Very satisfied with Pottermore experience

[ProfCrash]

I have no problem with a multiple store approach, the authors can sell from their websites, the Publishers can sell from their websites, but sell the books from the regular stores as well. Give me an incentive to buy from your website if you want my info, a lower price or a book without DRM or maybe some extra material but let me make that choice. Do not force me to use your store.

Harry, I agree people should be backing their stuff up. I would guess that most people are not. We see stories here on a regular basis where someones account got hacked and they lost all their books. They post here, have access to info on how to back up books, and still do not. What makes you think that the average person on the street is going to do so? Personally, I would prefer to have the books be available from places that provide more protection then less. More importantly, I think it is important for people to have that choice.

JKR removed that choice from people. Potter is huge right now and will probably remain strong for a long time to come. But will it be strong enough to justify the cost of maintaining the site and the servers that hold all the info? It is a risk that people are being forced to take. If other smaller authors start to do this, then life is going to get interesting and it could be detrimental to the e-book market. Why buy an e-reader when the sites you buy the books from cannot be trusted? People tend to be lazy and don't do things like back up their e-books. Why move to that technology when I can be so easily screwed over. I can only blame myself for losing a paperbook but why should I have to worry about the store closing and costing me my e-book?

The people here are not the norm. Our practices and what we find to be common sense is not embraced across the market. It will hurt the e-book market if these types of stores blow up in peoples faces. A long term problem but it is a precident (sp) that I am concerned about.

[ucfgrad93]

At the risk of derailing this thread, I have a couple of questions.

1. How do I back up and store locally books I have purchased through Amazon?

2. How I prepare them to use on a different device, lets say I switch to a Nook in the future.

If someone could either PM or link to a thread it would be much appreciated.

[JoeD]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

Harry, I agree people should be backing their stuff up. I would guess that most people are not. We see stories here on a regular basis where someones account got hacked and they lost all their books. They post here, have access to info on how to back up books, and still do not. What makes you think that the average person on the street is going to do so? Personally, I would prefer to have the books be available from places that provide more protection then less. More importantly, I think it is important for people to have that choice.

It shouldn't be up to the stores to act as a backup service really. People should instead be educated on how to setup a backup method or have someone in the know do so. Consider that even if their books, music and film purchases were safe due to stores doing the backup, people would still lose any documents they've created, financial records, digital photos and home movies.

When there's free and trivially easy ways to setup a daily backup either to a usb drive or with another family member over the net, people really need to do so.

JKR removed that choice from people. Potter is huge right now and will probably remain strong for a long time to come. But will it be strong enough to justify the cost of maintaining the site and the servers that hold all the info? It is a risk that people are being forced to take.

There is no risk. If pottermore closes tomorrow, those who bought today and downloaded the book still have full access to it. Those who tied it to a store account also have an added "backup" (not that I really consider amazon a backup)

If other smaller authors start to do this, then life is going to get interesting and it could be detrimental to the e-book market. Why buy an e-reader when the sites you buy the books from cannot be trusted? People tend to be lazy and don't do things like back up their e-books. Why move to that technology when I can be so easily screwed over. I can only blame myself for losing a paperbook but why should I have to worry about the store closing and costing me my e-book?

This won't become the norm. Most authors do not have the profile to sell direct. They need retail stores. However, they should setup their own direct store with DRM free books for their dedicated fans to buy direct.

The people here are not the norm. Our practices and what we find to be common sense is not embraced across the market. It will hurt the e-book market if these types of stores blow up in peoples faces. A long term problem but it is a precident (sp) that I am concerned about.

People need to take responsibility for backing up their own data. As long as any store you buy from is DRM free, it should be your responsibility to look after the item.

They offer a limited number of downloads which acts as an initially safety net, but long term people should control their own data.

As for running the site, if book sales dry up they can reduce the number of servers needed. Depending how they have it setup, for example a number of cloud services would reduce costs to free when demand was small and scale up as demand increases.

The key point though is that regardless of how Rowling chooses to sell the books, she's done so in a way that leaves you legally in control of your future access to the book.

I imagine that should any other authors setup their own direct sales sites, they'll still have their books available on retail stores. Leaving the choice up to the customer from where to buy. Rowling is well known enough that she has no need to pay middle men money to sell the eBook.

[JoeD]

Originally Posted by ucfgrad93

At the risk of derailing this thread, I have a couple of questions.

1. How do I back up and store locally books I have purchased through Amazon?

2. How I prepare them to use on a different device, lets say I switch to a Nook in the future.

If someone could either PM or link to a thread it would be much appreciated.

If the books are DRM'd, the short answer is, nobody here can provide you details on how to do so for fear of having this forum shut down. I'm sure someone will comment before long about a certain alien from melmac though.

Once you've removed the DRM (which may or may not be legal in your country) conversion is pretty simple, you add the book to calibre and select the output format you want and it does the rest.

[ProfCrash]

Here is how I back up my Kindle books.

1) I go to my manage your Kindle page
2) Each book has yellow button on the far right that reads "Action"
3) I choose "Download and deliver via USB"
4) I choose the same Kindle for all the devices
5) rinse and repeat.

I do this pretty regularly.

As for removing DRM, google Apprentice Alf and download Calibre. It took me 30 minutes to get the plug ins for Calibre up (Apprentice Alf) and running. The comments are helpful if you run into any problems.

I also store my ebooks on a thumbdrive and a back up hard drive.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

Here is how I back up my Kindle books.

1) I go to my manage your Kindle page
2) Each book has yellow button on the far right that reads "Action"
3) I choose "Download and deliver via USB"
4) I choose the same Kindle for all the devices
5) rinse and repeat.

I do this pretty regularly.

If you're using a Windows PC or a Mac, downloading via the PC/Mac Kindle App is an awful lot easier, because you don't have to do it one book at a time.

[ProfCrash]

JoeD: All of what you posted is true and accurate. Do you really think that is going to matter if something happens to Pottermore and people are not able to get to their downloads? The negative press is going to be huge.

Whether we like it or not, cloud computing is being sold to the public and most people are buying into it hook, line, and sinker. They didn't back up their hard drives on their computer 5 years ago and they are not backing up their stuff on the cloud. If Pottermore were to crash and people could not get to their e-books there will be headlines talking about how poorly the system works and many folks will draw the conclusion that e-books are not safe.

We know it is a silly argument but do you really think what we say and the few comments we are going to post are going to make a world of difference?

[ProfCrash]

Originally Posted by HarryT

If you're using a Windows PC or a Mac, downloading via the PC/Mac Kindle App is an awful lot easier, because you don't have to do it one book at a time.

I have been too lazy to look into that. I know it exists but I have always done it the long way.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

I have been too lazy to look into that. I know it exists but I have always done it the long way.

The benefit of using the Kindle App is that you can download as many books as you want with a mouse click, then just copy the files directly out of the "My Kindle Content" folder where the app stores them. Do give it a go - it's so much easier.

[JoeD]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

Whether we like it or not, cloud computing is being sold to the public and most people are buying into it hook, line, and sinker. They didn't back up their hard drives on their computer 5 years ago and they are not backing up their stuff on the cloud. If Pottermore were to crash and people could not get to their e-books there will be headlines talking about how poorly the system works and many folks will draw the conclusion that e-books are not safe.

We know it is a silly argument but do you really think what we say and the few comments we are going to post are going to make a world of difference?

Those headlines would be the work of bad journalism then.

The cloud is not and should never be considered as a sole backup method. Ask the people who were using megaupload to store legal content and are now having to await the outcome of legal action taken by the hosting company to regain access to their data.

Pottermore has done the best it can do to ensure you will have access to your book for as long as possible. They've provided a way to re-download it a limited number of times (may even reset it on request in years to come), a way to link to stores that allow unlimited downloads and a way to download direct and backup to any device you want.

Regardless of how much outcry people may try to create if pottermore shuts next year, there's _nothing_ more they could do.

The only thing I can see as an issue is one of convenience, you have to sign up for another account just to buy HP and that is a fair and valid point. The risk of the store shutting though isn't an issue imo unlike stores that use DRM would be.

People will learn the hard way to backup their data. I've told countless friends and family members about the importance of backing up, but it's not until they've lost several years of documents and digital photos that they take it seriously. However, that doesn't mean online companies should take the responsibility for acting as a lifetime backup.

[ProfCrash]

And journalists normally do a good job of pointing out that their reades were wrong for not backing up their data?

The potential shut down of the site was one of many reasons why I am not happy with the Pottermore experience. I belive it was pretty low on my list. The reality is that there are still people on this site, who have seen the posts complaining about lost accounts and books being pulled and the like, who are not backing up their e-books.

Say it is foolish, say it is stupid, say what you want but it is what is happening. So if Pottermore or Barnes and Noble or Amazon or Kobo or Sony goes out of business and they shut down their servers people are going to be up in arms and talking about how screwed they are.

I guess I feel more comfortable with Amazon then I do Pottermore because Amazon is more diversified and would have to be in really bad shape for things to go totally pear shaped. It is going to take longer and there will be many signs of the impending apocolypse. Pottermore might not be so obvious. Similar sites, Publisher run or author run, might be even more vunerable. Thanks, but I would prefer to have the option of buying my book from Amazon (I know others prefer other stores) then Pottermore for convience sake and security sake.

And then I back up my sales.

[latepaul]

I just bought the books (UK version). I thought the experience was very slick. Very happy that the different formats are all available as part of the same sale, so the price looks ok to me from that pov.

I also liked that it integrates well with Amazon so it's part of my account there.

The only thing I didn't like was the captcha system when creating my account. It was very hard to read the second word. But I've had the problem on other sites lately.

[JoeD]

Originally Posted by ProfCrash

And journalists normally do a good job of pointing out that their reades were wrong for not backing up their data?

We can't do anything about bad/sensationalist journalism that's true. But we can keep educating friends/family into setting up an automated backup system. However, many news items have stressed the importance of backing up your data especially non replaceable data like photos and often cover the cases of companies closing that used DRM as a means to argue that DRM is bad for the customer.

Say it is foolish, say it is stupid, say what you want but it is what is happening. So if Pottermore or Barnes and Noble or Amazon or Kobo or Sony goes out of business and they shut down their servers people are going to be up in arms and talking about how screwed they are.

When any company goes out of business and you lose access to data you'll be up in arms, but at least with a site that sells DRM free you are the one in control of your loss of access.

If Baen close tomorrow, I'll be sad to see them go, but I certainly wouldn't be up in arms about losing access to everything I've bought from them. They sold DRM free, they put the responsibility for future access in my hands.

Thanks, but I would prefer to have the option of buying my book from Amazon (I know others prefer other stores) then Pottermore for convience sake and security sake.

For many who are either not willing to or don't know how to remove DRM, Amazon is less secure than pottermore. Because even if that person does backups it won't matter.

Thankfully removing DRM is currently easy, but the tools may not always be so easily available.

Companies going out of or getting out of the business is the biggest reason DRM is bad. Both for ebooks,music and films. There's countless cases of Sony, MS, WallMart and others shutting down their services and in effect cutting customers off from their bought products. Pottermore can never do that.

Yes one day they may vanish, yes if you don't backup your book and your last device dies you lose access, but it's not pottermore's fault. They've not made it illegal to backup your purchases and take care of them (unlike most other retailers), whether you choose to do so or not is up to each and every individual to decide.

Now if we wanted an ideal world for ebook sales, I'd also prefer to buy from a one-stop shop if everything they sold was DRM free. Since that would mean no risk of people losing access in the future but also no risk of signing up for a site that isn't legit. In order to reach that point though, I think we need sites like Pottermore along the way to show DRM is not the answer to piracy.

[twowheels]

Originally Posted by Victoria

Pottermore has completely eliminated that problem.

I would argue that it's just as much a problem, if not more. It seems that Pottermore is more likely to close down than Amazon, especially as interest in the books fade over time.

[JoeD]

Originally Posted by twowheels

I would argue that it's just as much a problem, if not more. It seems that Pottermore is more likely to close down than Amazon, especially as interest in the books fade over time.

but you won't lose access to the book, unlike with Amazon and other stores. Which is the most important issue isn't it? Having control over how long you have access to products you've bought.

If pottermore had included any kind of DRM beyond watermarking, then I'd agree totally with you and would argue that any other store would be a better choice such as Amazon or B&N.