Kobo Discounts: Coupon Codes + Discussion

[slex]

Originally Posted by Marcy

If a company offers a coupon for use it is not the same as breaking into someone's house and stealing their stuff Your analogy doesn't hold up.

I boldly walked into the Kobo India store, said "I want that book", brought it to the register, gave them a coupon, they gave me the coupon discount, and I paid for the book.

I didn't sneak into the store, stick the book under my coat and sneak back out with it.

You actually kind of sneaked into it *, since you changed your location to India (I assume you are not there). And I'm not talking about the legality of it. It may be legal or it may be not **. It may not be covered by law, but it doesn't mean it's right. And that is what I am talking about. In both cases someone exploits the vulnerability of someone else and causes them damage.



* IMO the equivalent of boldly walking would be to ask for confirmation from Kobo when you feel the code is fishy, and to do it from the front door (not the Indian one) for your location.
** I have no idea how good Kobo's lawyers are, but if they make it a goal, they probably might annul all the purchases. Most probably the original poster got it as a "personal" code. Also, changing of location may violate some ToS. And it is possible that you probably violated some tax code as you were shopping from India.

[Terisa de morgan]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

Sorry. Feel free not to buy them if you haven't read any of them -- who knows if they'd be to your taste.

Problem is, I have read the first ones in Spanish and I know they are my taste

[Josieb1]

The way i see it is Kobo has two choices. Either decline the purchases or charge for them.

Anything else leaves themselves open to ridicule for having a system that allowed this to happen, and let it go on for so long.

[bartveld]

Originally Posted by chilady1

So I have a question: 3 of the books I purchased this weekend would not let me download from my Kobo library on the web, however, all 3 books are showing up within the Kobo Desktop app.

I found the directory where the files resides however, there are all in the form of 8a386142-xxxxx-xxx in other words, gibberish, not titles.

Short of opening each and every file, is there a way I can pinpoint those 3 books so I might import them into Calibre?

Any help would be appreciated.

This is what I do: In My Library (in my browser on PC) I click the blue button next to the book. Download with Adobe Digital Editions. The file is stored in My Documents/My Digital Editions. From there you can import it in Calibre. And you have your own copy on your own PC. Untouchable.
I never use Kobo Desktop.

[chilady1]

Originally Posted by bartveld

This is what I do: In My Library (in my browser on PC) I click the blue button next to the book. Download with Adobe Digital Editions. The file is stored in My Documents/My Digital Editions. From there you can import it in Calibre. And you have your own copy on your own PC. Untouchable.
I never use Kobo Desktop.

I don't think I was clear. I did what you suggested for all the books I purchased. There were 3 that would not download in that way. However, when I bring up the Kobo app - I see them in my Kobo Library.

When I go to Users/Library/Application Support/Kobo/Kobo Desktop Edition/kepub - there are a bunch of files listed like this:

bc9777f9-15f8-4ed8-9caa-534413549704 - how do I know which book this is? There is no title.

Again, book is in Kobo Library but trying to move it into Calibre library. Hope this makes sense.

[bartveld]

Sorry, I misread you, chilady1. I've had several times that the book wouldn't download. Every time I restarted the download and then it would come through. Have you tried multiple times?

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by slex

I also don't understand the differences in the reactions. Probably a few months ago Diesel had a buggy code giving similar discounts, but most people in the forum agreed that it's a bug and did nothing.

The Diesel situation was completely different. That was a clear error in the coding of their web site and it would have meant the gift cards of random people being drained by people using the loophole.

Here, Kobo have deliberately given out a 90% off coupon code. Whether they intended it to be multiple use or not I have no idea. That's really up to them. But it is not clearly an error as it is a genuine coupon code, not something hacking an error in the web site input sanitising.

[chilady1]

Originally Posted by bartveld

Sorry, I misread you, chilady1. I've had several times that the book wouldn't download. Every time I restarted the download and then it would come through. Have you tried multiple times?

I can try that. For one of them, there is no download button. One of them I get the following error:

Error getting License. License Server Communication Problem:
E_ADEPT_USER_AUTH

[samhy]

Originally Posted by bartveld

This is what I do: In My Library (in my browser on PC) I click the blue button next to the book. Download with Adobe Digital Editions. The file is stored in My Documents/My Digital Editions. From there you can import it in Calibre. And you have your own copy on your own PC. Untouchable.
I never use Kobo Desktop.

But in the case of chilady1, it seems to be three kepub ebooks and not epub ebooks so the process is different.
Chilady1, I think you'll find answers and knowledgeable persons in the Kobo forum (here it's the deals, freebies... part).

Originally Posted by slex

You actually kind of sneaked into it *, since you changed your location to India (I assume you are not there). And I'm not talking about the legality of it. It may be legal or it may be not **. It may not be covered by law, but it doesn't mean it's right. And that is what I am talking about. In both cases someone exploits the vulnerability of someone else and causes them damage.

I'm on the fence too, but I'm using my official (and only) account, set in my country and paying with my debit card. The only difference from another purchase using a coupon is the fact that I'm using the same coupon each time. In that case, it's hard for me to see how it's so different from the 50% multi-use coupon provided by Kobo several months ago.

Edit: sorry bartveld and chilady1, I see that you posted updates while I was typing.

[bartveld]

@slex: So, have you reported our shopping spree to Kobo yet? I wish you the best of luck dealing with their customer service.

[apesmom]

The code has gone viral and moved way beyond the MR readership. I've now seen it posted on a few different blogs as well as several coupon sites.

[slex]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

The Diesel situation was completely different. That was a clear error in the coding of their web site and it would have meant the gift cards of random people being drained by people using the loophole.

Here, Kobo have deliberately given out a 90% off coupon code. Whether they intended it to be multiple use or not I have no idea. That's really up to them. But it is not clearly an error as it is a genuine coupon code, not something hacking an error in the web site input sanitising.

Kobo:
Have a gift card or promo code? Use it here

Diesel:
Coupon or Gift Certificate Code:

Not quite clear that it was a gift card. Kobo and Diesel basically both say the same. Also, the fact that Kobo have deliberately given a code doesn't exclude the possibility of a coding error - regarding its scope and multiple use. Regarding Diesel it was probably the same - it is very unlikely that such codes never existed - most probably they existed but they were poorly programmed.

[Josieb1]

Originally Posted by apesmom

The code has gone viral and moved way beyond the MR readership. I've now seen it posted on a few different blogs as well as several coupon sites.

I spotted it on twitter, an author posted it and at that point (this morning) it had been retweeted 28 times.

[Katsunami]

Kobo should just remove the code and be done with it. There is no reason to wait multiple days.

I used this code, certainly, but still I can't understand why Kobo does nothing. If necessary, block access to all Kobo domains.

It could be a deliberate plot to gain huge amounts of attention, and make a bit of money in the process, instead of paying for advertisements...

[peterwardgd]

does paying via a credit card make a difference with using the code i still cant get it to work more than once! starting to think i've somehow been code blacklisted. Definitely not unlimited use for all of us. grrrr