PSA on 'ad-supported' Kindles

[LordReginaldC]

Long time lurker here. In light of the exciting news that Amazon has finally decided to let us use current covers for screensavers, I thought it would be a good time to remind/inform people that you don't need to pay $20 to have an ad-free Kindle.

To remove the ads for free you need to open up a chat session with Amazon customer support. Use the account your Kindle is registered under. When you finally get a rep just tell them something along the lines of (or exactly, as I did), "I would like to get ads removed from my Kindle." and you will get a canned response that goes something like, "Normally there is a fee to remove ads, but this one time I will remove them free of charge would that be okay?". Say heck yeah that's okay. And that's it.

I've done this with two separate Kindles years apart and it went exactly the same way both times.

The reason I thought to bring this up is because while reading through a lot of the posts in the recent threads on the screensaver news, it seems like a lot of people are unaware of this little work around. Don't pay Amazon money to get full access to a device they already charge hundreds for!

PS: If I stepped over any post guidelines please let me know and I will gladly abide by them and make necessary corrections

[Deskisamess]

I knew what I was getting when I purchased my Kindles for the lower ad supported price. I'm not going to play this game just so I can have the sleep screen show the book cover of what I'm reading.

We have 3 different Kindles, and on mine, most books are side-loaded because I change some font and margin settings, so the book cover won't work anyway. And mostly, I don't stare at my sleep screen. If I'm not reading, the cover is closed. I open the cover and swipe, and barely look at the image that shows for 2 seconds.

[ZodWallop]

I'll just continue to support the competition. But I wouldn't look down my nose at anyone who decided to do this workaround.

If someone gave me a Kindle, I'd have no problem being the squeaky wheel.

[LordReginaldC]

Originally Posted by Deskisamess

I knew what I was getting when I purchased my Kindles for the lower ad supported price. I'm not going to play this game just so I can have the sleep screen show the book cover of what I'm reading.

We have 3 different Kindles, and on mine, most books are side-loaded because I change some font and margin settings, so the book cover won't work anyway. And mostly, I don't stare at my sleep screen. If I'm not reading, the cover is closed. I open the cover and swipe, and barely look at the image that shows for 2 seconds.

I get ya. It all comes down to personal preference, some people couldn't care less and some people do care. Just figured I'd throw this out there for the few people who want the option without needing to pay for it.

There could be a whole discussion on the ethics of purchasinging 'ad supported' and 'without ads' options alone, but I'll leave that up to someone else.

[janrey]

Originally Posted by LordReginaldC

Long time lurker here. In light of the exciting news that Amazon has finally decided to let us use current covers for screensavers, I thought it would be a good time to remind/inform people that you don't need to pay $20 to have an ad-free Kindle.

To remove the ads for free you need to open up a chat session with Amazon customer support. Use the account your Kindle is registered under. When you finally get a rep just tell them something along the lines of (or exactly, as I did), "I would like to get ads removed from my Kindle." and you will get a canned response that goes something like, "Normally there is a fee to remove ads, but this one time I will remove them free of charge would that be okay?". Say heck yeah that's okay. And that's it.

I've done this with two separate Kindles years apart and it went exactly the same way both times.

The reason I thought to bring this up is because while reading through a lot of the posts in the recent threads on the screensaver news, it seems like a lot of people are unaware of this little work around. Don't pay Amazon money to get full access to a device they already charge hundreds for!

PS: If I stepped over any post guidelines please let me know and I will gladly abide by them and make necessary corrections

Years ago (like over 7) I had them removed from my mothers kindle (keyboard) free because she kept pressing buttons when opening the screen and accidently ordering a book. I would get an email call her to see if she really wanted the book, then have to go in and return it. Figured Amazon would tire of this.

Later I did it on my Voyage when the screen kept going wacko with the ads.

I still don't have the book cover as screen saver option yet but I have had to turn off wifi due to having a library book that was due back. You can keep them if you don't have wifi on but it still returns into the system.

[Quoth]

Sometimes even when (or especially?) S/H they insist you have to pay to remove adverts.