Amazon discontinuing support for older Kindles in May

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

Of course not, and no one is saying it is. I also disinfect every ebook I buy. But Amazon doesn't want us to mess with their DRM, because the folks who upload Kindle content to file sharing sites use the same tools we use.

I think that's only part of it.

[lkmiller]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

The latest version of K4PC is v2.8.70995.

The latest version is 2.8.3 (70995).

[lkmiller]

Originally Posted by latepaul

...
But the main thing to remember is that whatever source you get your ebooks from, if you choose to de-DRM them, then do it as soon as you acquire them. It's much easier to do them one at a time than scurry to do it on a big backlog when something like this comes down the pike.

Yup. I decided early last year when everyone was scambling before download and transfer ended that if I hadn't already downloaded and DeDRMed it, then it probably wasn't something I was ever going to miss anyway.

[MichaelKindle]

I just got the same notice in Germany.

[Yapyap]

I’m sure it’s global somehow - just wondering what sort of credit they’d offer to someone who cannot buy a Kindle device from Amazon.com but must buy Kindle books on Amazon.com…

I suppose I might find out some day. Or not. Still no e-mail re: my Paperwhite.

ETA: I guess sending out the e-mails is going to take a while - it’s obviously being done in batches.

[Sirtel]

No email here either.

[jonathan2022]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

No email here either.

My email was triggered when I downloaded some books to my kindle

[Yapyap]

Originally Posted by jonathan2022

My email was triggered when I downloaded some books to my kindle

I downloaded a book now from my content library to the old Paperwhite as well. Let’s see if that does the trick.

(I’m somewhat doubtful there’s a connection but who knows. At least it should send a signal to Amazon that the device is active and being used.)

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Yapyap

I downloaded a book now from my content library to the old Paperwhite as well. Let’s see if that does the trick.

(I’m somewhat doubtful there’s a connection but who knows. At least it should send a signal to Amazon that the device is active and being used.)

I'm not going to bother. If I don't get it, so be it. I'm not going to buy a new Kindle anyway, so it really doesn't matter.

[Yapyap]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

I’m not going to bother. If I don’t get it, so be it. I’m not going to buy a new Kindle anyway, so it really doesn’t matter.

My curiosity is mostly general - I’d like to know how Amazon is going to treat Kindle owners in countries without their own storefronts.

The discount and book credit I’ve seen offered in other countries aren’t big enough to be tempting (there would have to be a VERY good offer + a device with buttons for me to even think about a new Kindle at this point in my e-reading life - if there’s anything I’m currently tempted by, it’s the Boox Go 10.3), but at the very least, I’d think all people with registered affected Kindles and a legit way to buy Amazon ebooks would be offered similar compensation.

[vermontcathy]

Uh oh... It has already begun. I just borrowed a library book and went to Content Library, deliver to device - and my K3 and K4 are not listed! Went to a Prime book I have borrowed (it was a free trial - I've already set it to cancel) and I can send that to the K3 and K4.

Can anyone else try this? Just find an available library book, borrow it through Amazon and see if you can send it to K3 or K4? I'm in the US.

OK, Update - the book I was trying, "Free Piano (not haunted)" was only available in Kindle format to be borrowed, not ePub. I just now borrowed an ebook that was also available as ePub, but I did borrow it through amazon/kindle, and that one CAN be sent to my K3 and K4... so maybe it's just Amazon-exclusive library books...

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Yapyap

...at the very least, I’d think all people with registered affected Kindles and a legit way to buy Amazon ebooks would be offered similar compensation.

I'm not too sure about that. Amazon has never treated all its customers as equal - I still remember the "3G tax" imposed on all its international customers even when they didn't have any 3G Kindles on their accounts. KU still isn't available in countries without their own Amazon store. And so on.

[Yapyap]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

I’m not too sure about that. Amazon has never treated all its customers as equal - I still remember the “3G tax” imposed on all its international customers even when they didn’t have any 3G Kindles on their accounts. KU still isn’t available in countries without their own Amazon store. And so on.

Yes, this is why I’m curious.

I’d LIKE to think they’ve learned, but I’m not exactly certain of that. Hence the curiosity about how they will handle this. There’s a good chance there won’t be any discount or credit at all, but .. at the very least, we should still get the email informing us of our devices becoming useless (for anything related to Amazon; I have my Paperwhite jailbroken although that was just out of curiosity and to see if I could - I’ve had no need to use Koreader on a Kindle, especially one as old and slow and with a dying battery, although when I dusted it off last year, I did find that the screen actually looks sharper and clearer than on my Oasis).

[Regina]

Summary of what I read in few posts

These older Kindle devices do not support recent TLS versions. TLS - Transport Layer Security. Something to do with security when the device connects to server. Amazon servers currently accept old version of TLS and hence, everything works. Whenever the day comes, I think that Amazon servers will switch off the support for old TLS versions and the devices would not be able to communicate with Amazon servers and hence, would lose functionality.

As per Gemini, TLS v1.3 is current standard, v1.2 is transition state. v1.0 and v1.1 are deprecated. So, I think that they are killing TLS v1.0 and v1.1 which would render these older devices useless (with respect to connecting to Amazon servers).

[Quoth]

Tech industry analyst Paolo Pescatore said while Amazon's move may frustrate owners of models which still work, the decision was "understandable from a security and support perspective".
"The challenge is that these devices were built for a different era and are not equipped to run newer, more data-hungry services and features," he told the BBC, adding "ageing hardware" can also pose problems.

He sounds like an Amazon shill. These Kindles have not had updates for years. There is no security and support issue. The creation of Mobi (only K1, K2 & DX family which have no wiFi?) and azw3 is automatic from the uploads of epub.

Amazon doesn't hardly do kindle support even for newer models. There is no security issue.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c98k91yy4z4o

(may change to .com?)

Edited to expand quote which is utter nonsense. None of the claimed connecting issues would matter if Amazon had not ended Browser downloads.

run newer, more data-hungry services and features,

They render ebooks Nothing else. An idiotic statement!