Kindle Geographic Restrictions On US Website - Against US Buyers

[HansTWN]

I think it is great that US buyers get some restrictions slapped on them. Not out of spite, but because now US Kindle owners will give Amazon and the publishers hell! And, for the moment, US Kindle owners are far more important to Amazon then the rest of the world. Who cares about the rest of us? If we are lucky the whole system of assigning publishers' rights by region will fall apart and freedom rings!

[Crowl]

Originally Posted by nelsonescorcio

Geographical restrictions are, for sure, perverse.

However, they were already preverse BEFORE US restrictions. The rest of the world has felt this pain for years.

It is ALSO perverse to only be in shock now, when US readers are affected. Nothing has changed, really.
Everyone here in particular should have seen and understand that.

The point is that anything that adds to the public attention about the idiocy of geographical restrictions is useful.

[Terisa de morgan]

Originally Posted by EowynCarter

really ? I though that apple being apple... So i would be able to get the books from the iTouch, unDRM them, ePub, and voila, opus-readable file.

I must be crazy, i'm now considering buying an iTouch

I've done it (not for Opus, for Cybook and ePub for Stanza)

[krischik]

Originally Posted by opitzs

It's just, that this system should be updated for ebooks as fast as possible, although for the life of me I can't see anyone who will want to be first there, as the geographic licensees will want to be compensated for their losses.

I know I repeat myself but the most successful science fiction book series ever written sells without territorial restriction.

And without DRM. ePUB and PDF that is Mobipocket being Mobipocket adds DRM no matter what. But Mobipocket also sells Issue 2500 full price - which should be given away for free. And Issue 2400 (which too should be given away free) for €0.01 - with DRM applied.

Martin

[Striking Claw]

Originally Posted by Direct Ebooks

I'd agree that geographic restrictions are crazy, but we have to understand that there will be a transitionary period between traditional and "modern" publishing.
It is much more profitable currently for authors and their agents to sell their right to the highest bidder in each territory rather than to one publisher for worldwide rights. It is then up to the individual publisahers as to whether they make the books available in eBook formats.
This may not change anytime soon as the industry is so used to this model. What we may have though, is savvy authors selling the digital rights to their books to an internet based publiaher or retaining them for non-exclusive distribution themselves.

All this will take time, but we the readers can play an important part by posting on sites like this about what we want. Believe it or not, the powers that be do occassionally listen!

The strange thing is that with "traditional" pubishing in paper form there was never a problem to order a book from a US online shop and have them send it to Europe. That's what I did before I had an eBook reader. I never had Amazon decline an order because I wanted it shipped to Europe. In the beginning I also never had a problem with eBooks. All eBooks on Mobipocket and other online shops where available world wide. Over the last couple of months more and more books are restriced to purchase by US and Canadian customers only. What's even stranger is that one eBook my be available to customers outside US at Mobipocket but not at Diesel Books for example, while with an other book ist exactly the oposite.
Publishers complain about piracy problems and create a model where a lot of books would only be available for a lot of customers in some illegal way. For instance I have not found a way to purchase "Orphan's Triumph" by Robert Buettner as an eBook. I could by the paper version from Amazon without a problem. I for myself decided that if a publisher doesn't want my as a customer for his eBook, I sure as hell will not buy the book at all.

[krischik]

Originally Posted by Striking Claw

What's even stranger is that one eBook my be available to customers outside US at Mobipocket but not at Diesel Books for example, while with an other book ist exactly the oposite.

Of course that is what you see on the Webside before buying. When I recently wanted buy Dune at Libri a German eBook Shop purchase went thrue but when Libri requested encryption from Mobipocket it never happened. Later I got my money refunded.

Originally Posted by Striking Claw

Publishers complain about piracy problems and create a model where a lot of books would only be available for a lot of customers in some illegal way.

Indeed - in the darknet Dune is available for everyone...

But the publishers will never look for a fault in there own back yard.

Martin

[ShellShock]

Originally Posted by Direct Ebooks

It is much more profitable currently for authors and their agents to sell their right to the highest bidder in each territory rather than to one publisher for worldwide rights. It is then up to the individual publisahers as to whether they make the books available in eBook formats.
This may not change anytime soon as the industry is so used to this model. What we may have though, is savvy authors selling the digital rights to their books to an internet based publiaher or retaining them for non-exclusive distribution themselves.

If people can't legally get an ebook because of geo restrictions and therefore go to the darknet instead, this will directly hit publisher and author revenue, which may give some leverage to removing the restrictions; however the link between increased geo restrictions and increased piracy is likely to be very difficult to prove. Perhaps some time in the future piracy will become so bad that the legitimate market for ebooks in some regions will practically disappear, and may be this will lead to global contracts as it will no longer be worthwhile to draw up a contract that only covers a single region.

[Alisa]

Originally Posted by Direct Ebooks

This may not change anytime soon as the industry is so used to this model. What we may have though, is savvy authors selling the digital rights to their books to an internet based publiaher or retaining them for non-exclusive distribution themselves.

The only issue I see here is that many print publishers may balk at the deal if they don't get any digital rights. Then they have to compete with the ebook publisher for sales. I agree it won't change soon. Print is still the bulk of the business and authors won't sacrifice a print publisher relationship to widen ebooks for the present time. I wouldn't be surprised if we saw some publishing alliances to share the profits of ebooks released in multiple countries. Bureaucratic? Yes. Surprising given the kind of transition we're trying to make? Not so much.

On a side note, I'm saddened to see so much spite against Americans here. In general, Americans on this board have been against geographical restrictions as much as anyone else. Besides it's not as if we are just now having restrictions. We just get to see them highlighted because of Amazon's new set up. I hate being critical but that really left a bad taste in my mouth so I felt I should say something.

[Striking Claw]

Originally Posted by Alisa

Print is still the bulk of the business

Of cource it is, but if the people willing to buy eBooks are not allowed to buy them in the first place, how should this change.

It's also strange that a publisher like BAEN can sell their eBooks without any DRM world wide for a reasonable price, you even can download all available formats. If that would be such a bad thing economically because of piracy then I can't imagine that BAEN would still be in business. Why can't the other publisher offer a similar model?

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by Striking Claw

Of cource it is, but if the people willing to buy eBooks are not allowed to buy them in the first place, how should this change.

It's also strange that a publisher like BAEN can sell their eBooks without any DRM world wide for a reasonable price, you even can download all available formats. If that would be such a bad thing economically because of piracy then I can't imagine that BAEN would still be in business. Why can't the other publisher offer a similar model?

While others could do the DRM free and multiple format thing, the selling worldwide part is tougher. Baen contracts for non-exclusive Worldwide ebook rights. Something that for now anyway most publishers don't/can't do. Baen is a smaller niche publisher and it's easier to do things than it is for larger, more corporate publishing houses.

[aceflor]

Originally Posted by Alisa

On a side note, I'm saddened to see so much spite against Americans here. In general, Americans on this board have been against geographical restrictions as much as anyone else. Besides it's not as if we are just now having restrictions. We just get to see them highlighted because of Amazon's new set up. I hate being critical but that really left a bad taste in my mouth so I felt I should say something.

I don't think it is spite against americans, it may just be that we europeans have been complaining more and more about this lately but felt quite lonely in our complaints. None of us is happy that you americans have gotten the restrictions too (no schadensfreude here), but it is a hope for us that since americans are feeling the problem too now, the pressure on Amazon and others will get bigger.
Speaking for myself, I love americans. . Although I am french, and we are usually well known for not liking anyone. and showing it too..

[CommanderROR]

I just hit something extremely frustrating...and my Kindle has not even shipped yet!

I went browsing int he Kindle section and could not find ANY books by my favourite author Terry Pratchett. If I got to google though, I get a listing for Pratchett's newest book as Kindle edition...so what the hell is wrong here? Pratchett is a UK author, so why can US residents buy the books and EU residents can't? Can anyone see what is wrong with this image?
And...why can I buy the book without problems from (for example) Booksonboard???

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by CommanderROR

I just hit something extremely frustrating...and my Kindle has not even shipped yet!

I went browsing int he Kindle section and could not find ANY books by my favourite author Terry Pratchett. If I got to google though, I get a listing for Pratchett's newest book as Kindle edition...so what the hell is wrong here? Pratchett is a UK author, so why can US residents buy the books and EU residents can't? Can anyone see what is wrong with this image?
And...why can I buy the book without problems from (for example) Booksonboard???

Maybe his UK publisher is one of those that Amazon couldn't reach an agreement with? Looking at WH Smith's ebook store they have no Pratchett books available either, maybe his UK publisher hasn't put them out yet.

[Keeyum]

I don't think its Amazon's fault the geo restrictions are in place. Although it does sound like the Kindle store is a little broken at the moment. The restrictions seemed to be from the publishers decision to enable e-books in certain countries. It's like the video game market. Some video games aren't available in certain countries because of the the publisher's decision to exclude or include certain areas of the globe.

Or their might be some weird licensing agreements for some books. For example in Europe their is a Singstar game that allows users to download songs from an online song library and the US also has this store. However, the music on the two stores are not identical because of licensing agreements.

[toholio]

Originally Posted by CommanderROR

Pratchett is a UK author, so why can US residents buy the books and EU residents can't? Can anyone see what is wrong with this image?

The publishers are what's wrong with the image.

I'm a big Pratchett fan too. My concern is that here in Australia we wont see his works come to the Kindle because the publisher, Randomhouse, are a bunch of twits who are running their own horribly overpriced eBook store.

Obviously, there's many other places to buy the eBook but I can't stand the way local publishers force me to buy offshore because they can't get themselves organised.

Maybe it's time to send a few tweets to authors and some paper letters to publishers. Including a list of available sources which wont net them a cent is probably in order.