Amazon's Apology for the Orwell Incident

[Elsi]

I am confident that Amazon (or the original vendor) secured the publishing rights to these books before they offered to restore the copies of Orwell's books to those who purchased them.

[Jellby]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It would be highly immoral - and perhaps even fraudulent - to accept the refund if you still had the book, don't you think?

Only if you consider it a refund (which it is not, because they give $30 for something that costed $5), instead of a compensation for the inconvenience and "impolite" behaviour of deleting content without warning.

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by Jellby

Only if you consider it a refund (which it is not, because they give $30 for something that costed $5), instead of a compensation for the inconvenience and "impolite" behaviour of deleting content without warning.

i was about to post the same thing actually. this seems more like compensation for inconvenience than a refund to me too.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by Jellby

Only if you consider it a refund (which it is not, because they give $30 for something that costed $5), instead of a compensation for the inconvenience and "impolite" behaviour of deleting content without warning.

Exactly.

[ahi]

Originally Posted by HarryT

It would be highly immoral - and perhaps even fraudulent - to accept the refund if you still had the book, don't you think?

Even if it were, I don't see immoral acts against a fundamentally amoral (not to mention abstract/imaginary) entity on par with immoral acts against human beings.

- Ahi

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

i was about to post the same thing actually. this seems more like compensation for inconvenience than a refund to me too.

And what inconvenience have you suffered if you still have the book?

[ahi]

Originally Posted by HarryT

And what inconvenience have you suffered if you still have the book?

The minor one of having to restore from backup, along with probably a lasting nagging feeling of discomfort arising from the confirmed knowledge that content you store on your device may be violated by Amazon at their pleasure.

- Ahi

[zelda_pinwheel]

Originally Posted by HarryT

And what inconvenience have you suffered if you still have the book?

i think that for instance anyone who lost their notes would consider themselves inconvenienced, particularly if they had been reading the book for school. there is also the principle of the thing which many people seem to consider a flagrant abuse regardless of the status of their personal copy.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by HarryT

And what inconvenience have you suffered if you still have the book?

Amazon is offering him $30, and he took it. If you personally don't think that Amazon users deserve to be compensated, than take it up with Amazon.

Telling someone that they are being immoral or fraudulent by accepting an offer that a company made, just makes you look silly.

Then again, given your posting history, I guess nobody should be surprised by your statement.

[wodin]

Originally Posted by zelda_pinwheel

hm, very interesting. i guess they're really feeling the media backlash. i wonder whether they negotiated the rights to that book ? if not, seems an odd action to take, to return it...

Without a doubt, which is probably why it took this long. The optimal time for this to have happend would have been within days (or hours if possible) of the fiasco hitting the media in the first place.

What I'm wondering is how much it cost them, and is the knuklehead who made the original decision still working for them.

[poohbear_nc]

Originally Posted by Elsi

I am confident that Amazon (or the original vendor) secured the publishing rights to these books before they offered to restore the copies of Orwell's books to those who purchased them.

Or maybe not - would anyone turn down $30 to receive a $5 book? Seems like a very safe offer to make.

[Kostas]

Originally Posted by poohbear_nc

As you were one of the customers impacted by the removal of "Works of George Orwell" from your Kindle device in July of this year, we would like to offer you the option to have us re-deliver this book to your Kindle along with any annotations you made.

I think that with these 6 words, Amazon is making things even worse.
They confess that two months later they still possess and have access to strictly personnal informations (annotations) which belong to Kindle owners.
This is a real nightmare 1984 story.

[Connallmac]

Originally Posted by Shaggy

Amazon is offering him $30, and he took it. If you personally don't think that Amazon users deserve to be compensated, than take it up with Amazon.

Telling someone that they are being immoral or fraudulent by accepting an offer that a company made, just makes you look silly.

Then again, given your posting history, I guess nobody should be surprised by your statement.

I don't believe it's accepting the deal he considers immoral or fraudulent, it's the accepting the deal AND not living up to the conditions of said deal. The text of the e-mail seems to indicate that Amazon is offering to allow to choose one of the options, not both.

[Donnageddon]

Originally Posted by Kostas

I think that with these 6 words, Amazon is making things even worse.
They confess that two months later they still possess and have access to strictly personnal informations (annotations) which belong to Kindle owners.
This is a real nightmare 1984 story.

I was thinking a similar thing. If Amazon removed your annotations and kept them on their servers without your permission, are they not guilty of intellectual property theft?

[Abecedary]

From the original stories, I was under the impression that the annotations still lived on your Kindle after the book was deleted. If they're still there, then no problem. At the same time, the backing up of annotations is one of the things Kindle users can give Amazon explicit rights to do, so getting upset that Amazon backed up the annotations after saying "Yes, please back up my annotations" seems a bit silly.