The Vent and Rant Thread

[MacEachaidh]

I have been trying to get a cover for my eBook reader. The distributor in my country is bloody useless, hasn't had them in stock for five months, and can't give me any idea when they'll be getting more. In Korea - where the device is made - a cover is supplied with the unit, but not the models sold in Australia. The Korean website has an online shop, but won't sell to a customer outside Korea.

Ahh, but a company in Germany resells the iRiver covers through Amazon UK. Except they've done a "marketplace" deal with that sales whore, Amazon, so I have to buy through Amazon's website and pay Amazon a major cut on the deal. It's a bloody cover, a simple piece of vinyl textured to seem like leather and with a metal spine inside, that's all it is, but Amazon classes it in its "electronics" category, so I have to pay the same shipping costs as if I was buying a DVD player, which work out to nearly twice the item's purchase price. A vinyl cover for my eReader would cost me nearly 70 US dollars.

I wrote to Amazon's customer service, and got a form-letter reply saying they "apologise" for the "misunderstanding", but that was their system, and was their anything else they could help me with?

Buggerbuggerbuggerbuggerbugger.

There are what claim to be iRiver covers for sale on ebay, but they're Kindle covers, taking advantage of the fact that the dimensions are almost the same, except that the openings for the buttons and connection ports don't match up with the device. I bought an iRiver because I didn't want to step into the maws of Amazon or Apple, and Sony isn't available in Australia, but in many ways it was a seriously bad choice.

I know there aren't many iRiver owners on MR, but can anyone think of any other options for getting a cover, either iRiver or 3rd party?

[SneakySnake]

Is this for a real iriver story? or a dodgy kindle cover?

story cover

story case

[MacEachaidh]

G'day Snake,
Huh, I never thought of trying Ryda. They're not listed by the distributor as authorised retailers, so I didn't think to look there. Sad part of the story: I rang them, and they don't have any in stock, they order on-demand, and the distributor can't supply, so we're back to square one.

Those ones you spotted on ebay are the ones I mentioned, that are actually Kindle covers. And except for the two shots where the iRiver screen is showing, the photos aren't of iRiver Storys in those covers. I suspect they're Kindles in the photos, too. Problem is, that even those little corner straps prevent opening the access port in the bottom. Not insurmountable, of course, but not ideal either.

Anyway, thanks for your responses. I really appreciate it!

[MacEachaidh]

Wait wait wait! Great news, SneakySnake!

Ryda just called me back to say they were wrong - they've actually got some in stock, and I can drop over tomorrow and get one. Woo-hoo!!!

Thanks for your help! (Happy-happy-happy!!!)

[nohmi2]

Originally Posted by SneakySnake

Is this for a real iriver story? or a dodgy kindle cover?

story cover

story case

You do realise that you are quietly brilliant, don't you?

I have also been looking for a cover for my iRiver Story.

Many thanks.

Cheers.

[SneakySnake]

Originally Posted by nohmi2

You do realise that you are quietly brilliant, don't you?

I have also been looking for a cover for my iRiver Story.

Many thanks.

Cheers.

I thought I was kinda noisy! Glad to be of service.

[pdurrant]

Aaarrrgghhh!!! Bloody hack publishers that just churn out quite 'conversions' of Project Gutenberg texts.

I've finally finished checking the samples of all 37 (yes, THIRTY-SEVEN!) editions of "Kidnapped" in the Kindle store on Amazon, and posting reviews.

All but 7 are quick conversions of the Project Gutenberg text, adding nothing, and doing no better than Amazon's own quick, FREE, conversion. A couple even manage to completely mess up the paragraph formatting, making the editions unreadable!

Of the remaining seven, two are only OK - poor formatting and not a great conversion.

The last five are actually quite good. Four are by big publishers - Penguin, Puffin, Vintage (Random House) and Bantam.

The last, of course, is mine, and is the only illustrated one!

But oh — all the rest! It's such a shame. The publishers can only be hoping to pick up enough sales through large numbers of titles, rather than actually doing anything that's good.

Bloody hack publishers! It's incredibly painful to go through so many editions, seeing the poor formatting over and over again. But despite the temptation to just give them all a generic review, I've forced myself to do properly indvidual reviews of them all.

Well, even if it doesn't get me sales, hopefully it'll stop some poor reader buying a lemon at an outrageous price.

[MacEachaidh]

So, pdurrant, they're making a profit in essence out of doing nothing more than electronically converting the format? And ripping off Gutenberg and its volunteers' time and efforts in the process?

Why is Amazon condoning this?

OK, I know why, because there's a profit in it for them as well. Sheesh, this sell-anything-for-a-price insanity has got to stop somewhere. Vive la revolution!

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by MacEachaidh

So, pdurrant, they're making a profit in essence out of doing nothing more than electronically converting the format? And ripping off Gutenberg and its volunteers' time and efforts in the process?

Why is Amazon condoning this?

OK, I know why, because there's a profit in it for them as well. Sheesh, this sell-anything-for-a-price insanity has got to stop somewhere. Vive la revolution!

I bought an excellent modern English version of Dante's Divine Comedy from Amazon, but there was no translator mentioned in the text. I had a devil of a time finding out who the translator was. When I did, I contacted him and asked him if he was aware that his book was being sold on Amazon (he had made a copy available free of charge online and for downloading in multiple formats for non-commercial use). He said he wasn't, and that he was going to look into it. Evidently some low-life scumbag took his hard work, eliminated his name from the credits, and sold it for profit. I hope he sues their butt.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by MacEachaidh

So, pdurrant, they're making a profit in essence out of doing nothing more than electronically converting the format? And ripping off Gutenberg and its volunteers' time and efforts in the process?

Why is Amazon condoning this?

OK, I know why, because there's a profit in it for them as well. Sheesh, this sell-anything-for-a-price insanity has got to stop somewhere. Vive la revolution!

Cool! Avatar! Love that Scene from 2001!

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by MacEachaidh

So, pdurrant, they're making a profit in essence out of doing nothing more than electronically converting the format? And ripping off Gutenberg and its volunteers' time and efforts in the process?

Why is Amazon condoning this?

OK, I know why, because there's a profit in it for them as well. Sheesh, this sell-anything-for-a-price insanity has got to stop somewhere. Vive la revolution!

There's nothing wrong with people taking a public domain text and trying to sell it. It's not that that I'm complaining about. It's that they do it so badly!

I suspect Amazon don't try to weed out the really poorly formatted versions because they don't want to spend the resources necessary to do it, and then defend having done it.

[MacEachaidh]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

There's nothing wrong with people taking a public domain text and trying to sell it. It's not that that I'm complaining about. It's that they do it so badly!

No, the complaint was mine, but it seems we effectively concur anyway: my issue was their charging for it if they don't value-add by at least formatting it decently (and some recognition of the need for visual appeal wouldn't go astray either - does aesthetics count for nothing?)

Originally Posted by pdurrant

I suspect Amazon don't try to weed out the really poorly formatted versions because they don't want to spend the resources necessary to do it, and then defend having done it.

Really? Amazon's a business. It's a product being sold. What's wrong with them saying "this doesn't meet our standards"? Apple does it all the time. In my book Amazon (anyone) still has some level of duty of care to the customer in respect to the quality of what it sells. I hate the fact that they've become such a 500lb gorilla that they can earn their (sometimes massive) cut merely by virtue of the fact that they're there, as if that simple fact of their marketing dominance is all they need to be doing for us and the rest of the obligation for satisfaction in the transaction is on our side. Sure, if you don't like what you get you can send it back for a refund (or is that not the case with eBooks? I've never bought an eBook from Amazon), but is that really a sufficient answer to the world? Along with aesthetics what happened to aspiration? I dislike the fact that the limit of Amazon's customer service or awareness is also the limit of what's merely required by applicable legislation.

I know, my dissatisfaction is part of getting older and more wistful for what's gone and ever-more curmudgeonly. Lately, the changes seem to be measurable on a daily basis.

[dsvick]

I'm sick and tired - mostly tired now though. Was up all night... went to work to change some servers and other essential devices to the new UPSs they let me get. Everything went find until the firewall crashed when I brought it back up.

Luckily we had an old one, the bad news is that there is a reason it is the "old" one, the other bad news is that the config file is almost 4 years out of date.

Going to bed now, there are way too many posts here to catch up on

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by dsvick

I'm sick and tired - mostly tired now though. Was up all night... went to work to change some servers and other essential devices to the new UPSs they let me get. Everything went find until the firewall crashed when I brought it back up.

Luckily we had an old one, the bad news is that there is a reason it is the "old" one, the other bad news is that the config file is almost 4 years out of date.

Going to bed now, there are way too many posts here to catch up on

Oh No!!! Sorry to hear. Get some sleep and come back at it fresh!

[GeoffC]

mutter mutter ... optical drives ...

I've not had this netbook more than a year and rarely have I used the optical drive, but it refuses to read DVD / CD-Roms,

though it will play Blu-ray discs .... .

mutter mutter ....