Kindle Deleted Ayn Rand Content

[Kali Yuga]

Originally Posted by Phebe

However, "Information wants to be free."

How odd, since bandwidth, servers and editors need to be paid for.

FYI some of Rand's earlier works are apparently in the public domain, otherwise you will just have to wait for the rest either to be made commercially available or enter the public domain -- or pirate it. I'm pretty sure Rand would rip you a new one for copyright violations, if that matters to you at all.

I empathize with your need for large print, and fully agree that it's a huge benefit of an e-book version. Unfortunately that doesn't alter the fundamental copyright issue.

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

How odd, since bandwidth, servers and editors need to be paid for.

FYI some of Rand's earlier works are apparently in the public domain, otherwise you will just have to wait for the rest either to be made commercially available or enter the public domain -- or pirate it. I'm pretty sure Rand would rip you a new one for copyright violations, if that matters to you at all.

I empathize with your need for large print, and fully agree that it's a huge benefit of an e-book version. Unfortunately that doesn't alter the fundamental copyright issue.

Actually Information is pretty much free. It is the presentation of information that gets copyrighted. And it is the presentation that we enjoy reading otherwise XL spreadsheets would be more popular eBooks.

Dale

[HansTWN]

I have some nice jobs around my house for those that want everything to be free. I don't pay anything, but I will give lots of praise!

[BlackVoid]

I am actually amazed that some people find this behavior by Amazon justifiable. If it is not legal content, that it is Amazon's problem and not the user's. Amazon should pay damages to the copyright owners and NOT screwing up its own customers.

That kind of control above any device I own is TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE. I will stick with my Sony.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by pshrynk

But my point here is that the ayn Rand books are owned by the heirs of her estate. If the books are sold, they should be the ones getting the money for it. JK Rowling got the money for the early sales of HP.

Agreed, but that is between the seller and the owner. In the case of the Amazon books, the customer did nothing wrong.

My further point is that the booksellers did not have means to pull the books back, but Amazon did. I think that they may have had to do this, or they would have been liable to the estate for some fairly significant damages.

Having the means to pull the books back does not mean they have the legal right to pull them back. In the case of the Harry Potter books, I seriously doubt it would have been legal for them to force customers to return those books, even if they had the means. The same is true here. The customer made a legal purchase. The only ones who violated copyright are Amazon and the original uploader. To put it another way, buying the books was legal, selling them was not.

Whether or not the unauthorized distributors pull the books back has nothing to do with their liability. There is nothing in copyright law that says you are off the hook if you "undo" the infringement. The copyright violation occurred, regardless of whether or not Amazon deletes the books off of their customer's devices.

[Shaggy]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

How odd, since bandwidth, servers and editors need to be paid for.

That's not really what that expression means.

FYI some of Rand's earlier works are apparently in the public domain,

Makes me wonder if the whole thing was possibly a mistake. It's possible the original uploader did not realize that all of Rand's works were not in the public domain. Not that it is an excuse, they should have done the research before they uploaded them, but I would have a lot more sympathy for them if it was an honest misunderstanding.

otherwise you will just have to wait for the rest either to be made commercially available or enter the public domain -- or pirate it. I'm pretty sure Rand would rip you a new one for copyright violations, if that matters to you at all.

I doubt it would matter as long as Phebe is not planning on distributing it themselves.

[pshrynk]

Originally Posted by Shaggy

Agreed, but that is between the seller and the owner. In the case of the Amazon books, the customer did nothing wrong.



Having the means to pull the books back does not mean they have the legal right to pull them back. In the case of the Harry Potter books, I seriously doubt it would have been legal for them to force customers to return those books, even if they had the means. The same is true here. The customer made a legal purchase. The only ones who violated copyright are Amazon and the original uploader. To put it another way, buying the books was legal, selling them was not.

Whether or not the unauthorized distributors pull the books back has nothing to do with their liability. There is nothing in copyright law that says you are off the hook if you "undo" the infringement. The copyright violation occurred, regardless of whether or not Amazon deletes the books off of their customer's devices.

Well, that's one of those things that an administrative law judge will eventually need to answer. My point is that Amazon probably felt that they needed to remedy the error in that fashion. They are a pretty conservative company in that respect.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by pshrynk

Well, that's one of those things that an administrative law judge will eventually need to answer. My point is that Amazon probably felt that they needed to remedy the error in that fashion. They are a pretty conservative company in that respect.

Stepping outside the context of the legal discussion to look for a reason for what Amazon did, I damn near broke my neck tripping over the idea that perhaps this is not about the specific situation - that is, not about dealing with the Ayn Rand copyright owner.

Maybe what Amazon is interested in doing is demonstrating that Amazon will not harbor unauthorized ebooks, and will not become a kind of defacto Pirate Bay. This could be a matter of maintaining the trust and goodwill of publishers and copyright owners in general.

Of course, it has a downside to some extent with the trust and goodwill of its customers. I'm not sure that all that many customers are all that concerned about the potential for Amazon arbitrarily deleting ebooks. After all, most ebooks sold on Amazon are not going to be pirated copies like the Rand book. (That's not to say that it might not be a good idea for Amazon to throw the customers a sweetener of some kind.)

But on balance, it strikes me that it is reasonable to assume that most customers won't be bothered, while many publishers and copyright owners will be gratified, by this action.

[Elfwreck]

Originally Posted by Harmon

But on balance, it strikes me that it is reasonable to assume that most customers won't be bothered, while many publishers and copyright owners will be gratified, by this action.

Most customers won't be bothered as long as it's a one-time event. The average customer is fairly oblivious to copyright law, and assumes that whatever they buy from Amazon.com is legit. (And indeed, Amazon did nothing in this case to challenge that belief. They declared a "problem" with the ebook and revoked it; customers may have assumed a virus was involved.)

One book being revoked will be shrugged off as "odd Amazon bug." But if a person, or cluster of people, have a handful of books revoked, they'll start challenging Amazon about it--when we make this purchase, how do we know if we're going to keep it long enough to read the book? What kind of assurance will Amazon give that this is a purchase, not a preview while Amazon holds the price of the book in escrow?

If this starts happening with a number of desired-but-unavailable books, covered by copyright but whose authors are no longer alive, Amazon may inspire a new wave of customer paranoia as people who don't keep up with the nuances of copyright law try to figure out why Amazon is deleting their purchases.

[Kali Yuga]

Originally Posted by Shaggy

That's not really what that expression means.

I'm well aware of what the expression means. My point is that, while it's a pithy sound bite, the concept is not necessarily correct. The desire of certain people to access digital content at zero cost does not invalidate copyright law.

Originally Posted by Shaggy

Makes me wonder if the whole thing was possibly a mistake....

Clearly someone made a mistake. Maybe the person who listed it knew it was copyrighted, maybe they didn't. Impossible to tell, really.

[Jill74]

Originally Posted by BlackVoid

I am actually amazed that some people find this behavior by Amazon justifiable. If it is not legal content, that it is Amazon's problem and not the user's. Amazon should pay damages to the copyright owners and NOT screwing up its own customers.

That kind of control above any device I own is TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE. I will stick with my Sony.

Yes, I agree with you Blackvoid.

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by Harmon

Stepping outside the context of the legal discussion to look for a reason for what Amazon did, I damn near broke my neck tripping over the idea that perhaps this is not about the specific situation - that is, not about dealing with the Ayn Rand copyright owner.

Maybe what Amazon is interested in doing is demonstrating that Amazon will not harbor unauthorized ebooks, and will not become a kind of defacto Pirate Bay. This could be a matter of maintaining the trust and goodwill of publishers and copyright owners in general.

How could they possibly know if the eBook on your machine purchased elsewhere could be unauthorized? There is no method. This should not be a concern.

Dale

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

How could they possibly know if the eBook on your machine purchased elsewhere could be unauthorized? There is no method. This should not be a concern.

Dale

I don't dispute your statement, but I also don't understand your point. We aren't talking about ebooks purchased elsewhere, we are talking about ebooks purchases from the Amazon site.

[Kali Yuga]

Originally Posted by BlackVoid

That kind of control above any device I own is TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE. I will stick with my Sony.

Yeah, Sony is definitely the champion of user rights.

Let's see, they installed rootkits on people's computers via audio CD's, tried to charge customers $49.99 to remove bloatware from their Sony Vaio laptops, goes for proprietary formats and even proprietary media with their electronics, banned users from Everquest for things like selling characters and objects on eBay or for talking to the press, then tried to monopolize the trade in Everquest virtual goods....

Mind you, I don't think Sony is Pure Evil, only that you may be sorely disappointed if you expect Sony to protect your privacy and your rights....

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by Harmon

I don't dispute your statement, but I also don't understand your point. We aren't talking about ebooks purchased elsewhere, we are talking about ebooks purchases from the Amazon site.

You are the one saying stepping aside for a moment so I followed that thought. If you restrict the discussion to eBooks purchased on the Amazon site I do not see you concern. They presumably won't sell you these books in the first place and if they repeat the fiasco of letting one get by as happened here they will certainly likely remove it again. sorry if I misunderstood your original comment.