About to ditch my Kindle as I can't get the books that I want.

[mgmueller]

Originally Posted by Aloreth

Hi guys,

Title of the thread says it all I guess. I recieved a kindle for christmas and I think I have had enough already. I have looked at Baen, fictionwise and Amazon, smashwords and Waterstones (amoungst many many others) and I can't for love nor money (literally) find
a) More than 3 of the diskworld books.
b) Anything by Peter F Hamilton
c) Raymond E Feist
d) David Eddings

Most supporting formats seem to be Secure Mobipocket/Microsoft Reader/eReader and EPUB. None of which the Kindle can read. Before I ditch this POS can anyone point me in the direction of a website that will actually sell me a half decent selection of books?

To put the icing on the cake, the list of cheap and free books that is stickied at the top of this forum isn't supported by Amazon UK either!

Amazon UK seems to have the license to distribute the square root of sod all.

Sorry to sound somewhat aggressive but I've really had enough.

Thanks for any comments / suggestions.

Mike

KIndle's format basically is identical to Mobipocket.
mobipocket.com has about 15 discworld books, if I remember correctly.
It's very simple, using mobipocket (.prc) on Kindle...

[daffy4u]

Originally Posted by mgmueller

KIndle's format basically is identical to Mobipocket.
mobipocket.com has about 15 discworld books, if I remember correctly.
It's very simple, using mobipocket (.prc) on Kindle...

He'll have to strip the DRM to use Mobipocket.com books on the Kindle.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by Aloreth

a) More than 3 of the diskworld books.
b) Anything by Peter F Hamilton
c) Raymond E Feist
d) David Eddings

Most supporting formats seem to be Secure Mobipocket/Microsoft Reader/eReader and EPUB. None of which the Kindle can read.

All discworld except "The Last Hero" are available on fictionwise, in secure mobipocket format.

13 of Peter F Hamilton's works are available on fictionwise in secure mobipocket format.

19 of Reymod E Feist's works are available on fictionwise in secure mobipocket format.

But only 7 of David Eddings' works are available on fictionwise.

All of these can be read on your Kindle once you strip the DRM. If you're unwilling to strip the DRM, the Kindle probably isn't for you. I'd suggest perhaps the CyBook Gen 3 or CyBook Opus than /can/ both read secure Mobipocket or secure eOub might be more suitable.

[HarryT]

Unfortunately I do have to agree that the Kindle is not great for the user outside the US who wants to read commercial eBooks, and doesn't want the hassle of having to remove DRM and convert formats. A device which supports ePub will give you access to a much wider range of material.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by daffy4u

I see all your authors listed on the U.S. Amazon Kindle Store site (Discworld only has 4 titles, so it's a case of not every book being in ebook form).

Searching for Discworld only does find 4 of them. But search for Terry Pratchett and you will find the rest as well.

rbooks in the UK has all (or most if not all) the Discworld series.

http://www.rbooks.co.uk/search_resul...bn=&publisher=

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Searching for Discworld only does find 4 of them. But search for Terry Pratchett and you will find the rest as well.

rbooks in the UK has all (or most if not all) the Discworld series.

http://www.rbooks.co.uk/search_resul...bn=&publisher=

Random House are Mr. Pratchett's UK publisher so, as you say, "rbooks" (their eBook store) does offer them all in ePub and PDF format. Unfortunately only 8 of them are currently available to UK Kindle owners, but, given that Random House have only recently "signed on" with Amazon, one might reasonably expect the rest to become available shortly.

[Aloreth]

Hi guys,

Thanks for the comments and suggestions, it is really appreciated.

I have slept on it and I think I will still return my Kindle. I really like it but I'm not very impressed with Amazon trying to corner the market by selling a product that doesnt actually work at the moment. It's left a bad taste in my mouth really, I love the idea of ebook readers so I think I will get a SONY as thats actually supported in the UK. My credit card is about to take the hit of purchasing all the terry pratchett books in one go!

Thanks folks - think I will send some feedback to Amazon along with my kindle. I guess faeces packed in with the Kindle might invalidate their returns policy so I guess just a letter will have to do

[seagull]

I'm not getting where your coming from here, your angry at Amazon why exactly? My Kindle works fine.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by Aloreth

Hi guys,

Thanks for the comments and suggestions, it is really appreciated.

I have slept on it and I think I will still return my Kindle. I really like it but I'm not very impressed with Amazon trying to corner the market by selling a product that doesnt actually work at the moment. It's left a bad taste in my mouth really, I love the idea of ebook readers so I think I will get a SONY as thats actually supported in the UK. My credit card is about to take the hit of purchasing all the terry pratchett books in one go!

Thanks folks - think I will send some feedback to Amazon along with my kindle. I guess faeces packed in with the Kindle might invalidate their returns policy so I guess just a letter will have to do

Well, unfortunately it is still somewhat early in the ebook adoption cycle and many books simply are not available legitimately yet. We are seeing more of them released as ebooks and more older ones being converted all the time, but there still is a ways to go. For my money epub is the best candidate to focus on, particularly outside the U.S. so the ebook readers that support epub would be you best bet in my mind.

Lots of good info here at MR on all sides of the equation.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by seagull

I'm not getting where your coming from here, your angry at Amazon why exactly? My Kindle works fine.

Geographical restrictions, by the sound of it. They are of course irrelevant if, like me, one uploads one's own books to the Kindle, but if you do want to buy "best sellers", the selection of books available to the non-US buyer is rather poor compared to other eBook stores.

[FlorenceArt]

Originally Posted by Aloreth

Hi guys,

Thanks for the comments and suggestions, it is really appreciated.

I have slept on it and I think I will still return my Kindle. I really like it but I'm not very impressed with Amazon trying to corner the market by selling a product that doesnt actually work at the moment. It's left a bad taste in my mouth really, I love the idea of ebook readers so I think I will get a SONY as thats actually supported in the UK. My credit card is about to take the hit of purchasing all the terry pratchett books in one go!

Thanks folks - think I will send some feedback to Amazon along with my kindle. I guess faeces packed in with the Kindle might invalidate their returns policy so I guess just a letter will have to do

Sorry you had such a disappointment, and yes, a polite letter to Amazon explaining your reasons is a great idea. I hope they will understand some day that trying to chain users to their device and/or store is not a good idea in the long term.

FYI, Fictionwise is not really a viable option for us Europeans now, most of their DRM books have geographical restrictions. Books on Board has more books available for Europe, and Cyberread is slightly more expensive but has no geographical restrictions.

[Aloreth]

Originally Posted by seagull

I'm not getting where your coming from here, your angry at Amazon why exactly? My Kindle works fine.

I would be interested in finding out where you get your ebooks from.

At the moment Amazon UK doesnt let me download many of the books that I want (I can find them on the American site).

Other book sellers mainly sell DRMed books (fair enough) but not in a format supported by the Kindle.

Result? I can't get the books that I want.

Reason that I am angry with Amazon? The country specific information for the Kindles makes no mention of the fact that there are **** all books available!

Harry - you said that you upload your own books? Do you mind if I ask what you mean? You already have book in .txt files? I cant imagine you mean scanning in pdfs of books oyu own

Everyone else? Thanks!

[HarryT]

To be fair, there are currently 321,283 Kindle books available for buyers in the UK, so that's certainly not an insignificant number.

The Kindle will read any DRM-free Mobipocket book. My personal interest is primarily reading out of copyright classics, of which there are many thousands available completely free (see our "Book Uploads" forums here at MR). If you like SF or Fantasy, take a look at Baen - all their books are DRM-free.

The question I always ask is not "is a specific book available for my reader" - if it's not, I can always buy it in paper form - but rather "are there sufficient books available to keep me going" and the answer to that, for me personally, is that there are more than enough eBooks which interest me to last me several lifetimes.

[FlorenceArt]

Originally Posted by HarryT

To be fair, there are currently 321,283 Kindle books available for buyers in the UK, so that's certainly not an insignificant number.

The Kindle will read any DRM-free Mobipocket book. My personal interest is primarily reading out of copyright classics, of which there are many thousands available completely free (see our "Book Uploads" forums here at MR). If you like SF or Fantasy, take a look at Baen - all their books are DRM-free.

The question I always ask is not "is a specific book available for my reader" - if it's not, I can always buy it in paper form - but rather "are there sufficient books available to keep me going" and the answer to that, for me personally, is that there are more than enough eBooks which interest me to last me several lifetimes.

Actually, I found out after I bought my Cybook that this kind of number can be rather misleading, as within these hundreds of thousands of books there are relatively few that will interest me personally, while many books I would like to buy are not available as e-books, or are available in stores or formats that are closed to me.

There are still relatively few e-books available compared to all the paper books you can buy, and this will be a problem whatever device or format you choose, at least in the short term. But I do think Amazon's policy is especially restrictive, as they are apparently trying to both prevent Kindle owners buying books elsewhere, and non-Kindle owners buying at Amazon.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

Actually, I found out after I bought my Cybook that this kind of number can be rather misleading, as within these hundreds of thousands of books there are relatively few that will interest me personally, while many books I would like to buy are not available as e-books, or are available in stores or formats that are closed to me.

I agree with you entirely, which I why I say that it's a good idea to ask "are there sufficient books available for my device that will interest me". As long as the answer to that question is "yes", then it doesn't really matter how many books are not available.