What Book Will Amazon Delete Next?
by Peter Kafka
Posted on July 21, 2009 at 5:11 AM PT
Last week, Amazon acknowledged that it deleted some copies of “1984″ and “Animal Farm” from customers’ Kindles. So what book will be next?
I ask this because while Amazon has said it won’t repeat what it did last week, it hasn’t actually sworn off remote book-removal–or remote anything-removal, for that matter–altogether.
Which means the e-commerce giant can do it again.
On Friday, Amazon told me that it yanked the George Orwell novels from customers’ e-book readers because they were “illegal”–bootlegged copies it never should have sold in the first place. “We are changing our systems so that in the future we will not remove books from customers’ devices in these circumstances,” the company said in a statement.
See the problem? It’s the, big, gaping “in these circumstances” loophole.
I’m still holding out a tiny bit of hope that Amazon (AMZN) is never going to delete a book, or anything it sells its customers, ever again. And that its oddly worded nonpromise is just an oddly worded nonpromise.
But I’ve repeatedly asked Amazon PR folks to mollify me, or at least spell out the circumstances in which they would delete a book again, and I haven’t gotten any response. So I’m fearing the worst: Amazon reserves the right to yank books out of your Kindle, but won’t tell you why or when until it happens.
If you want to play devil’s advocate, you can note that other e-commerce companies have similar abilities. Apple (AAPL) has disclosed that it has a “kill switch” that allows it to remotely wipe out apps from iPhones, ostensibly for security reasons.
And theoretically, the ability to wipe out a rogue iFart app should be as disconcerting as the ability to make a book disappear–intellectual property is intellectual property. But it just doesn’t rankle in the same way.
What to do? Slate columnist Farhad Manjoo wants new legislation to tackle the problem. But even if you like that approach, it’s not going to happen anytime soon–our lawmakers have full plates these days. My suggestion: Demand that Amazon, Apple or whoever else has remote access to your gadgets spell out exactly when, if ever, they will forcibly take back what they sold you. Or don’t buy from them at all.
Comments
I am concerned that Amazon or someone else will use this technology to change books without the user knowing. I am sure that the PRC government would love to rewrite history according to their whims and current beliefs. Now they can.
Posted by Richard Frisch at July 21st, 2009 at 5:53 amI moved this spring and by doing so I hate to move my four shelves worth of books. It was enough to convince me thati it was time to go get a kindle. However I haven’t done it yet because I haven’t had time.
After what Amazon has done however, I’ve decided to wait until e-books go DRM free. What they did in one fell swoop was destroy my faith in e-books. One of my friends also had problems getting his books to work on a new device since he ran out of activation and it’s enough to make me want to think I’m fortunate that my back hurts from moving all my books.
Posted by Bjorn Tipling at July 21st, 2009 at 7:53 amThere are lots of books (well, mostly very old books) available without DRM for the Kindle. I’ve purchased very few through Amazon, although it serves the purpose for magazines and newspapers.
If publishers (and Amazon) want the right to delete books they should sell them for FAR less than the purchase price and just call it a “rental”.
Paradigm shift has made paper publishing obsolete. Alternatives are a lot cheaper, and anyone can be an author now. Old media will try mightily to slow down this process by whatever means they can, but ultimately they will fail. Their iron gates will surround weeds while flowers flourish outside.
Posted by Mac Beach at July 21st, 2009 at 9:44 am