i just bought a black-listed kindle

[lullaby88]

my needs when i buy it, was to put my ebook collection in it and read.
not to buy any books on amazon, not to use internet. (wifi or 3G)

and i can read ebooks, manga, listen music (in font), use wifi. i even register using jailbreak but just to use the " collection" features.


For you it's bad.

People have already stole me 3cellphones. so i know what it is to want your things back. but it never happens.

one day, i was to the bank machine to pick money, and a man forget to take is card back and is account was open. i could have take as much as money as i wanted but i return is card to him by mail.

i found a cellphone once, i made 50km to give it back to the owner.

so for once, i offer me something with the money i saved (120$ in 6month).

yeah i just 've 200$ per month to live.
i don't do shopping like other girls, i don't go to bar with friend, neither on student's party.

so yeah for once i want to be egoist.
and more, if you tell me that amazon won't give me the name of the person.

[Bratzzo]

Originally Posted by lullaby88

So if amazon don't provide me the name of this person. what am i suppose to do?

And no, it was a "cheque" don't know the word in english ).

If amazon won't let me give it back to him. do i have to threw it away?

Here is what amazon says:

In case of a lost Kindle:

If your Kindle is found and we're contacted, we'll arrange for it to be returned to you.

In case of a found Kindle:

Please contact us for instructions on how to send us the Kindle you found. We will contact the owner and return the Kindle to them.

source: http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/custom...0510540#stolen

[Ron.]

Originally Posted by l_macd

Really, you can't just deregister the Kindle from your account before you sell it so the new owner can then register it to their own account?

You can sure, but in the thread I mentioned the person is debating if it is worth it to take a chance buying a used kindle and facing the possibility of it being a blacklisted kindle. how do you know if the used kindle your are buying is blacklisted or not, does amazon let you check serial numbers ? can you email amazon a serial number telling them you are thinking of buying that kindle and ask if its blacklisted ?

[FourOhFour]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

If the kindle was really "found" in a Taxi.. does that really make it stolen?

Depending on the laws where it was found, possibly. In some jurisdictions, failing to turn found items over to the police or return them to their rightful owner carries the same penalty as theft. This came up in the whole prerelease iphone found in a bar thing.

[HomeInMyShoes]

@lullaby88: in the end its your decision. I'm not exactly sure why you expect people on a forum to accept your decision. It is possible if you register this device with Amazon that it could be blacklisted. That is your problem. You have done nice things in the past, why should this case be any different? It's foolhardy to try to get people on the Web to help you rationalize your ethics.

[howyoudoin]

lullaby88, contact Amazon. If the kindle is reported as stolen or lost, get them to arrange for you to contact the original owner.

If they refuse to do so on the basis of customer confidentiality, IMO, you have every right to refuse to send Amazon the kindle. Amazon does not own that Kindle, and IMO you are under no obligation to forward it to them.

Either contact the seller and work towards getting the transaction overturned, or report it to the authorities in your area that you have been sold stolen goods.

[alansplace]

Originally Posted by l_macd

Really, you can't just deregister the Kindle from your account before you sell it so the new owner can then register it to their own account?

sure you can.

[ProfCrash]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

All you have to do if you loose your kindle is deregister it. Reporting a "lost" kindle as stolen seems just wrong to me. Although I guess some don't think others should benefit from their misfortune.

BOb

When my Mom lost her DX I called Amazon and reported it as Lost. They went ahead and bricked it. Mind you, she lost it an airport so there is a chance that it was stolen. All I know is that my Mom no longer had her DX.

Lost, stolen, it doesn't matter. The end result is the same, they brick the Kindle.

And I am fine with that. I would hope that the person who found my Mom's DX and deregistered it so that they could use it would do the right thing and call Amazon to report having found a Kindle. But since that didn't happen, I had the device bricked. I paid for the DX, it was meant for my Mom to use. It was not mean for some random person who found it and decided to keep it. It was not meant for the person who bought the found DX, if that is what happened.

[DMB]

I had my first K3 stolen from an open bag while I was lunching in a London pub. I found it deeply upsetting. Amazon blacklisted it for me and that meant that when I bought myself a brand-new K3 I could get back all my books on it.

I doubt if it would have been much good for the thief with the books that were on it: mostly classics, science and political philosophy.

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by DMB

Amazon blacklisted it for me and that meant that when I bought myself a brand-new K3 I could get back all my books on it.

The two are not mutually exclusive. You register you new kindle with your account and you have access to your purchased books... whether your old one was "bricked" or not.

BOb

[ProfCrash]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

The two are not mutually exclusive. You register you new kindle with your account and you have access to your purchased books... whether your old one was "bricked" or not.

BOb

True but why should a thief benefit from my device?

[alansplace]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

True but why should a thief benefit from my device?

or a person who's acquired stolen merchandise (kinda' an amateur fence)? or a person with the attitude 'their loss my gain'?

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

True but why should a thief benefit from my device?

Finders keepers losers weepers.

I'm not talking about a THEFT here. I am saying, if you LOST your device, having amazon blacklist it so someone else can't enjoy seems a bit of sour grapes to me.

Sure, if sucks to lose something like that, I get that. I would also hope it was returned. Of course, this is coming from someone that paid $359 for his kindle not $79 or $99 that they cost today.

BOb

[ProfCrash]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

Finders keepers losers weepers.

I'm not talking about a THEFT here. I am saying, if you LOST your device, having amazon blacklist it so someone else can't enjoy seems a bit of sour grapes to me.

Sure, if sucks to lose something like that, I get that. I would also hope it was returned. Of course, this is coming from someone that paid $359 for his kindle not $79 or $99 that they cost today.

BOb

We see things differently. This is an expensive device. I would turn the device into lost and found or the police or call the company that made the device and see if they have a method for returning it to the person who lost it. That is the ethical thing to do. If someone will not do the right thing, then I will deprive them of the full use of the item that I paid for.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

All you have to do if you loose your kindle is deregister it. Reporting a "lost" kindle as stolen seems just wrong to me. Although I guess some don't think others should benefit from their misfortune.

BOb

I have lost 2 EBRs. (yeah, I'm an absentminded professor type.) One was at the Chicago Symphony, and the other was on American Airlines. In both instances, I checked with the lost & found. In both instances, my name & address were pasted to the device in the form of a return mail label.

At the Symphony, I checked with the lost & found the next day, and they had no record but told me to check back. I checked back a couple of weeks later, at which time they had a record of it being turned in, but could not locate it. So obviously, someone turned it in, then someone else stole it.

On American, I checked the lost & found when I got to my hotel, & they didn't have it. Later, on the way home, I checked again, & the story was that my airplane hadn't been cleaned & to check in Chicago. In Chicago, they had a bunch of EBRs that had been turned in, but mine wasn't among them.

I have renamed my two Kindles "LOST/STOLEN REWARD: call <one of my phone numbers>" Oddly, I haven't lost a kindle since, so clearly, this works!

My hunch is that any thief will be unable to easily figure out how to change that name, and might decide to be an honest citizen since there's a reward involved.

(But it occurs to me that I should also upload a document entitled "Please Read If You Have Found This eBook Reader" with more detailed information, including the fact that as soon as I find I've lost the EBR, I'm having it deactivated and banned from Amazon, and reporting the loss to the police. Nicely, of course. Including the amount of the award. Carrot. Stick.)

It seems to me that bricking the EBR is the right answer, assuming that can be done, because it deprives the thief of being able to use the device, and does not leave them with a working model to sell. Anyone who buys an electronic device without checking to see if it works does not have any basis to complain about losing his money.

So your point about deregistering does not make much sense to me if the device can be bricked. But it is worth considering if the device can only be blacklisted or deregistered.

On the whole, I think you are right. The reason is that I doubt that very many thieves are taking the device to read on. I cynically believe that most thieves aren't interested in reading at all, much less on EBRs. They intend to pawn or sell the device.

And I don't think that most people who buy second hand devices believe that they are stolen, mainly because most aren't. If the device is merely blacklisted rather than bricked, most people won't be in a position to tell until it's too late.

So blacklisting it doesn't really matter, except possible to screw some trusting 3rd party.

On the question of keeping the found EBR, I think that the finder should demand her money back from her sister, and contact Amazon to return the device. And threaten to tell Mom if the sister doesn't comply.