Thread: How can we convince Amazon to sell ePub format?
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Old 01-01-2011, 03:04 PM   #274
ATDrake
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Quote:
Originally Posted by KenJackson View Post
As for EPUB vs MOBI, I wouldn't be opposed to Amazon selling corrupted Mobi books in a such a way that I could read them on my Sony Reader. I just focus on EPUB because it seems to be an excellent, open and widely-used format. I still haven't read even one Mobi ebook, so I can't compare.
Okay, you seem to keep saying the point of this thread is not that you want the actual Kindle to support ePub, like these discussions usually go, but for Amazon to sell a format compatible with other readers so you can use your preferred reader and also buy from your favourite retailer, have I got that right?

In which case, would you be okay with buying and converting the (admittedly few) DRM-free Mobi books that Amazon does sell?

Subterranean Press, a specialty SF/fantasy small press with a very good reputation (several of their books were up for Hugo Awards last year), sells their titles in the Kindle store DRM-free (you can also get a large number of them on better terms at the same price via Baen's Webscription, but that's beside the point)

.As an example, here's Clementine, a novella by Cherie Priest set in her post-apocalyptic steampunk zombie invasion AU, the first of which, Boneshaker, was nominated for Hugo.

If you scroll down to the Product Details, you'll notice it says "Simultaneous Device Usage: Unlimited", which is Amazon's not-so-secret code phrase for "this book is DRM-free". Books which don't list SDU or have a set number will be DRMed instead.

So voilą! Now you know how to pick out the non-DRM books which you can safely get from Amazon with a clear conscience.

Unless you're holding out for them to sell ePub versions outright, which I doubt will happen in the forseeable future, given that they won't even support the older Mobipocket style of DRM on the Kindle so that people can use Mobi library books or even their old Mobi purchases, even though they bought and own the company and technology outright.

And I say this as a Kindle owner who considers ePub both technically and practically superior and would dearly love it if Amazon did sell their books as ePub, just because it seems the more I pay for an e-book, the more likely there is to be some annoying formatting/typo to fix and that's much more inconvenient with Mobi, which is both very limited in functionality and closed to boot.
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