looking for privacy friendly quality ereader

[ottischwenk]

Originally Posted by Quoth

Where is that law written, which then has to be enacted by each member country?

Here and it complies with EU regulations

The ereader removes the DRM or you could not read it. The chips in the HDMI receiver remove the HDCP DRM or you couldn't view it.

Viewing does not change the work

https://www.mhpbooks.com/austrian-pr...ss-kindle-drm/

This procedure does not contradict the law

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by mirage

The OP here was mercilessly attacked. But she/he was honest, respectful, and principled. He thinks about these issues and, agree or disagree, makes reasoned choices. I wish he hadn't been chased away. He had a lot to offer, even if some of you disagree with the approach.

The OP admitted they would pirate their ebooks. And you wonder why s/he was attacked?

Yes, the OP was honest, polite and respectful. But stealing is stealing and it's not tolerated here.

[Deskisamess]

I wish he hadn't been chased away. He had a lot to offer, even if some of you disagree with the approach.

Chased away? He/she posted a few hours ago, and the id hasn't been banned.

Stealing books is openly preached against on this board. "Reasoned choices" won't deter that. The practice will be shouted down here, plain and simple. It may not change anyone's mind, but keeps the position of the board in clear plain sight.

Edited to correct spell check.

[mirage]

Originally Posted by Deskisamess

Chased away? He/she posted a few hours ago, and the id hasn't been banned.

Stealing books is openly preached against on this board. "Reasoned choices" won't deter that. The practice will be shouted down here, plain and simple. It may not change anyone's mind, but keeps the position of the board in clear plain sight.

I missed the OP's earlier post from today. Thanks for pointing that out.

I don't object to objecting to stealing. I'm not defending stealing. I don't believe in stealing. But I do think the OP has a point of view much broader than how he/she comes by some of the books he reads that is worth considering.

I didn't write anything about "seasoned choices," though I did about "reasoned choices."

People speculated that when people post about wanting privacy with respect to ereaders that it must be because they want to steal books. That's not a fair or accurate conjecture to make, which is why I went on so long about it all. People's motivations about privacy issues aren't usually because they feel the need to hide something sordid. Quite the contrary.

[Deskisamess]

I'm reading your post in a sans-serif font, with left justification, no hyphenation, and you've used spaces between paragraphs rather than indentation.

Which works well with such a wide<-------------->column of text.

But when it's done that way
with narrow columns it is
much more visually distracting.

Especially on an e-reader with
a 6 or 7" screen, as most of the
space is wasted with white space
and not text.

[JSWolf]

@mirage, do you plan to buy eBooks? If you do, how do you do it without some corporations knowing that you've bought these eBooks? You buy from Kobo, Amazon, or Google and they know you have. You cannot buy an eBook without giving up some information. You can keep WiFi off on your Reader. But you also need a valid account in order to buy these eBooks. So why not create a valid account and properly register? If you want to be assured of being able to keep track of what you've read or what you are reading, you will need a valid account to register.

Take Kobo (for example), yes you can do a fake registration, but there have been firmware updates where the fake registration stopped working because something changed. You don't know if they will happen again. So that's out.

The thing is, unless you plan on reading only public domain, or creative commons eBooks, you cannot keep your information private. Keeping WiFi off will keep your reding data from being sent back.

The reason I'm suspicious is that unless you are going to read public domain or creative commons eBooks, red flags are raised. So I'll ask. I know that some people want more privacy, but you cannot have it with a Reader and have privacy if you plan on buying or using the library to get eBooks.

Oh I forgot to add, scan/OCR pBooks is another thing you can do without giving away information.

[mirage]

I've bought eBooks from Amazon, who has my name and a profile about me that extends far beyond that. I've borrowed eBooks from my local libraries. Overdrive has all that goes with that. Probably Adobe, too for those same eBooks and my CC subscription. I've bought a few books over the years that were not DRM protected. I've stated above that I have lots of accounts that I have registered and paid for that can and do track me far more than I'd prefer, though I do have some browser extensions that limit it a little. I have a cell phone that tells providers where I am most all the time. I stated this above.

If the Kobo Clara HD I ordered ever arrives, which I'm now thinking might never happen because it may be replaced soon, I'll almost certainly give them a legitimate email address and buy some Kobo eBooks. It'll be easy enough to turn wifi off beyond that. They do, after all, state in their Privacy Policy that they reserve the "right" to track and sell our data. But as I wrote above, wanting to limit that is not as binary as you and some others here want to make it. We can draw lines where we draw them and feed the beast less than the maximum. It may not change much, but we can do some things to limit what's done with our data, particularly since these companies don't pay us to use it. At least we're trying, being aware, not giving in completely to all this. Those who choose not to care are welcome to choose not to care.

You could spend months reading about the details of this and its massive implications in our lives written by well regarded academics, industry people, and political figures. There are students and professors in top universities doing exactly that. I don't think these people are devoting this much time to these issues so that they can steal eBooks. There are larger issues in this world as I'm sure you've noticed recently. My point is that these concerns are what motivates most of us who don't like being so aggressively snooped on. It's not about wanting to steal. It's more about not wanting to be stolen from and what that does to the world we live in. YMMV, of course. But just because some of us regard this differently than you might does not make us worthy of criminal suspicion without evidence.

[JSWolf]

I know not everyone who wants privacy is stealing eBooks. But you cannot have privacy with a Reader. It just isn't possible. So knowing it's not possible, I ask why because if it is for stealing, I'll not help. If it's for some other reason, I can explain the downsides to this. The only thing that can be done is keep WiFi off. Fake registering a Kobo can end up making things worse when the fake registration no longer works for the new firmware. And with a Kindle, you have to register in order to be able to create collections.

Anyone who thinks they can have a Reader and full privacy is just not thinking clearly and should go back to buying pBooks using cash.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Anyone who thinks they can have a Reader and full privacy is just not thinking clearly and should go back to buying pBooks using cash.

And while buying that pbook and paying cash, try to avoid the in-store surveillance cameras. You never know who is watching that footage.

[John F]

Originally Posted by DNSB

And while buying that pbook and paying cash, try to avoid the in-store surveillance cameras. You never know who is watching that footage.

And turn off your cell phone?

[issybird]

Originally Posted by Deskisamess

Stealing books is openly preached against on this board. "Reasoned choices" won't deter that. The practice will be shouted down here, plain and simple. It may not change anyone's mind, but keeps the position of the board in clear plain sight.

Exactly. Perfectly stated.

Originally Posted by mirage

People speculated that when people post about wanting privacy with respect to ereaders that it must be because they want to steal books. That's not a fair or accurate conjecture to make, which is why I went on so long about it all.

Sometimes it’s not fair and accurate and sometimes it is fair and accurate. But so long as no one lays traps which cause the OP to spell out which it is, we don’t know for sure and we don’t have to know. We might as well assume benign usage. Which is why I posted as I did upthread.

[Deskisamess]

Originally Posted by DNSB

And while buying that pbook and paying cash, try to avoid the in-store surveillance cameras. You never know who is watching that footage.

I'm fairly sure every store I enter, every drive through, bank, curb pickup line, etc. has my picture, or at least a pic of my license plate.

[Marinolino]

Originally Posted by ottischwenk

Yes - here in Austria you can make copies for private use.
Even with a copier.
Especially with a scanner, OCR, format change from pdf to epub!
Here it is prohibited by law to remove DRM, but it is not against the law if you take pictures on a reader side by side and ....

You mean it is e.g. prohibited to remove drm from our mobi files and then convert it into epub, to be able to read it on our epub eink device, but we can legally take screenshots of our drm-ed mobi on e.g. lcd tablet and then read those images on our eink epub device (or convert those images into pdf/epub beforehand).

[ottischwenk]

Originally Posted by Marinolino

You mean it is e.g. prohibited to remove drm from our mobi files and then convert it into epub, to be able to read it on our epub eink device, but we can legally take screenshots of our drm-ed mobi on e.g. lcd tablet and then read those images on our eink epub device (or convert those images into pdf/epub beforehand).

yes, this is valid for Austria - according to the EU rules.
But of course it is forbidden to pass it on to others.
If it is not passed on, then nobody can know.

[shalym]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

The problem there is you get back PDF. That to me is useless.

I agree that PDFs aren't great. However, that's not what you asked. You asked if it was legal. It is. You can even buy books from Amazon and have them sent directly to 1dollarscan.

Shari