Amazon's vertical integration/monopoly

[Cinisajoy]

Originally Posted by knc1

The forum software changes a thread title on the index page to bold when there is a new (un-read by the viewer) post.

I wonder if we could get that changed to only bold this thread when notimp has something new to say, regardless of the 'read' status.

I just want notified when he answers the question of "what do you want the developers to do". I still haven't seen the answer to that one.

[notimp]

Here is the thing.

There was a standards giving body - that made some assessments, and we all acted for a while like those "conceptually" stood for what we all understood under the term ebook.

Amazon - always tried to "break out" of this ruleset (for personal reasons ) - but as long as their formats mobi and azw3 could be reversed by "public actors", we could proclaim that those were still ebooks.

Definition of ebook:

- can be created by distributed entities
- can be created in the interests of distributed entities
- follows open web standards (html based)
- easy to understand and produce even by individuals - because processing power for at least html abstraction is not a problem
- publishers and distributers can try to saveguard their interests via DRM, which is mostly "habitual" (because math), but by an unspoken agreement, this was seen as mostly beneficial for all players. Granted, the "digitalization" process isnt finished - and the system is skewed towards "anyone can remove DRM - after some time" - but from my point of view this is a critical part of its properties, because I don't see culture as the same thing Amazon would describe as "their long tail business". And by long tail In this case I mean several decades.

With .kfx we practically lost all of this. The statement "kfx in itself is unfit (or less fit) for archival purposes" is telling, because it is a breach of the ebook standard - at least conceptually.

Lets look at the other points above (set up by me to be shot down.. ) - Amazon broke all of them.

Hence - don't act like you still live in the old paradigm - where we all had a consensus about what "ebooks" were and don't just prolong the same structures that now are used to auto deliver the new default format that goes against the entire original intent.

You even have an internal justification for doing it. Currently.

The first one is a piece of technobabble "I believe they did it to further optimize their in engine rendering".
The second one is "Amazon should be allowed to make money too".

Those were voiced openly in this thread as well.

My initial idea was, that people in here should "mirror" the intent of the original standards giving body at the highest level of consumer interaction - namely "informed users, that still care about formats" - but mods in here stated, that mobileread has no tradition in setting a "common goal" under which to act on.

So if thats not possible to establish - probably the only thing left to do is to establish a notion of "what was lost" (make it the notion of a "fundamental loss" - because it was one) in the ecosystem changes, we didn't talk about, and blame them on the Kindle brand - so at least the notion that "something went wrong" lingers among users as long as possible.

And then hope for the made up "market competitor" with a heart of gold, that gives away product creation rights for free - because *yolo* or because of ethical considerations, or because he hasn't mirrored the Amazon model - yet...

What is an ebook? In not answering this question, you are opting out from taking a stance in regard to current and future developments of this medium. You may all have different reasons for it - I'd argue that most of them arent in the public interest - but you have to understand that nonaction (in the same way bloggers decided not to tackle any of those issues above) is a position in itself.

The problem with promoting "actual" actions (code this, do that..) is that as the kfx reverser mentioned a few postings ago - any action you might set at this point (producing code, releasing code) might result in a worse short term outcome than actually doing nothing.

Because at this point - your best outcome is coupled to a purely voluntary loophole Amazon keeps open and manages in their interest. If you loose their "still handing out old books to those that ask" goodwill - you'll loose functionality.

[Cinisajoy]

According to Merriam-Webster
"E-book: a book that is read on a computer or other electronic device."

Not a darn thing about how it has to be produced.

We all understand you cannot stand kfx. We understand you want a discussion.
Well if you want a discussion, why are you in a developer forum and not the discussion forum?

So again, what do you expect the developers to do about kfx?

[Cinisajoy]

Because at this point - your best outcome is coupled to a purely voluntary loophole Amazon keeps open and manages in their interest. If you loose their "still handing out old books to those that ask" goodwill - you'll loose functionality.

This paragraph makes absolutely no sense. Is the functionality going to fall off because it isn't tight? Are the old books going to fall off because they are no longer tight?

Or did you mean lose but accidentally typed loose?

[latepaul]

Standards bodies' pronouncements are only binding if you sign up to them - Amazon hasn't.

What do you want to do? Make it mandatory to adhere to some 3rd party standard? If so you should probably lobby your government not the kindle dev board of a web forum.

Personally whilst I dislike what Amazon is doing I'd rather react with my buying decisions than my vote. I'm not an advocate of the unfettered free market by any means but this is regulation where none is needed IMHO.

BTW exactly which body are you referring to? I find it hard to believe that a standards body defined the "ebook" rather than a particular type of ebook e.g. epub. OK, maybe such standards do "define" it in their preambles as a way of establishing context but not as a binding standard on its own.

[apprenticeharper]

Originally Posted by notimp

Definition of ebook:
[...]
- follows open web standards (html based)
[...]
- publishers and distributers can try to saveguard their interests via DRM, which is mostly "habitual" (because math), but by an unspoken agreement, this was seen as mostly beneficial for all players. [...]

Ebooks aren't conceptually tied to HTML/CSS.
DRM isn't 'mostly beneficial' for anyone, nor have I ever seen it as such.

Given you have those two points completely wrong, I give little weight to the rest of your lengthy post.

[notimp]

@apprenticeharper: DRM is harmful to consumer/user/public interests. It gets used as a lock in for ecosystems, the restrictions it produces are entirely artificially created.

DRM removal in any case becomes necessary at some point "down the road" - heck it is the first thing even I recommend everyone should do after purchasing a "reading license" for the price of an ebook. (In germany you aren't allowed to sell eBooks at a lower price point than paper editions to "protect booksellers as a commercial sector" (from getting outmuscled by "economies of scale"...) )

I dont care about the "we have to be able to sell you a better version, a few years from now" argument, I don't even care about the "there is no wear and tear on it" argument. No you can't use DRM to establish them by having people agree to those limitations.

But it is arguable (I have never argued for it in my life - I just see the following as a somewhat relevant point), that you need some "modality" to prevent "ubiquitous sharing" out of the gate. Also - from my POV water marking is a worse way to realize this - because it is essentially criminalizing individuals for not being able to rule out the behavior of their peers, which in return leads to self censored behavior.

Please understand that I share your believes entirely - but this is more than a DRM discussion, this is a discussion about the point when DRM in itself becomes just another layer, because the restrictive functions are woven into the fileformat to begin with.
("kfx is only readable on proprietary hardware, thats always connected, not owned by the user, firmware updates install without your consent and so on..").

I'd happily agree to a DRM layer (if it becomes removable over time, and only then) any day - if we could keep books in fileformats that people out there arent disallowed to understand, produce, or sell.

Its the difference between "you loose this features because of an artificial layer" and "you loose them because its an ebook". Its the difference between "the author/publisher chooses to restrict his work" and "the author/publisher can't create the final book, not if he wants all those premium features".
-

@latepaul: It is hard to believe in the collective power of individual choice (changing your own buying behavior), when the issue itself doesnt get publicised (the blogger scene didn't care to inform their readers in the least), when Amazon was able to roll out the format change over night - not informing consumers what had changed (apart from "more bookerly") and the only way to opt out (one book at a time) is so unpractical that the majority of consumers will never use it.

My argument actually is about the moment you loose most of the element of choice you bring forward as the thing thats still out there and in our favor - when most of your library (on the device) has already been converted to a format you can't take with you. kfx as a lock in - if you like. All of this - as of right now - is established and ongoing.

Also - there is the structural element, that if you allow a distributor to inhabit all "ebook production" rights (structural change, and be it "just for the most popular format") within his ecosystem, and there is no noticeable pushback -- other competitors will follow the same model. It's like passing up opportunity if you dont (If authors and publishers want to give up their rights to still be able to produce the actual product...).

@Cinisajoy: Trying to define an eBook as something even a bannerad would qualify for - if there was enough text on it, is something that could only come out of your mouth at this point.. All you did for the last five pages in this posting is to proclaim that "you are not convinced" and that we should move on - because "hating kfx is so yesterdays news, I mean cmon..."


Sure - eBooks dont have to be conceptually "bound" to be written in HTML for all the foreseeable future - but to keep them in an "easy to understand, easy to produce" open (and be it via reverse engineering) standard is necessary to keep important properties of books as a cultural medium.

Something everyone with some interest can start creating themselves. Thats the "you have to keep the means to create them distributed" part of the argument.

.kfx marks the moment when this stopped being the case for the main Kindle file format. Rollout was overnight, Amazon didn't care to inform their customers, bloggers didn't care to inform their users, production tools suddenly werent distributed - and hackers chose not to release the creation tools, because the file format stopped being "fit for archiving" on the users side ("No calibre for you!").

And Amazon should be allowed to do all of this without too much public attention, because...? (Bloggers get paid by banner ads...? *sarcasm*)

[Cinisajoy]

I just want you to tell me what you want or expect the developers to do.

For the last 5 pages all you have done is tell us about that one format.

Here are the facts.
You buy a proprietary device, you are going to get the format that works best for it.
Rather the average consumer can do anything with that format means nothing.
It will be cracked eventually.

Fact 2: Not all ebooks have DRM. As far as Amazon goes, the publisher is the one that decides.

Fact 3: where did you get your definition of an ebook?

Fact 4:This is the forum for action not discussion.

And Fact 5: If I am pretty much the only one answering you then I don't think the developers here are really interested.

Fact 6: If you were to post your concerns out in the Amazon Kindle forum, I am 99.9% positive that you would find some that agree with you.

[Cinisajoy]

Fact 7: If I want to create an ebook I can. Amazon cannot stop me. If I do not want to use the kfx format, I do not have to sell it on Amazon.

Fact 8: If I want to make money with my book, I accept the fact that the distributors will send it to the buyer in the best format for the buyer's device. It probably will not be in the exact format that I wrote it in or originally uploaded it as.

Fact 9: No matter the format, I still have control of the words. That is the key point.

So kfx does not hurt authors.

[jhowell]

Originally Posted by notimp

With .kfx we practically lost all of this. The statement "kfx in itself is unfit (or less fit) for archival purposes" is telling, because it is a breach of the ebook standard - at least conceptually.

I understand the author/publisher/seller viewpoint of wanting to restrict access to prevent theft and maximize income. They have incentive to use DRM, proprietary data formats, and walled-garden distribution infrastructure to assure this. Not all sellers do, but Amazon does.

From a customer/reader viewpoint I would like unfettered access to the books I purchase so that I can assure their readability in the long term. The existing de-DRM and e-book conversion software provides this despite the seller's attempts to prevent it.

The existing situation appears to be working pretty well. Control is exerted over most customers as the sellers wish, but those customers with a strong desire can break that control. KFX won't change this. I don't see the balance of power shifting any time soon.

Originally Posted by notimp

And then hope for the made up "market competitor" with a heart of gold, that gives away product creation rights for free - because *yolo* or because of ethical considerations, or because he hasn't mirrored the Amazon model - yet...

E-book creation has nothing to do with any of your other discussion. Authors and publishers use non-Amazon tools and formats when creating e-books. They are not being harmed by Amazon's follow-on conversion of their works to its own formats. (Other than possibly when this conversion adds undesired artifacts.)

This brings to mind an area where Amazon is actually trying to exert this control. There are two tools that Amazon provides, Kindle Textbook Creator and Kindle Comic Creator, that work entirely in Amazon's proprietary formats. They add interactive features to what would otherwise be static books. Anyone creating books using these tools should be aware that the results will be usable only within the Amazon ecosystem.

This is a better example of your original argument of Amazon trying to control the creation of e-books. To me it seems a minor issue.

[notimp]

Authors use non Amazon tools and formats to create "works" - but Amazon then has to convert them into the final format that goes into distribution. Thats the actual "book". What does it matter to the public how the publishers manuscripts were formated, and if they used Word or Latex to create them?

It (.kfx) is not the only format out there. It also isn't the only format still usable on Kindles, but it is the main file format - from this point forward.

Amazon then ads a "feature layer" on top of it (hyphenation (its not a their invention, its grammar), ligatures, ... (the same, ok - maybe they own the font...), and packs it into a proprietary format - that then goes into distribution.

Authors and publishers cant create the final book anymore (grammar and featureset). The product that gets distributed "has" to be created by the distributer as part of a distribution agreement. Each and every time. If you choose not to do that - on the Kindle platform you loose entire featuresets, you don't play "in the first league" of current digital books, and so on...

That the eBook creation process is also compartmentalized and conceptualized as "something you never share with anyone" has been part of my main argument from the very beginning. I have to admit though - that I havent looked into Amazons Comic Book formats or pdf equivalents so far. Nevertheless, when this practice started to affect their main eBook format it had my undivided attention.

Your "functioning compromise" always includes Amazon as a mediator in the middle. But understand, that Amazon has to play this role on each and every book that you want to make this assessment about. They don't just provide an ecosystem - they became an integral part in the process - namely they have to produce every book that is offered in the "most current format".

Thats the issue.
--

@Cinisajoy:

The idea that the means of productions of books should not only be cheap ("free bibles") but also publicly obtainable and distributed "played a key role in the development of the Renaissance, Reformation, the Age of Enlightenment, and the scientific revolution and laid the material basis for the modern knowledge-based economy and the spread of learning to the masses." src: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johann...rg#cite_note-2

All of modern science (Critical rationalism, Falsificationism) depends on the ability to cite entire paragraphs of works and future developments in AI and machine learning will only be part of the same discourse and scientific tradition, if open file formats arent a thing of the past. Google themselves have created tools and databases (scholar, ngram, books) that depended on the openness and machine readability of books, spanning centuries. When libraries decided to sue them for having accumulated content against their interests (made it searchable, machine readable, even republished it, ..) it was deemed fair use by your judicial systems. It also depends on the ability of independent (from each other) entities to create and distribute scientific journals, on the ability of certain universities being able to opt in and opt out of buying from certain publishing systems, it depends on books being part of libraries where anyone can get public access to even rare texts and expensive publications and so on.

When the individual user buys a .kfx - citation is limited to the Amazon ruleset, search is limited, ownership is nonexistent (only Amazon owns everything that has the file extension kfx...), ...

Somewhere in all of this the idea of public libraries that aren't just "contract bound book service centers" needs some aspects of it to work as well.

None of those are important considerations for your "banner ad with text that Amazon has to make money on as well" reconceptualization of the modern ebook.

The rest of the considerations come from the fact that a few months ago we had a de facto feature parity with the ePub standard as Amazon consumers - while now with .kfx whe should be considered "happy" when we still can get an older version of the same book via a loophole Amazon provides, because we are still allowed to understand that...

At least acknowledge that for most readers with .kfx practically every aspect of "what an eBook is" changed. Then we can have our discussion about which aspects "really needed to be open" or "really need to remain distributed".

Yes you can opt out from DRM - but opting out of the main Kindle file format is something most Authors and distributers probably wouldn't do "just to behave in an ethical fashion".

I don't even want to scold them for behaving differently, of course they do, I just tend to be angry and not get over the point that they started to give away their production rights from one day to the next - nonetheless, to the most prominent monopoly distributer of books in our time. For free.

For a promise of "more protection".

Of course it is Amazons ecosystem - but it also is their promise to sell us electronic books (use DRM if you have to), and not just 2 cent sticker images of them in a curated world of what formerly were independently created and produced, diversely distributed, and openly accessible works of culture, to anyone that cared about even a single one of them.

If you as an "action oriented community" want to know "what to do next" - I have laid out my thoughts on this in a previous posting. I'm not connected enough within this community to actually establish a plan of action for you, or even host certain discussions, I only can openly address aspects of what I see happening - for the most part.

I've also commented on certain political aspects concerning release policies, or how this community likes to be structured from an organizational standpoint (mostly at least showing some understanding) - but really, thats about all I can do.

[Cinisajoy]

Excuse me, but if I buy an ebook from Amazon, I am not buying a kfx. I am buying an ebook that Amazon will send in a format that best fits the app or device I send it to.
If I decide I want it on a different device then Amazon will send the best format for that device.

Now on your grammar comment are you saying that Amazon is now changing words?
Grammar is the way sentences are written.
Putting in hyphens do not change the grammar and 99% of the time it doesn't change the meaning.
Unless it is a word that could be split more than one way.
Here is an actual website.
Gattiscares. Is it Gatti scares or Gattis cares?

[geekmaster]

Originally Posted by Cinisajoy

... Putting in hyphens do not change the grammar and 99% of the time it doesn't change the meaning.
Unless it is a word that could be split more than one way.
Here is an actual website.
Gattiscares. Is it Gatti scares or Gattis cares?

Co-worker / cow-orker?

Yes, kfx is a proprietary format, Klingon is a proprietary language, so what? Words are words, regardless of medium.

And anything you can read, you can photograph, and OCR, and stick into another format. You can even translate it to another language. What you cannot do is to redistribute it without permission. Even on paper...

[knc1]

If you as an "action oriented community" want to know "what to do next"

Which is your primary mistake.

You are **STILL** posting in the wrong forum.

[geekmaster]

Originally Posted by notimp

... If you as an "action oriented community" want to know "what to do next" - ...

We *are* an "action-oriented community". Just not the action you may prefer. If you want to know what action WE would take, umm... probably "feed to it the compiler and see binary it spits out". Of course, other groups may suggest different actions. We develop code here. That is why this forum is called "Kindle Developers Corner". Which makes me wonder why your off-topic fork of a developer thread was not moved to a relevant POLITICAL forum...