Amazon: We Won’t Delete Your Kindle Books Unless We Need to Delete Your Books
by Peter Kafka
Posted on October 1, 2009 at 8:10 AM PT
After Amazon got caught deleting customers’ George Orwell novels from their Kindles this summer, the e-commerce giant apologized and promised never to do it again.
Except not really: Amazon actually said it wouldn’t yank books from Kindles again “in these circumstances.”
At the time, I thought that sounded like a lawyerly loophole designed to give Amazon (AMZN) some flexibility in the event that it did indeed want to remove things you bought from your e-reader. Now Amazon has removed some of that wiggle room–and not surprisingly, it’s doing so at the behest of its lawyers.
Amazon has reached a proposed settlement with a high school student who sued after his copy of “1984″ disappeared (really). Part of the arrangement: A much more detailed set of rules regarding disappearing books. Here they are, via TechFlash:
Amazon will not remotely delete or modify such Works from Devices purchased and being used in the United States unless (a) the user consents to such deletion or modification; (b) the user requests a refund for the Work or otherwise fails to pay for the Work (e.g., if a credit or debit card issuer declines to remit payment); (c) a judicial or regulatory order requires such deletion or modification; or (d) deletion or modification is reasonably necessary to protect the consumer or the operation of a Device or network through which the Device communicates (e.g., to remove harmful code embedded within a copy of a Work downloaded to a Device).
That’s more like, it, right? True, if you have a real case of Orwellian paranoia, you could argue that Amazon still has the right to take your stuff from your device for any reason, while arguing that it’s a network “protection” issue, etc. But if you’re really that worried about Jeff Bezos’s grasp, you probably don’t want to buy a connected device from him, period.
The entire settlement is embedded below.
Comments
This author should learn to read. The agreement is only common sense. For example, they remove it if it contains a virus or if you don’t pay for it. What a goof.
Posted by dan houck at October 1st, 2009 at 9:33 amDan, IMO you are missing the point.
Amazon CAN delete the book (electronic version) that you bought.
Tell me under what circumstances Amazon can come take back the book (physical version) that I bought?
Posted by Ron Snyder at October 1st, 2009 at 10:43 amkindle is overpriced and clunky so who cares? the 753 geeks using it?
Posted by Sam Harrison at October 1st, 2009 at 2:24 pmkindle is overpriced and clunky so who cares?
Posted by Sam Harrison at October 1st, 2009 at 2:25 pmRon, I think you have missed the point and should research how media is licensed. It is ‘hard’ vs ’soft’. In some ways hard and soft are the same: if you leave a store without paying for the book, the store can take it away from you. In some ways soft is different: if at some point a hacker figures out a way to embed a virus in a book, Amazon reserves the right to remove it. At any rate, you are only licensing the book just like you license your software or the content of your DVD. If you abuse the license you have to surrender it.
Posted by dan houck at October 12th, 2009 at 6:34 am