On February 26th, Kindle customers will lose the ability to download eBook purchases directly to their PC. If you want to switch to a rival eReader brand in the future, I suggest that you use the soon-to-be discontinued “Download and Transfer via USB” feature to archive your Kindle library.

  • Prox@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    9 days ago

    Am I an idiot for enjoying my Kindle Paperwhite as an eReader, while at the same time never actually buying books from Amazon?

    • underwire212@lemm.eeEnglish
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      9 days ago

      It’s a good piece of hardware. I do the same thing. Although I recently got a Kobo and I gotta say that I do prefer the kobo slightly better. Kindle is still good shit though

    • TheEntity@lemmy.worldEnglish
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      9 days ago

      Same. Most news sites treating this change as a “Kindle issue” is borderline disinformation. This is an “Amazon issue”. Kindle the device isn’t changing and there is no reason to switch if you already own one (just please don’t buy a new one).

    • Rozz@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
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      9 days ago

      Same. I find ebooks for my family or we use Libby. I wouldn’t know how to buy a book on my kindle if I wanted to.

  • Drakena@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    9 days ago

    I resisted eBooks for years, preferring physical books from the library or new/second hand stores. I got gifted a Kindle from a well meaning relative a few years ago and I have a small collection on there, mainly built up when I was commuting.

    This news came just as I am backing up my own data, moving off of the big name Cloud services and going back to open source software. (In confession the convenience of M365 etc won me over so the last 10 or so years I fell into the trap!)

    Anyway needless to say my 40(ish) Kindle books quickly got downloaded and archived this week. Thanks to Calibre I’ve also fixed the covers to a book series that suddenly got updated to an awful ‘new hip’ version! :)

    I’m now intrigued about repurposing the Kindle hardware as it still works and I don’t want it to go to waste, but with this and other recent events I’m done personally proving data or money to these big corporate companies as much as I possibly can.

    • A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      9 days ago

      ebooks have managed to pull the same scam that game developers pulled on gamers 20 years ago.

      “ebooks will be cheaper! and with the fact that we wont have to pay for printing, shipping, storage, etc, You’ll pay a lower price while the author/publisher still receive more money than they would have from the physical book! its a win/win for everyone!”

      aaaand then as soon as they were accepted ebook prices became the same (or near enough) price as the physical version, and in a few rare cases, even more expensive. Resulting in the massive promised profits for publishers, and maybe authors, but no gain but lots of demerits (like obnoxious drm, and shit like amazon going onto your device to delete it cause they lost the rights or something, which has happened) for end users/readers

      And thats first party, brand new books.

      There is no second hand market for ebooks, like there is from physical. Si theres no browsing a place like Half Price Booked or whatever to find something that isnt in your normal wheel house but thanks to being pre-owed, its cheap enough to roll the dice on.

  • Singletona082@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    9 days ago

    thus I have my personal library backed up on calibre. Wonderful software that’s been around for twenty fiveish years.

        • amphy@lemmy.caEnglish
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          8 days ago

          This. I’ve personally found it easiest to use Calibre to strip DRM & get things tidy, then use Audiobookshelf to manage both my ebooks and audiobooks

            • amphy@lemmy.caEnglish
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              7 days ago

              Yep! Here’s an ebook I have hosted through Audiobookshelf, reading it over the Internet using my domain & reverse proxy.

              (The top bar is shown/hidden when you tap the screen, so it’s not always in the way like this)

    • somenonewho@feddit.orgEnglish
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      9 days ago

      I love Calibre. I’ve recently broken my E-Reader (Tolino) but all my books are backed up on Calibre so the only loss is the hardware (still sad but not as annoying)

    • casmael@lemm.eeEnglish
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      9 days ago

      Yeah is this going to break calibre functionality? I remember using it to rip books from my kindle library but not how, exactly 🤔

      • BirdObserver@lemmy.worldEnglish
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        9 days ago

        It’ll break saving books you bought from Amazon, but you’ll still be able to send books you got from other places to it from Calibre. Fortunately barely any of my ebooks on my kindle are from Amazon (though my next ereader isn’t going to be a kindle, that’s for sure).

        • casmael@lemm.eeEnglish
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          9 days ago

          Cool guess I’ll download anything I bought from Amazon before the cutoff then it’s been ages and I can’t remember what’s there o7

      • Singletona082@lemmy.worldEnglish
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        9 days ago

        Probably some kind of plugin or script to run… i forget the specifics because literally grab the kindle version, then search z-library.

  • Snot Flickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
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    9 days ago

    This is why I never once purchased a book from Amazon even though I have a Kindle.

    Pretty pumped to jailbreak it with the new jailbreak.

          • st3ph3n@midwest.socialEnglish
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            9 days ago

            Run software they don’t approve of. Like alternate reading apps that don’t need you to pipe everything through an Amazon account, read formats they don’t support, etc.

            • IllNess@infosec.pubEnglish
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              9 days ago

              Hi. Thank you for the info.

              I am looking for a new e-reader. Is there any reason why I should buy a Kindle and jailbreak it rather than get a PineNote, SuperNote, Nook device, Boox device, or a Kobo Libra?

              Or would you recommend something else?

              • RobotZap10000@feddit.nlEnglish
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                9 days ago

                I was looking at the PineNote myself, but they stopped selling the developer version due to low demand. I’m afraid that it won’t be back until those who do own it finish writing the software for it.

                • SilentRampage34@lemmy.worldEnglish
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                  9 days ago

                  According to their site and a couple others, they have recently started selling again and with what looks to be some variant of Debian on it.

              • st3ph3n@midwest.socialEnglish
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                9 days ago

                I have a Boox Palma 2 - their cellphone-sized thing that doesn’t have a cellular radio. I love it. They’re more expensive than kindles, though, since they’re not subsidizing their cost with ebook sales. I haven’t actually tried jailbreaking a kindle so I can’t say how good an experience that would be, but you could probably pick up a kindle of some description on the used market for dirt cheap to try it out.

                • EngineerGaming@feddit.nlEnglish
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                  9 days ago

                  And I have a bigger reader, since most of my library are pdf/djvu scans and they’d look unreadable on a screen any smaller.

                • IllNess@infosec.pubEnglish
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                  9 days ago

                  The Palma was one of my top choices but I was thinking it might be a little small for me. It is one of the better looking devices.

                  I didn’t even think getting a used Kindle. New Kindle prices seem a little high for getting a locked system, so a used one is probably the most cost effective method.

                  Thanks for the suggestion.

    • spooky2092@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
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      9 days ago

      I’ll be done with audible the moment I stop being able to liberate and archive what I pay for.

      Until then, they’re helping me build my audiobookshelf

  • jamie_oliver@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    9 days ago

    Been using an Onyx Boox Nova 3 for maybe 8 years now. It runs android, drm free everything (edit: it has no store really, it is basically empty. Supports virtually any filetype you can read. Epub, pdf, mobi, cbz). For some android could be a distraction from reading, but the browser is slow enough to were you use it to hop on annas-archive, get a book and then quickly close it. File transfer via shared wifi or USB, good reader, some nice reading stats without needing any account. Recommend if anyone wants to jump the amazon ship.

      • jamie_oliver@lemmy.worldEnglish
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        8 days ago

        Ah shit I think you are right. Feels like I have had it forever but seems that was a false memory of some sort.

        I bought it while I lived in my previous apartment which I feel was longer ago and so I got a bit confused with the dates I think lol. Thanks for pointing it out.

    • MonkderVierte@lemmy.mlEnglish
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      9 days ago

      E-paper devices with Android are usually way underpowered for the platform, easier to just use the phone for such things.

      • jamie_oliver@lemmy.worldEnglish
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        9 days ago

        I think you are missing the point of using an e-ink device… I don’t think anyone would use one because of “how powerful” it is.

        I don’t want to read for hours on end on my phone or computer. With this, I can turn backlight off and use a lamp, like a normal book. Better for my eyes and relaxing.

        Also, having dedicated devices for certain activities will change how you interact with them when using them. If I read a book on my computer I am tempted to look things up, get some work done or play a game. This is just for leisurely reading, and so when I pick it up that is what I do with it.

        If you read a lot (books, not documentation which requires looking things up) then it really is a lot better for your eyes and a better experience to use e-ink.

    • viking@infosec.pubEnglish
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      9 days ago

      I have a first generation kindle that I bought 16 years ago. They used to be awesome, and Amazon shaped the way ecommerce worked. The lesson here is not to be fully dependent on one supplier, not to boycott everything just because it’s big.

      • Miphera@lemmy.worldEnglish
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        9 days ago

        Yeah, they were great back then. I have the first generation Kindle Paperwhite (12-ish years), though at this point I only use it to read fanfics lol

        AO3 let’s you download entire fics directly in the EPUB & AZW3 format, doubt they’re ever gonna change that 😁

  • utopiah@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    9 days ago

    reMarkable, PineNote, Bookeen, etc…

    I’m not saying anybody deserve to be mistreated … but come on, at this point if you buy something from Amazon it’s Stockholm syndrome. Just do NOT. It’s that easy.

    F*ck Bezos and other billionaires. Stop making them even richer from your pain. Stop your mind from being literally enslaved!

    • matterofact@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
      0·
      9 days ago

      Thing is, the pinenote is €610, and the kindle paperwhite is £160, cheaper on discount.

      I get your point and there’s a reason why the kindle is as cheap as it is, but I can understand why someone would see those prices and go for the kindle.

      • madjo@feddit.nlEnglish
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        9 days ago

        Or go for the Kobo, which is similarly priced as the Kindle. The Kobo Clara Colour is £150

        • Deway@lemmy.worldEnglish
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          9 days ago

          I’ve had three ereaders, all three were kobo.Yet I wouldn’t recommend them anymore. There’s a mandatory online activation now. There are ways to bypass it but it’s not great.

          Many models are unstable with KoReader so it’s not even an alternative anymore.

          The day I replace my eReader is going to be a hard day.

    • major_jellyfish@lemmy.caEnglish
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      9 days ago

      There is a whole community of people out there who will pretty much refuse to buy brand new electronics. And thats for very obvious and valid reasons.

      Kindles can be found for dirt cheap if not free 2nd hand. And so many users have a kindle for this reason. Myself included. Id never throw out or discard an electronic device that continues to work. For the same obvious reasons as why i dont buy new ones.

      And so this information is super relevant and important to users like me. Regardless of how much people like you might be convinced that “we had it coming” or whatever.

      • utopiah@lemmy.worldEnglish
        0·
        9 days ago

        Sure, it’s the same problem with most of electronics, it’s the console business model, or ink printer, where the device itself is “too” cheap and companies make money on content. Unfortunately it comes with shackles. I’m all for breaking the shackles but unfortunately has to be aware of what they are getting into, not just the trouble but also potentially supporting the company promoting DRMs and more.

        I work in XR and Meta/Facebook is the embodiment of that problem. The Quest is too cheap compared to alternatives like Lynx (standalone designing in France, unfortunately still running on Android but at least rootable) or even the “old” now Valve Index, which in addition to its price also requires a gaming desktop.

        So… it’s a money making machine for corporations. Hopefully recycling is done in a way that provide 0 support for the corporations locking down its device, promoting its marketplace BUT also, sadly less realistic, doesn’t also prevent companies who try to sell genuine alternative that do NOT promote such business model from existing.

          • major_jellyfish@lemmy.caEnglish
            0·
            8 days ago

            3Easier said than done. Had a quick search. In 45km of my home there is not one reMarkable, PineNone or Bookeen. There is 2 kobos. And around 200 kindles. Kindes are starting at 5 bucks for ones that look a little beat up. Kobos are 80 bucks. You can still avoid buying most books from amazon. Obviously not all. Even owning Kobo there are some books you end up buying from Amazon. They have the largest foreign language library. There are thousands of popular books which you cannot get in a foreign language anywhere else these days. And you have to acknowledge that most people in the world are not reading books in English.

            Sometimes you can get a solid deal. If youre super patient or lucky. But the 2nd hand market will generally always follow the market distribution of retail.

            So long as kindle is domninating. 2nd hand users are gonna be heavily pressured into buying kindle.

            I wholeheartedly agree that we shouldnt support amazon and i do think they are making kindles a pain.

            But i dont think you can expect people to just find 2nd hand alternatives like what you listed. Especially when you consider the demographic of people shopping for eraders.

            This is why i find these kinds of comment chains futile. We all love to vote with our money, but its not that simple for a lot of people. Maybe instead of this “you get what you deserve” attitude we could put more energy towards promoting the jailbreaks and trying to make those as accessible as possible for your chineese grandma to be able to do it herself on her Windows Vista. Not to mention that there is 0 value in telling anyone that bought a new kindle that they deserve whats comming. At best they sell their kindle when they buy a kobo perpetuating the cycle. At worst they trash it and contribute the already growing problems of ewaste.

            • utopiah@lemmy.worldEnglish
              0·
              6 days ago

              FWIW my point isn’t about shaming people, it’s to make buyers fully aware of the consequence of their actions, both political and ecological. My point is to show that actual alternatives exist and yes they are more rare and expensive (probably also because they are rare, which is by design for Amazon, they do have scale in mind from the founding of the company, they undercut in order to dominate all marketplaces!). I genuinely wish the options I listed were both cheaper and more available. Now… it’s a bit like buying clothes from Primark vs e.g. Patagonia. The pricing is radically different, and their are both selling clothes, but I’d argue they are NOT the same products, including the ecological impact. So… again, not trying to shame anyone, solely show that alternatives, with different trade off, do actually exist TODAY. Every time one person try to go with the cheap and popular, they are tipping the scale to, IMHO, worst solutions for everyone else, including the 2nd hand market.

          • Pika@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
            0·
            9 days ago

            unfortunately though, due to the same issues there isn’t a very large second hand market of those either. Like the cheapest remarkable second hand I could find was still 300$ and the cheapest pine note was 270$ for preowns.

            when you compare it to the kindle which has preowns starting at 40$ it’s a hard buy

            • Echolynx@lemmy.zipEnglish
              0·
              8 days ago

              I got a secondhand Kobo on eBay for less than $100, almost in new condition (the seller just forgot to include the charging cable, but luckily I had plenty of spare micro-USB cables). It’s a 2018 model, but it has 8 GB of storage, plenty for most people, and a nice 6" 300 PPI screen with warm light and dark mode. It’s more than sufficient.

              Point being, alternatives are out there. reMarkable and Boox aren’t exactly equivalent devices, since those are meant as more e-ink note-taking tablets, not dedicated e-readers. You could probably find a 2018 Kobo Clara HD for around $40-50 used nowadays as well… and it has more features than the equivalent 2018 Kindle.

              • Pika@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
                0·
                8 days ago

                Yeah it seems I misunderstood what those tablets were,

                I did find the old Samsung Tab tablets that would do pretty decent job though, those are somewhat around the same price range too, like 70-140ish range preowned

                And looking into the kobo clara series it does look like those are about 120-130 second hand currently so not as bad

  • Flatfire@lemmy.caEnglish
    0·
    8 days ago

    I wonder if this is at all related to the EU changes to eBook DRM standards, where the standard Kindle Adobe DRM isn’t compliant

  • cley_faye@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    9 days ago

    Locked-in platform closing the door. How surprising.

    Accepting DRM in the first place is the problem. Hard to avoid, but still. I just got a boox; great value, can’t use adobe DRM. Didn’t have any problem there. Of course, money is going everywhere except big “publishers”, but that’s hardly an issue; they choose their business model, I choose my customer model.

    • Rowan Thorpe@lemmy.mlEnglish
      0·
      9 days ago

      they choose their business model, I choose my customer model.

      Ooh, this is very pithy. I like it. I will use it.

    • Railcar8095@lemm.eeEnglish
      0·
      9 days ago

      I’ve been monkey paw’d with my wish “Z library becoming the most convenient eBook platform”

    • Prox@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      9 days ago

      How would that help here? The only thing Amazon is removing is the ability to download your purchased eBooks to your PC.

        • Wispy2891@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          9 days ago

          The files now use a different kind of DRM that hasn’t been defeated yet.

          The purpose of using the soon to be removed feature was to get files with an older encryption that can be easily removed

  • umbrella@lemmy.mlEnglish
    0·
    9 days ago

    library genesis exists, people. anna’s archive, anyone?

    digital drm is the one fucking thing they push onto us that we don’t actually have to fucking deal with.

    leave amazon. leave netflix. leave whatever fucking streaming service you subscribe to, and stop being sensitive about rich people’s money.