Kobo Plus now available in US & UK

[John F]

Originally Posted by DNSB

Better to keep one's mouth shut and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.

And yet, you don't follow your own advice.

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I didn't know it could be done using Kindle Unlimited and two Kindles. But the answer is that you do it.

If I had a Kobo Plus, this is something I would try.

I'd be nervous about causing authors to miss out on getting paid, so wouldn't pull anything cute.

[ZodWallop]

You know, Kobo Plus would be a good chance for the Big 5 to join and give an Amazon competitor a steroid injection. It's a shame they won't do it.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I'd be nervous about causing authors to miss out on getting paid, so wouldn't pull anything cute.

It's not about being cute. It's about being able to fix the eBooks and the author still getting paid.

[Quoth]

I think you can only fix ebooks you buy, if you want to be sure people are paid.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Quoth

I think you can only fix ebooks you buy, if you want to be sure people are paid.

Have you tried? The idea is to load the eBook on the Kobo and then removed the DRM, make some edits and use Calibre to load it to the Kobo so the Kobo doesn't know it's a different eBook.

It sounds like it might work.

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Have you tried? The idea is to load the eBook on the Kobo and then removed the DRM, make some edits and use Calibre to load it to the Kobo so the Kobo doesn't know it's a different eBook.

It sounds like it might work.

Since you’re the interested party here and you have the tools to do this why not test it yourself.

You could have your answer as well as provide it for everyone here.

[Skydog]

Originally Posted by MGlitch

Since you’re the interested party here and you have the tools to do this why not test it yourself.



You could have your answer as well as provide it for everyone here.

Good suggestion.

[Cootey]

Originally Posted by BrandonGiesing

Interesting, I borrowed a few and there's no filter on my device at all, only OverDrive and Dropbox show up. On the latest Sage firmware, 4.35.20400.

Also notably, the Kobo Plus page on Discover throws a network error, eBooks, Audiobooks, Overdrive, Wishlist, etc. all load fine and I can still borrow and see what are Kobo Plus books if I find it one of those other places.

How frustrating. Have you tried rebooting the device, or even repairing the account? That might fix the error on your end. I had to repair the account on one of my Kobos, and afterwards Kobo Plus worked properly.

[Cootey]

I’ve been away for a bit due to illness, so I’m glad to see the thread rambling along in colorful ways. 😅

I’ve been experimenting with what was available. As expected, the big guns are missing, but there are a lot of other offerings.

I had mixed results with Japanese light novels. Cross Infinite World is all in. Other mainstream publishers in that genre are not.

Kodansha Comics is in. They are using a similar approach with their manga that they take with KU. The first four volumes of older series can be found on KP, but hot, new titles are not. In contrast, Viz Comics has nothing on KP that I can see. I haven’t extensively searched for American comics yet.

As expected, there's a veritable ocean of Indy pubbed work. However, I was pleased to see classic Science Fiction works sprinkled in with the hot, bare-chested, alien werewolves looking for a good earth woman. All kidding aside, many of the main SF&F publishers haven’t jumped on board yet. I thought Baen would be a good candidate, but their works aren’t available on the program either.

If you search for books via title, looking for similar works to that book with the Kobo Plus filter helps you find more downloadable content. If you want to browse via category, then access the menu on the top left of the website, select Kobo Plus, and you'll get a landing page filled with categories to choose from. I haven’t found a way to search via genre using Discover on the Kobo eReader yet, however.

So far, I’ve been pleased with my free trial. I’ve found political works, fantasy, science fiction, Japanese light novels, comics, manga, etc. More than I can read in one month, making the future $7.99 subscription a tempting purchase.

[Cootey]

Originally Posted by DNSB

It does seem that Tapatalk and MobileRead's image handler do not work together.

Unfortunately, it may be a pain to work around this on a mobile device.

Yeah, agreed. It’s likely mobileread is blocking Tapatalk because it’s easy to attach HiRes images from a phone that are so large that they break the website’s formatting. That’s just speculation, but judging by some exasperated comments made by a mod or two, it wouldn’t surprise me if it were the case.

[JSWolf]

Is it possible to read Kobo Plus eBooks as ePub?

[DNSB]

No, Jon. Kobo Plus ebooks are kepub and mostly epub3 so you (as in Jon) could not possibly read them using RMSDK.

[Cootey]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Is it possible to read Kobo Plus eBooks as ePub?

Not without stripping their DRM.

Kobo Plus does frequent handshaking over Wi-Fi as you're reading to keep tabs on how many pages have been turned. Earlier in this thread, people have pointed out that stripping the DRM from a Kobo Plus book is a form of theft. Others have posted that it's a trivial matter to strip that DRM. I've not really looked into it much myself. That's as much as I'll say publicly. As an author, I have no desire to rob somebody of their income. I read all my Kobo Plus books with Wi-Fi on from the Kobo reader.

In short, Yes, you can convert those books to generic EPUB, but in order to do it, you have to illegally strip DRM from a rental. Likely more in point to your question, if you strip the DRM in order to convert the format, you break the magic of Kobo Plus that rewards authors.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk Pro

[Cootey]

I’m going into my third month with Kobo Plus now, and I’m fairly pleased with it. I certainly have plenty of books to read without complaining that the selection isn’t large enough.

I have spotted one flaw, however. You’re allowed up to 50 books at a time, which is five times more than Kindle Unlimited allows, but unlike KU, you can’t manage the books that you have. Meaning, there’s no mechanism that I can see to return the book. At some point, I will hit my 51st book, and then I’ll know how Kobo Plus handles it. Any of you Canadians care to give me a sneak peek?