Amazon Gives In To Ridiculous Authors Guild Claim: Allows Authors To Block Text-To-Speech
from the and-here's-how-we-shoot-ourselves-in-the-foot dept
Well here's an unfortunate surprise. Following the ridiculous claims of the Authors Guild that automated reading aloud of ebooks using text-to-speech software is a violation of copyright, Amazon has agreed to back down and make the TTS feature optional on a per-book basis. The company issued a statement explaining why it believes that there is no copyright violation at all, but is still making the feature optional:Kindle 2's experimental text-to-speech feature is legal: no copy is made, no derivative work is created, and no performance is being given. Furthermore, we ourselves are a major participant in the professionally narrated audiobooks business through our subsidiaries Audible and Brilliance. We believe text-to-speech will introduce new customers to the convenience of listening to books and thereby grow the professionally narrated audiobooks business.While this does, effectively, allow the copyright holders to shoot themselves in the foot yet again, it's disappointing that the company wasn't at least willing to stand up for its right to offer such a feature without needing permission.
Nevertheless, we strongly believe many rights-holders will be more comfortable with the text-to-speech feature if they are in the driver's seat.
Therefore, we are modifying our systems so that rightsholders can decide on a title by title basis whether they want text-to-speech enabled or disabled for any particular title.
Meanwhile, if you don't mind the temptation to bang your head against the wall repeatedly, you can read an interview the Authors Guild's Paul Aiken conducted with Engadget about this whole thing. What's amazing is his inability to even understand how having a computer read aloud a book is no different than a person reading aloud the book or the Kindle reading aloud the book. He seems to think each is a different case that deserves different rights (and, of course, different licenses).
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Filed Under: authors guild, books, copyright, kindle, paul aiken, text-to-speech
Companies: amazon
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So now we know...
So now we know who amazon thinks is the kindles customer.
Hint: It's not the people buying the kindle.
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Re: So now we know...
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Let that be a lesson
Our justice system is aimed at what's cheapest, NOT what's right, just, fitting, and proper.
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The real benefit I could see with text to speech for a ebook reader is people with sight disabilities. Audiobooks are expensive comparatively. I love to read and if I lost my eyesight audiobooks would take the place of paper and ebooks. A TTS capable ebook reader would be a nice addition to audiobooks. Its just like going to a movie at a theater is a better expeince compaired to watching at home. You save the theater for the really good ones and watch the rest at home. For the good books you spend for the quality of having an actor read.
So the way I see it the writers guild wants to screw over the disabled and elderly.
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Fools
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killswitch
I don't care about TTS, but that that really was quick of Amazon to bow out like that.
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firmware update?
In any case, TTS sucks. It's all flat and emotionless and still harder to understand than a real person and still tends to misprounouce words too. I will take a good audiobook reading any day.
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Re: firmware update?
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I assume that means...
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I just cancelled my order.
This is ridiculous and it was a feature that was available when I ordered it earlier, in the first place. I'm glad it hadn't shipped yet.
Oh well...
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Re: I just cancelled my order.
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Re: Re: I just cancelled my order.
Amazon was in the right and they could have successfully fought this. Instead, they decided to take the easy way out and back down. You think they should be rewarded for that?
If they cave so easily and there's no negative consequences, what incentive will they have to fight for what's right next time? Why do some people believe that a company should be allowed to do virtually anything it wants and that people should still support it?
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Re: Re: Re: I just cancelled my order.
Somehow I think these groups are capable of being a ten times bigger headache for Amazon than the WGA are.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: I just cancelled my order.
You guys entirely miss the point. Blind people aren't buying a kindle and books in this manner, they are buying audio books to start with. They aren't in this market at all and they sure aren't going to get upset that you guys can't get an extra benefit for free on their backs. They are buying less costly audio books or braille type books.
You need to spend some time with people with limited sight and see how they read, with machines to enlarge the type onto a screen as an example, or buying large type books.
It's sort of like using the time-shifting fair use as a way to piggy back on unlimited online file sharing of TV programs or movies. It misses the point entirely.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: I just cancelled my order.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: I just cancelled my order.
Man, Harold, you just never stop being wrong, do you?
If you were right, why would the National Federation for the Blind be weighing on the matter?
http://www.nabble.com/NFB-on-Kindle-2-td22000456.html
Many blind people do, in fact, buy audio books and use reading software to read them.
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Re: Re: I just cancelled my order.
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it's official...
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I'm going to return mine
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Re: I'm going to return mine
What the Author's Guild doesn't seem to realize is that people don't buy 2 copies of a book, one hard copy and one audiobook. They buy one or the other. They're idiots.
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Re: Re: I'm going to return mine
A. Contact your Attorney General for discrimination charges
B. Look into a civil suit for discrimination
C. Contact advocate groups for the visually challenged
You have a right in the US to access anything a non-visually-challenged person can. Plus, you can easily shame them into removing this stupid killswitch.
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Re: Re: Re: I'm going to return mine
>B. Look into a civil suit for discrimination
>C. Contact advocate groups for the visually challenged
How long until the class action suit begins?
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What Authors Guild learnt from from RIAA
2. Nickel-and-diming customers for every incremental feature is a sign of innovative business model.
3. You don't have to justify your actions, instead keep repeating the same ridiculous arguments again and again till the press and the politicians repeats them for you.
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Just the Abusrd Begining for Endless Licensing
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Why cave, Amazon?
I'd ask for my guild dues back.
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sigh, again?
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Re:
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Not for me
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Let there be full disclosure
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Don't let those blind pricks push you around Authors Guild, you showed 'em good.....
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What makes this really hypocritical...
"There's a fundamental difference between a text-to-speech on a general use machine, such as a Mac or a PC, and a dedicated device that is intended primarily for consuming books.
What's the difference?
The difference is that there are audio rights involved in the books -- the Kindle converts every book that's sold into something other than just an ebook."
Sorry? Even if you accept that it is being really converted, rather than just read aloud, a PC TTS app does the exact same thing to every book. Also, Kindle isn't specifically for applying TTS to books - its a general function for anything written, like newspapers and magazines for which audio versions aren't available. So Aiken is talking out of his rear.
Fine, Amazon - if you don't want to defend your customers, I'm sure there will be plenty of discrimination suits lined up to enable TTS.
PS: Does Aiken think people who use voice synthesizers should be allowed to read books aloud to their kids?
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Re:
Bloody stupid move on amazon's part. They should have left the WGA looking like idiots all by themselves.
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If a player piano and a scroll can constitute a performance, (actually the player piano and scroll first created the idea that performances should be a protected right under copyright), then clearly the Kindle 2's ability to read text and covert it to audio is also a performance.
If Amazon had hired actors to read each book, i.e., convert the text into audio, no one would doubt that it was a performance. The fact that the conversion is being done by a machine does not change anything.
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Re:
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Copy RIght
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Audio books (aka books on tape) is a different product. The TTS feature would allow a user to get two uses out of a book rather than the single one they purchased (to read it), example having your kindle run while you are driving a car, perhaps with other people in the car at the same time. It is a question of rights granted, nothing more and nothing less. When you buy a book, you have no right to reproduce it on a website or give a public performance of it (reading it in public), why would you have the rights to reproduce it in any other format that the original format you purchased it in?
Yes, the question of "private use" always comes in, but at some point people have to learn what the purchase of a book or music really means. You purchase the license to use the product as presented, not in other ways. You don't buy a copy per se, you buy the rights to use a copy.
Web2.0 has certainly melted a few brains on the subject of rights and licensing.
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Re:
Harold, apparently, has never been in the book business. Most authors don't make a living from what they write, but there is no shortage in the supply of new authors who are willing to write books.
And, that's certainly not going to change because of this.
Audio books (aka books on tape) is a different product. The TTS feature would allow a user to get two uses out of a book rather than the single one they purchased (to read it),
You bought the book. With it comes unlimited "uses" of the text of that book. You can read it aloud or read it to yourself as many times as you want... or you can have someone else read it aloud or to themselves... even if that other person is a computer.
It is a question of rights granted, nothing more and nothing less.
Yes, and if you knew diddly about the law, you'd know that the rights granted with the purchase of the book includes the right to have it read aloud to you.
When you buy a book, you have no right to reproduce it on a website or give a public performance of it (reading it in public), why would you have the rights to reproduce it in any other format that the original format you purchased it in?
Indeed. But, of course, that's not what the Kindle does.
Web2.0 has certainly melted a few brains on the subject of rights and licensing.
Um. So far, the only one who seems clueless on rights and licensing is you.
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Authors write because they like to write - but the business of books says if there is no money in it, the books don't get published (unless the author uses a vanity press). If there is no money to be made selling books, there are no new books. Of course, they could always release them as freeware, but without marketing and promotion, most books would be unknown and never seen by the public.
The rights granted do include the right to have the book read to you (by a third party). But the Kindle isn't a person, it's a mechanical rendering of the book, in audio format. That isn't the exact same right, now is it? Audio books exist for a reason, they are a different product with different uses. You are looking at a small right granted to allow handicapped people to enjoy a book (read to them by someone else) and you are attempting to extend that right to people who don't require it, using a mechanical device and not a person. It isn't exactly the same.
It's exactly what Kindle does, turning written word into a version of an audio book.
Again, Web2.0 has made everyone like you into an armchair lawyer squealing about "rights" that don't really exist. I suspect you would have an entirely different opinion if you made your living as an author, rather than just being a KIA on the net.
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Re:
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Re: Re:
Blind people won't have an issue with this, they don't typically buy books off the shelf in this manner, they buy either braille type books, or buy audio books directly. There is no loss of rights here, there isn't anything more or less here than there was before.
Attempting to expand your own limited rights by piggybacking on disabled people who need a service is just disgusting.
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Re:
Nope, wrong again Harold (amazing how wrong you can be on so many different things in such a short period of time). I do not participate in any sort of file sharing, uploading/downloading of unauthorized content at all.
Authors write because they like to write - but the business of books says if there is no money in it, the books don't get published (unless the author uses a vanity press). If there is no money to be made selling books, there are no new books. Of course, they could always release them as freeware, but without marketing and promotion, most books would be unknown and never seen by the public.
Assumes incorrectly (again, Harold, it's stunning how many incorrect assumptions you make...), that these actions actually make it harder for authors to make money. That's wrong. Providing MORE VALUE to readers means that they're more likely to buy. LIMITING value to readers makes them LESS LIKELY to buy. This latest move takes away value, diminishing the market.
The rights granted do include the right to have the book read to you (by a third party). But the Kindle isn't a person, it's a mechanical rendering of the book, in audio format
No, it is not a "rendering." That implies a final product. It is not. If you don't understand how TTS works, you really shouldn't open your mouth.
To date, you have shown yourself to not understand business, economics, value, price, cost account, the music business, the book business and a number of other things as well.
Exactly how can we take you seriously?
Audio books exist for a reason, they are a different product with different uses.
Who said otherwise? But just because a different product exists, doesn't mean that a separate right is granted.
Again, Web2.0 has made everyone like you into an armchair lawyer squealing about "rights" that don't really exist. I suspect you would have an entirely different opinion if you made your living as an author, rather than just being a KIA on the net.
Yes, that's why authors from Neil Gaiman to John Scalzi to Wil Wheaton to Cory Doctorow and many others have all come out against the Authors Guild over this. Plenty of authors are smart enough to recognize how it increases the value of a book.
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Re: Re:
I'm only wrong because you don't agree, not because of fact. Reality isn't exactly your strong suit, I doubt you run a business or actually produce a product. You would feel very different if you were losing income by having your rights eroded.
Your value argument is laughable. People bought hard and soft cover books with nobody to read it to them, and they got value. Now they are going to get a book in a digital format that they won't even have to store in bookcases or gather dust, which is more value, and yet you still want more? If you want more in this world, you pay for more. It's a pretty simple deal. Mcdonalds hamburgers are $2, a good steak is $40. You don't get steak for a Mcprice.
What you are seeing as a "doesn't cost them anything to do" option is far from the truth. A talking Kimble pretty much destroys the books on tape / audio books marketplace, removes another sources of income, the type of income that helps to keep costs down. It isn't like you are getting a free audio CD with every book you buy, now is it? last computer book I bought with a CD / DVD attached cost a bit more than what amazon is going to charge for a kimble download.
The rights granted by purchasing a book, either printed or by Kimble, are the same, not different. Additional use rights can be granted, but typically they aren't free. TTS rendering (even done realtime) is a different use from the original purchase, and not a right granted typically in buying a book. What is so hard to understand here?
Audio books are a serperate product and seperate use right. You don't get a printed copy of the book with the audio CD, nor does it grant you the right to write out the content of the book and give it to other people. It also doesn't give you the right to present that audio in public, example. It's a different product, nothing more or less.
In the end, Amazon makes a pile of money selling books with the rights that go with them. Kimble is an extension of that business and those rights. Amazon wouldn't want to end up in a (losing) rights battle with authors just to make armchair lawyers and professional protestors happy.
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Re: Re: Re:
Heh. So you don't have any actual argument to respond to proof that you were wrong... and this is the best you can do? Fascinating.
Authors are showing that you are wrong. Because you happen to not like one of the authors you are left unable to give a coherent argument. Yikes.
I'm only wrong because you don't agree, not because of fact
No Harold, you are wrong because you are FACTUALLY INCORRECT.
There is NO AUDIO RIGHT that is violated by an automated reading of a text file you purchased. It doesn't exist. There is a performance right -- but that's not a performance. There is a right on a derivative work, but that's only a work in a *fixed* medium. An automated reading aloud does not qualify.
There is NO RIGHT that is violated by the TTS reading aloud -- and stunningly, the Authors Guild even admits that when it comes to TTS on a computer.
Reality isn't exactly your strong suit, I doubt you run a business or actually produce a product.
I do both, extremely successfully, but your ability to be wrong doesn't surprise me.
You would feel very different if you were losing income by having your rights eroded.
Not at all. You know why? Because I set up my business such that my rights don't get "eroded". I picked a business model where the free exchange of ideas INCREASES my ability to make money.
But, again, you are simply wrong in claiming that the authors "rights" are eroded. They're not. You cannot name the right that was eroded. It doesn't exist. The Authors Guild is simply making up a non-existent right.
If you want more in this world, you pay for more. It's a pretty simple deal.
Your ignorance of basic economics is astounding. I assume you pay more today for computers then you did 10 years ago? Oh wait... they're cheaper today? How could that be?!? Weird Harold insists that's impossible. But, of course, it's because Weird Harold does not understand the economics of information.
A talking Kimble pretty much destroys the books on tape / audio books marketplace, removes another sources of income, the type of income that helps to keep costs down
Um. There is no law against "removing a source of income." You know who removed a source of income from horse and buggy makers? Automakers. And that was perfectly legal. Your ignorance seems to know no bounds.
The rights granted by purchasing a book, either printed or by Kimble, are the same, not different.
Among the rights is the right to have it read aloud, by human or by computer. If you can point to the law that says otherwise, I'd love to see it, because IT DOESN'T EXIST.
TTS rendering (even done realtime) is a different use from the original purchase, and not a right granted typically in buying a book. What is so hard to understand here?
What's hard to understand is the fact that you've MADE UP a legal right that DOES NOT EXIST anywhere in the law. Seriously. Point us to the law that says that reading aloud something by a machine requires a different right. Even the Authors Guild in the interview above isn't so stupid to make such a claim, because they know it's not true.
Audio books are a serperate product and seperate use right.
Yes. AUDIO BOOKS are. But that's because AUDIO books are recorded in a FIXED MEDIUM. That's the right that is set aside by copyright law, of which you appear to be wholly ignorant.
You don't get a printed copy of the book with the audio CD, nor does it grant you the right to write out the content of the book and give it to other people.
Right, because those are FIXED MEDIA. FIXED. Look up copyright law. Then come back and apologize for being totally ignorant of the law.
It also doesn't give you the right to present that audio in public, example. It's a different product, nothing more or less.
No, that's a performance right, which is something different. But, of course, no surprise that you seem ignorant on that as well.
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For those of you no longer buying a Kindle, you should send Amazon a few hateful e-mails.
Someone should pretend to be blind and send Amazon a complaint. Isn't there some sort of over-arching visually impaired rights group that would be interested in how greed resulted in restricted rights for visually impaired people using this device.
What the authors guild doesn't realize is that this means anyone who is smart and doesn't have the option to play the text-to-speech on an ebook, will simply downloaded the copyrighted version online.
What this results in is the simply LOSS OF SALES and customer disatisfaction.
How incredibly fucking stupid!
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Content creators get all the rights, and consumers lose more and more every day.
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This discriminates against the visually impaired
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great news
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From Amazon's point of view, a shrewd solution
This is great! There will be publishers who opt to make this an extra charge, and those who do not. Then the market will decide. All books won't be affected, only those chosen by the publishers.
And who comes out looking like the bad guy? Not the company who can say "the publisher disabled this neat feature for this particular book." Amazon can rightly claim that the feature is there, unless the publisher decides to disable it. If you had 100 books on your Kindle, and one of them wouldn't do text-to-speech because the publisher decided not to allow it, who would you complain to?
Hint: not Amazon.
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Entertainment
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Re: Entertainment
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Re: Re: Entertainment
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What a joke
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How stupid.....
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TTS anywhere?
Also, I object to the guild's insensitivity to those with seeing problems who would love to put any book they can into an audio format. I'm betting there's some books which will have this restriction on them for no reason other than because someone can, yet that book would never be published as an audiobook.
I'm beginning to think the entire world has gone stupid with control freakishness.
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any scifi or fantasy authors members?
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Next Up ...
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Re Weirdo Herold
Oh and calling Mike a "pirate bay type" is just making yourself look like a TOOL.
once again Weirdo H., Text to speech is NOT an Audio Book.
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To continue this book in English, please insert 25¢
So again, people are looking at the 5% of people who buy audio and printed formats, thinking they just found the next Red Lake Goldmine. But once again, their logic is absolutely flawed.
I'd say only 5% of people who buy the printed version also buy the audio version, and even that may be a stretch. But someone along the way thought they can make a quick buck by creating a new license which benefits the publisher of the printed version because TTS is a derivative of the printed works.
So while you bicker like two old ladies about what's right, I will just head to the library and check out the audio and print version for free.
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Kindle's price will cover a lot of library late fees
$20.00 for a book.
I'm just saying libraries costs less...
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Re: Kindle's price will cover a lot of library late fees
http://www.amazon.com/kindle
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Amazon should not have given in
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Re: Amazon should not have given in
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Sympathy for the authors
I totally buy the argument that copyright law is not the thing that applies here. But what do you say to the authors who have both audiobook and e-book contracts and are sitting there thinking "OMG I'm gonna get sued for breaching exclusivity!!"? You're not going to make any headway until you can answer that.
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Re: Sympathy for the authors
the "free things from copyright" people forget that rights are granted in different ways for different things to different people at different times. Amazon is wisely leaving the option to the publisher / author so that they don't end up in the position of having aided the breaching of a contract somewhere else.
It's remarkable how little people understand about publishing and granted rights.
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Lazy Man's Book Reader is Status Symbol Of The Lazy Man
Maybe Kindling's existence is to create problems which need to be solved? After all, it has a remarkable ability to create new licensing problems. Even if you bought books regularly, kindling versions are usually $10 off of the print version. This still makes a breakeven point for the hardware at 35 books.
Assuming a 2 year product cycle, before the battery dies, spill coffee on it, or you leave it on top of your car (because your a fat oaf) It's still over 2 books a month before Kindling 3 hits the shelf. During this time, you can't lend a funny book to others. Even if you did borrow your entire library of satirical non fiction to a friend or co-worker for a day or two, they'd surely start reading your other books, and you wouldn't see your kindling fire starter for months, provided *they* didn't leave it on their car.
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Not quite one-sided
They do look ignorant, but I don't think they're wrong to insist on being able to control this (except, will it be the authors in control: I think not).
Some publishers, and some authors, have demonstrated that even free ebooks make money: ebooks increase sales of printed books. While that might not apply to all markets, at that end of the range, audio is likely to be enabled. Baen sell ebooks too, at a low price. The audio option will sell to people who don't buy paper.
Other companies seem to fear ebook sales. They believe that ebooks will replace paper. They will block the audio option.
And most publishers just seem to be confused.
The Authors Guild are looking for a weapon against the publishers, and I don't blame them for that. But I hear the whir of Dr. Gatling's patent toenail clippers coming up to speed.
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there are many
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Wait for the lawsuits
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Wtf Amazon
Author's Guild, you suck and now look like one of the biggest bunch of idiots out there.
Certainly Amazon, you could have looked anywhere on the net and saw the entire public pointing out how stupid that group was, and yet you still bowed down before them. Pathetic.
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banged my head too much
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adobe next
Just build your own hackintosh Kindle. That way you'll get the device you really want and no rights-claimers restricting your enjoyment of their product.
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