[HN Gopher] Amazon is no longer allowing downloading Kindle Unli...
___________________________________________________________________
Amazon is no longer allowing downloading Kindle Unlimited titles
via USB
Author : dodgermax
Score : 126 points
Date : 2023-01-15 17:51 UTC (5 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (goodereader.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (goodereader.com)
| dukeofdoom wrote:
| what's the best alternative? that you can upgrade the tiny
| storage these readers come with to store more on them
| charles_f wrote:
| Books are usually less than a meg, I don't know how much more
| than the few gb they come with you'd need
| II2II wrote:
| I don't know if they are the best alternative, but I have been
| using Kobo for over a decade. In that time, they have not shown
| any intererest in locking down their devices. That is not to
| say they are easy to modify, but they do not use encryption (or
| any other mechanism) to lock people out of their devices[1].
| Anyone with a knowledge on unix and an update file can figure
| out how to modify the software. The community has also been
| making binary patches to Kobo's proprietary components for
| about a decade, and they don't seem to be interested in
| preventing that either. Some models even have replacable
| internal uSD cards, should you want to increase the storage.
|
| The last Kobo I bought has never been online and runs open
| source reader software (KOReader) which is much more powerful
| than any commercial alternative I have seen.
|
| There are other options out there that likely have similar
| qualities. I simply have not used them. I simply wanted to
| point out that there are much more open platforms out there.
|
| [1] I am talking about device level access here. Kobo does use
| DRM for purchased books and books borrowed through libraries.
| politelemon wrote:
| I've been on the fence regarding my next ereading move for a
| while now. Amazon has been continuing its Apple-ification of the
| Kindle ecosystem by shutting down systems, APIs, and features
| that made it open and accessible. I am sure most people won't
| care, and the current state will continue to appeal to a certain
| kind of mindset that is only interested in the consumption aspect
| (or worse, the shilling for such ecosystems).
|
| Not that the rest of the industry is a great place at the moment.
| All major ebook sources are DRMd and locked, and that includes
| libraries, which have traditionally been associated with public
| spaces and openness.
|
| I have heard that Kobos are becoming a more viable alternative as
| a reading device, and that they are a little more open. It works
| with Calibre and Calibre-Web. I will now be researching a Kobo
| device for this year, and although I am 'voting with my wallet',
| I don't think it will make much of a difference being a single
| drop among millions going the other way.
| charles_f wrote:
| I just switched from a first generation paperwhite to a kobo
| clara 2e. My kid has a last generation paperwhite so I can
| compare.
|
| What I like: the small format, 6" is better than 7 imo. It's
| not Amazon. It works with overdrive (at least in Canada) so I
| can borrow books from library.
|
| What I don't like: it doesn't have a "send to kindle by email"
| equivalent, that I was heavily relying on. Books sent by usb
| don't sync between devices, and have some quirks (they seem to
| work slower, you can't highlight across pages). Calibre web
| could give you that but in practice it is too buggy to be a
| sustainable option. It's overall not as polished as a kindle
|
| Overall I'm ok with the move, it works sufficiently well, and
| I'm especially glad to reduce the cash I send to Amazon
| jacurtis wrote:
| Just to clarify, you can still use the Kindle for books
| purchased elsewhere or rented at a library. This article is
| specifically a restriction on "Kindle Unlimited" which is a
| spotify-like subscription for books.
|
| Without this subscription, the Kindle still allows standard
| one-off downloads from the Amazon store (no surprise). But it
| can also accept epub and mobi file formats coming from
| anywhere. You can plug the Kindle in with a usb cable and move
| files over directly like a mass storage device. Alternatively,
| it offers a free "wireless transfer" service where you email
| epub, pbf, or mobi files to a randomly generated email address
| unique to your device. I use the email service frequently to
| transfer ePub files I get elsewhere and it works flawlessly.
| You send the email and open the kindle and it generally shows
| up in your library on the device near-instantly. It's very
| good.
|
| If you use Calibre to manage your ebooks, it has a "send to
| Kindle" button, which is just using this email wireless
| transfer tool under the hood. You input your unique email
| address into Calibre and then when you click the "Send to
| Kindle" button that's how it works and it works well.
|
| As mentioned earlier you can also transfer via usb. The newest
| Kindles also have USB-C which was a welcome addition.
|
| Lastly I use my Kindle with books rented at the library. You
| just need a library card and a "Libby" account. The integration
| is a first-party integration, so no surprise it works
| essentially natively with Kindle. You choose an ebook at your
| local library and read it on your Kindle. The Kindle will even
| show you details about when the book is due and you can return
| it from the Kindle. It's all very good.
|
| I know Kobo is considered more open because its not tied to
| Amazon. But I am a heavy Kindle user and have never felt
| weighed down by it being an Amazon device. I read books from a
| variety of sources. I buy books (computer books usually) from
| independent creators and I will send ePubs to Kindle, I will
| read books loaned from the library and I will also sometimes
| buy books directly from Amazon. The Kobo gives you the same
| functionality for the first two, but not the ease of purchasing
| from Amazon. Amazon is the largest book vendor in the world, so
| like it or not, I find myself still buying from there, so its
| nice to have that option.
|
| I admit I have never paid for the Kindle Unlimited
| subscription. Its mostly low-quality novels pumped out by
| authors who publish 3-12 books a year. It is incredibly popular
| among Romance Novel readers (the largest genre of published
| books), but there are also lots of mystery and sci-fi books on
| there. But these aren't top quality NYTimes Top Selling books,
| they are low-rate airport novels in my experience.
| CameronNemo wrote:
| The Kobo I have can be mounted as a USB mass storage device,
| and the books synced that way (with rsync or just copying in
| the file browser).
| fumeux_fume wrote:
| Kindle devices now support the open epub format which is a
| improvement at least. Kobo devices come chained to Rakuten so
| it's not a big enough difference for me to consider
| switching... for now.
| wilsonnb3 wrote:
| They only kind of support epub - you can now email a drm-free
| epub file to your "Send to Kindle" email address but it will
| be converted to a different format before being sent to your
| device.
|
| You still can't load or read epubs directly on Kindles.
| wincy wrote:
| I got my wife a Boox and it's just a modified Android (watching
| a YouTube video on an e-ink screen is good for a laugh). She
| likes it a lot. It's nice too since it's completely open so you
| can add whatever apps you want to it.
| ethanbond wrote:
| In case you haven't, check out the Supernote. It is _amazing_
| if you like annotating /highlighting etc. Only big downside is
| no backlight, but a neck light has made the transition easy for
| me and the annotation capabilities well, we'll worth it.
|
| Also works with Calibre (epub, pdf, docx)
| KRAKRISMOTT wrote:
| I wish they would get Android running on this
| https://www.pine64.org/pinenote/
|
| Moon+ reader will knock kindle out of the water
| transcriptase wrote:
| Shit like this is why I turned on airplane mode immediately after
| setup 3 years ago and never turned it off.
|
| It's a ebook reader. I load files on through calibre and read
| them. Any update or access to the internet is exceedingly
| unlikely to be to my benefit.
|
| Zero issues so far.
| duskwuff wrote:
| > It's a ebook reader. I load files on through calibre and read
| them.
|
| Then you wouldn't have been using Kindle Unlimited anyway, so
| you'd be unaffected by this change.
| [deleted]
| wintermutestwin wrote:
| I did this as well but my reason is that I don't want AMZ to
| steal my data. Why should I let some monopolist corp know
| anything about my reading?
|
| It is a bummer that you can't look up Wikipedia.
|
| I wonder if this works with newer Kindles?
| [deleted]
| grujicd wrote:
| Main benefit of internet access is that you can share progress
| with Kindle app on your phone. Sometimes you end up with some
| time to kill and you only have a phone at hand.
| csdvrx wrote:
| I've found collapsing the reading progress to an integer as
| the best cross platform option.
|
| Most books conveniently provide integers at the bottom of
| each page, prefixed by "p."
| cauthon wrote:
| Ok, technically true, but not super helpful.
|
| I haven't used kindle in a few years, but last I checked,
| "page" numbers were relative to the device you were on (and
| its screen size).
| csdvrx wrote:
| I haven't had that problem, but if I did I'd then use 2
| integers (current page number, total page number)
| joe5150 wrote:
| Kindle uses a device-independent "location" value which
| you can enable on most displays if you want to sync up.
| benced wrote:
| Also goodreads integration is pretty great
| peruvian wrote:
| Same -- turned my Kindle on, did not log in, put it in airplane
| mod and sync pirated ebooks to it thru Calibre. Only way to
| roll.
| amelius wrote:
| I wish my iPhone allowed me to untether from the vendor that
| easily ...
| Semaphor wrote:
| Zero issues besides not being able to use the service this
| tasks about?
| rahimnathwani wrote:
| This refers to Kindle Unlimited, a library of books for which you
| rent access (via a subscription).
|
| They're _not_ talking about books you 'bought' individually.
| throwanem wrote:
| Yet.
| jchw wrote:
| I lolled at "impossible to break the DRM." Of course practically,
| they could make it very difficult, I'm not denying that. However,
| it's kind of funny to have DRM on something that can be copied
| with screenshots. If we ever get to the hilariously desperate
| level of HDCP for ebooks, you could _still_ use a camera pointed
| at a screen and decent OCR to get something reasonable.
|
| It's even dumber of course, because many people, when faced with
| the issue that they can no longer get a DRM free copy of
| something they bought, have a perfectly reasonable alternative
| that is free and provides DRM free copies of nearly anything. I
| guess it must be really important to stomp out the casual
| copying, but I find it hard to believe that people who are just
| casually copying would bother to do what was necessary already.
| Seems to me like this is probably something that mostly power
| users would've done.
| aflag wrote:
| The pirated copies usually come from people who defeated DRM
| and made it available to the public. If DRM is harder to break,
| it means less availability via alternate means.
| jchw wrote:
| True, but they'll take the path of less resistance. If
| breaking the DRM is not strictly necessary for copying, then
| as soon as breaking the DRM becomes more difficult than
| automating screenshots and OCR, I'd expect that to start
| happening.
|
| The truth is though, I personally doubt ebook DRM is terribly
| impressive. Maybe I'm just wrong, but it seems like the
| reality is that people who break the DRM just don't bother
| publishing their tools anymore because the cat and mouse game
| isn't worth the trouble.
| Arainach wrote:
| Taking screenshots and using OCR isn't breaking the DRM. They
| didn't say "impossible to pirate".
| amelius wrote:
| Yes, they are weasels to publishers as much as they are to
| customers.
| jchw wrote:
| I didn't say that was breaking the DRM. I said I think it's
| silly to have DRM on something that's so easy to copy
| regardless. That's still true alongside "no DRM is impossible
| to break"
| PhasmaFelis wrote:
| OCRing individual screenshots is not "easy to copy."
|
| _Most_ people who pirate (books, software, music,
| whatever) won 't bother to go to such extreme lengths.
| Stuff like this obviously doesn't make piracy impossible,
| but it does substantially reduce it.
| LinAGKar wrote:
| So it will make stripping the DRM for personal use (and,
| I suppose, sharing with friends) infeasible, while doing
| little to prevent it from showing up at piracy sites.
| PhasmaFelis wrote:
| Which will be enough to discourage a lot of pirates.
| Certainly most of the potential pirates who could
| conceivably be converted to buyers.
|
| Gabe Newell had the right idea when he said that you
| don't have to make piracy impossible, you just have to
| make purchasing easier than pirating. The kind of people
| who will jump through endless hoops, tolerate shoddy
| rips, etc. just to get something for free were never
| going to be your customers anyway.
| LinAGKar wrote:
| That would make me more likely to pirate it. Currently
| I've been able to buy the books and strip the DRM
| Arch-TK wrote:
| It's all great to quote Gabe Newell but you are
| completely misunderstanding his point. The point is that
| the steam platform makes it so easy to buy and play games
| that pirating them is comparatively risky (chance of
| malware, lack of updates) and not worth it, not that he
| has made games difficult enough to pirate that his
| platform seems favorable. Games on steam have no default
| DRM like ebooks on the amazon store, for the kinds of
| games I play, most of them can be copied from steam and
| played without the interference of DRM. For a lot of the
| ones which do have some kind of DRM or steam reliance, it
| is actually trivial to use a fake steam library to bypass
| this form of "DRM". All in all, the amount of actual DRM
| on steam is limited only to AAA titles.
|
| I pirate e-books not because I can't afford to buy them,
| but because I can't find a DRM free copy so I just buy
| the hard copy and pirate a digital version. The reality
| is, if there were more e-book stores which were like
| steam, I would probably use them, because hopefully I
| would have access to the content I bought to display it
| on any device I want and archive it for the future.
| gnicholas wrote:
| Amazon also changed the way their Kindle Cloud Reader (the Kindle
| web app) works so that it now displays an image of text instead
| of HTML text. This appears to have been done for anti-piracy
| reasons, but it has the knock-on effect of breaking accessibility
| browser plugins that people with disabilities rely on to make
| Kindle books accessible. In case anyone is not aware, image-of-
| text is considered a newbie mistake from an accessibility
| perspective, so it's odd for Amazon to take this step backward.
|
| Amazon rolled out this update over a year ago, and my startup
| still gets emails from people who are upset that they can no
| longer read books they purchased with the BeeLine Reader plugin,
| as they expected they would when they bought the books.
|
| There's nothing we can do to get Amazon to fix this, but we are
| now launching partnerships with other ebook platforms that are
| more accessibility-friendly.
| criddell wrote:
| > There's nothing we can do to get Amazon to fix this
|
| It might be easier to get publishers to fix this. Not all
| publishers use DRM on books sold by Amazon (Tor is a notable
| example). Books not encumbered with DRM can be used by
| alternative apps.
| iggldiggl wrote:
| > Not all publishers use DRM on books sold by Amazon
|
| Is there some way of finding that out in advance of buying
| the book? (Other than individually asking each
| publisher/author?)
| gnicholas wrote:
| Apparently the book's details will say "simultaneous device
| usage: unlimited" if it doesn't have DRM.
| gnicholas wrote:
| Interesting point! I'm not sure that Amazon would change
| their web app's software stack for a subset of their
| publishers though. My guess is we'd need to find a big
| publisher and get them to ask Amazon not to use this new
| image-of-text method. But I assume that any big publisher
| would be unlikely to not use DRM.
| dannyw wrote:
| You could consider contacting lawyers to explore accommodations
| under the ADA.
| neilv wrote:
| You might want to support vendors of ebooks and ereaders that
| support DRM-free open formats, while you still sometimes have the
| option.
|
| I recently chose a PocketBook InkPad Lite, and started buying
| DRM-free O'Reilly books through Ebooks.com:
| https://www.neilvandyke.org/ebooks/
| eslaught wrote:
| While we're here, Dragonmount is a DRM-free ebook store for
| certain authors published by TOR:
| https://dragonmount.com/store/
|
| But the vast majority of traditionally published books are not
| available (legally) DRM-free.
| cstross wrote:
| This is a corporate policy issue.
|
| 80% of commercial trade book publishing in the US/UK/EU is
| dominated by five multinationals, the "Big Five" -- Penguin
| Random House, Simon and Schuster, Macmillan, Hachette, and
| HarperCollins.
|
| Corporate policy at _all_ of these companies _except_
| Macmillan absolutely requires DRM on digital products, no
| exceptions permitted. This policy comes from boardroom level
| and trickles down to contaminate every department. Remember,
| most of these companies are in turn subsidiaries of
| organizations with interests in other media: news, TV, film,
| and so on. DRM infected them decades ago and any attempt to
| change direction on it would be an admission of policy
| failure, which is the kiss of death to an executive career.)
|
| Macmillan, the smallest -- and the English language arm of
| German conglomerate Holtzbrinck -- is privately owned, so not
| vulnerable to activist shareholders: they listened to their
| authors and publishers several years back and a number of
| their imprints publish DRM-free.
|
| Other than that, many small/indie publishers gave up on DRM
| years ago. But they may not have what you want ...
| neilv wrote:
| Perhaps they're not legally DRM-free because not enough
| people are voting with their pocketbooks, and paying for DRM-
| free.
|
| (Voting with a prybar is not the same.)
| Finnucane wrote:
| https://weightlessbooks.com/
|
| Distributes a lot of small press sf/fantasy books and
| magazines, all drm free.
| AdmiralAsshat wrote:
| Amazon also changed their encryption schema yet again, such that
| any book published in 2023 or newer is using a new format that is
| as of yet uncrackable by DeDRM/NoDRM.
|
| I've been slowly weening myself from Amazon and buying all books
| through Kobo (mostly because Amazon often has ebook sales that
| aren't on sale elsewhere), but 2023 seems like a good time to
| break completely.
|
| Unfortunately I've still got a bunch of comics though them, and
| last I checked the old Comixology scraping tools had broken when
| Amazon nixed the old Comixology web client.
| charles_f wrote:
| Doesn't the work around to use an old version of the kindle app
| work anymore?
| Uvix wrote:
| It works for titles released before January 2023. New titles
| going forward refuse to download in old versions of the app.
| criddell wrote:
| If you download the books for an old Kindle that doesn't
| support KFX, can you get a crackable file?
| dopa42365 wrote:
| Correct (Paperwhite 1 for example).
| triyambakam wrote:
| Can DRM be removed from books downloaded from Kobo?
| AdmiralAsshat wrote:
| Yes, the OBOK plug-in has decrypted everything I've thrown at
| it so far, sans books borrowed from overdrive. But I have no
| interest in defrauding libraries: I just want to make backups
| of books I legally purchased.
| kevinh wrote:
| Unfortunately, from what I've heard, for your book to be on
| Kindle Unlimited it cannot be available elsewhere, so many
| smaller authors won't be available on other stores. I'm
| surprised Amazon hasn't gotten scrutiny for it.
| hyperhopper wrote:
| I bought the original Kindle, rooted it, and kept it off the
| internet.
|
| Does this mean I'll no longer be able to use an Amazon Kindle
| reader service with their own kindle e-reader?
|
| This is pretty messed up.
| PhasmaFelis wrote:
| This is only for books you "checked out" with the monthly
| subscription service, not books you bought directly.
| jacurtis wrote:
| I think its important to clarify a few things. The article is
| noting that they blocked the downloading of books that use
| "Kindle Unlimited" which is a subscription, that runs $10 a
| month, for unlimited of select Kindle titles. Think of Kindle
| Unlimited as the book equivalent to Spotify Premium.
|
| You can still download and un-DRM books that you buy individually
| from Amazon directly. This is an important distinction. Because
| you "own" the book you buy directly. You don't own titles through
| Kindle Unlimited, you are borrowing them.
|
| The restriction from allowing the downloaded books on this
| service actually makes a lot more sense when you understand the
| service. This is no different than we see from any other service
| where you pay a monthly fee for access to content while
| maintaining an active subscription. For example you can download
| songs with Spotify, but they automatically expire after 30 days
| unless they "phone home" to confirm you still have a
| subscription. Netflix, HBO, Hulu, etc all let you download movies
| now, but they expire unless you maintain a subscription.
|
| You don't own any of this content, it is just lent to you for the
| duration of an active subscription. Kindle Unlimited is no
| different, but for books.
|
| The important part is that nothing has changed for books
| purchased directly from Amazon individually. This change is only
| for the Kindle Unlimited service.
| vaughands wrote:
| Just a small note: it is not possible to unDRM books published
| post 2023 at this time. Amazon has changed their DRM scheme.
| brador wrote:
| Screenshots + OCR will always be possible.
| themoonisachees wrote:
| Don't they offer older DRM schemes for older devices? Surely
| you do not have to update your kindle (especially if it is
| older) to read newly published books?
| freeone3000 wrote:
| You do, with updates issued back to the Paperwhite 1st gen.
| DX owners were issued a $100 trade-up credit last year.
| xg15 wrote:
| > _Because you "own" the book you buy directly. You don't own
| titles through Kindle Unlimited, you are borrowing them._
|
| Could someone please explain to me the concept of "borrowing"
| for digital books which can be infinitely copied?
| Terretta wrote:
| You're not borrowing a digital book. You're borrowing a
| permission slip to read it.
| mihaaly wrote:
| Amazon restricting the use of purchased content the way they
| please, HBO removing content, just like other providers, I feel
| it was an essential and wise move a few years back not buying
| online available content anymore (have some still in my account,
| who knows how long can access). Same with streaming providers on
| beloved content, music frequently disappear from my playlists, it
| is a nuisance. Better managing content myself. It is common sence
| afterall, how could anyone trust these organizations in 5 yet
| alone 10, 15 or more years will still give you access the way you
| had and need. You better manage yourself then. More hustle but
| much more reliable.
| duskwuff wrote:
| Kindle Unlimited titles aren't "purchased content". It's a all-
| you-can-eat subscription, and it's understood that your access
| to those books is contingent on maintaining the subscription.
| ninth_ant wrote:
| > In such a scenario, maybe it would be a good idea to keep a
| backup of all your Kindle titles on your PC or a compatible
| storage medium while Amazon is still hanging on with the AZW
| format.
|
| No maybe here. If they block the export to USB method, then your
| "owned" content is locked into kindle readers permanently.
|
| The time to backup your library into Calibre is now, before they
| lock you out of your content. After you're locked out is too
| late.
| cortesoft wrote:
| This isn't for owned content, though, it is for books you have
| access to through their subscription service.
| ninth_ant wrote:
| This change locks you out of the subscription content, yes.
|
| The author went on to suggest a likely next move for amazon
| was to apply the same restriction for your own books, and
| that maybe you should create backups in that scenario. This
| is the section I was quoting.
|
| If you believe the authors suggestion that amazon will take
| these next steps, as I do, then the suggestion to "maybe"
| backup your content in that scenario is flawed. Once they
| lock you out it's too late -- backing it up now is the
| correct response.
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