Quote:
Originally Posted by hypothetical
Can we now accept the possibility that this could be a legitimate (although mildly misinformed) concern for amazon. Is it now possible that all of this is the result of google research done by an underpaid intern, instead of the fact that this site posts instructions on how to use a kindle at a library or another store?
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It is my strong belief that this misinformation didn't come from "google research by an underpaid intern" ... but from an incorrect article or comment to an article posted on the internet early this month a portion of which made it into a news-feed.
However, the letter came from Amazon's attorneys, and it should be the attorney's job to find out if the accusation has any basis in fact before they issue a take-down letter.
The mistake (on the part of both Amazon and their attorneys) was in assuming that the scripts in question had been (1) created by the owerns and operators of MobileRead, and were being (2) distributed by the owners and operators of MobleRead.
In an effort to boot-strap some support for their mistaken belief, they pointed to materials as obscure and someone saying "sure I have kindlepid.py and I'll send it to you via PM."
That sort of post is not MobileRead.com "creating and distributing" materials, whether or not those materials are designed to circumvent DRM.
Further, discussion of such tools, even discussion of how to use those tools, is protected speech in the United States. Of course MobileRead is going to be at the top of any Google search if you type in "kindlepid.py" .... a lot of people discuss that topic in this forum. I, for one, hope we keep on discussing it.
However, I also hope that someone with a little bit of brain matter at Amazon begins to understand that:
(1) the various DRM cracks that exist were not created by Alex Turcic or the moderators of MobileRead;
(2) these cracks have been in existence for well over a year and are in wide distribution throughout the internet;
(3) slapping a take-down letter on MobileRead is going to only create more discussion of scripts like this and whether or not they actually do anything except inconvenience the consumer;
(4) and more discussion means that more people will find out the scripts exist, and are going to decide that, if the only way they can get the content they actually want on the device they own is to hire the 10 year old script whiz who lives next door to show them how to download and use these things;
(5) and they will have served only to alienate their customer base.