sheer inventiveness. It was just a lot more so before the rewrite replaced some of that inventiveness with standard romance tropes.

Amazon also pushed updates to my ebook of Madeline Miller's The Song of Achilles that same year, but those were extras (albeit spoiler-containing ones) I was less irritated by it.

[lirazel]

That sucks! Were you just rereading and came across changes and were like WTF????? Because that would be crazy-making!

[lebateleur]

Yes, pretty much that. And it was crazy-making! Luckily, I'd written reactions in my journal so I had a record of actually having read a different book than the one that was now on my kindle. That, plus a happy little "Updated!" banner in my content library clued me in to what was going on.

[lirazel]

Do you have another copy of the original? It's horrible to think a book you loved is just lost to you!