Kindle in Canada, book selection question

[onemanblitz]

If a Kindle book is not offered on Amazon.ca, are you allowed to purchase a kindle book on Amazon.com if you reside in Canada?

What sites can you access with the K2 in Canada? Is it just wikipedia? Will instapapper work?


Also,

Which reader has better selection in Canada? K2 or Nook?


Can you somehow buy a book from one store and convert it so it works for the other store's device?


Thanks for answering the NOOB questions...

[ATDrake]

1) Yes. All Kindle books are actually sold through Amazon.com, and you will pay in US dollars, though due to geographical restriction (publishers having local rights and so forth), there are separate Kindle "stores" for each country and some books will not be available to Canada (and other books may only be available in Canada and not the US).

Be warned that for any non-free stuff (there are a lot of zero-cost limited-time promotional and public domain books), there is currently a $2 Whispernet surcharge fee outside the US, which is included in the selling price of the book.

To avoid getting hit on the credit card with a lot of small charges/conversion fees over time, I advise purchasing a medium-large denomination US dollar gift certificate when the exchange rate is favourable and applying it to your Amazon.com account.

But you can have a look at the FREE (and very inexpensive) books for the Kindle stickied at the top of the forum to see the range and variety of free promo books that gets offered, and the Inkmesh Free Kindle Books page for a list of the current ones.

A lot of the freebies are either Christian fiction, often with an evangelical tone, or romance, often on the erotic side, so if you don't care for either genre, this may not be as much of an added-value consideration as for another reader.

2) On a Kindle 2 with the 2.3 firmware, you can only do Wikipedia in Canada. I've heard that the 2.5 firmware update gives full web access, but I haven't installed it yet, so someone else will have to confirm/deny.

3) Kindle. For a long time, Nook wasn't supposed to be sold outside the US and a lot of people went through hoops to get one.

Many ebooks in the B&N store are still listed as "shipping to US addresses only", which means that you won't be able to order/download them from Canada unless you're willing to do a bit of hoop-jumping, setting up a US shipping address and purchasing while hiding your IP behind a US proxy.

4) Yes, but if it comes in a "Secured" format, you will have to strip the DRM before conversion. James Moore, Minister of Heritage, is currently working to make this illegal, with his "digital locks" copyright bill. I'd normally advise writing to him to tell him what a bad idea this is, but he obviously doesn't listen to anyone but himself and goes around calling everyone who disagrees with him "radical extremists" and then pretending he never said so.

But you can get a lot of legal, DRM-free ebooks in many formats that you can easily convert, if they don't already offer the Mobipocket format which works on the Kindle.

If you like science fiction and fantasy, Baen's Webscription service is excellent. They don't just sell their own books, but also ones from other publishers and several authors' backlists to whom the rights have reverted to them. New books that are the equivalent of fresh hardcover releases are only $6, and I've heard that if you buy a monthly Webscription bundle (5-6 books for $15), you can also arrange to have it sent to another person as a free promo, and then they can also send it to another person when they claim their freebie, and so forth.

There's also the BookViewCafé, which is a group of various authors selling their backlist works in ebook format themselves. They also put up free short stories, novellas, and the occasional serial novel, and their members include respected award-winning authors such as Vonda McIntyre and Judith Tarr.

Fictionwise, though it's gone downhill since Barnes & Noble purchased it and began running the business into the ground, is still a great source of midlist authors' backlist books. You can get short stories and novels from people like Mike Resnick and Greg Bear in MultiFormat, which is the DRM-free version that you can download in any filetype you need.

They are not just limited to sf/fantasy, but have the same range and variety as a regular bookstore, with books in every genre. And every so often, they have special deals and discount coupons, though apparently not as many as they used to have before.

For romance, there is Jasmine Jade, webstore for Ellora's Cave Publishing, which does erotica and also tamer romance under its Cerridwen Press imprint, Carina Press, a division of Harlequin books, and AllRomance Ebooks, which aggregates stuff from large publishers, small presses, and independent authors.

All are DRM-free, though some of the books at AllRomance are only available in Secured format.

Hope this helps.

[onemanblitz]

Wow, thanks for quick and thorough response...

I actually meant Kobo vs Kindle as far as content goes...


Also, I shop a lot on Amazon.ca and Amazon.com, I use both. What is an easy way for me to know that a book that is available in the US is not available in Canada?

Thanks again!!!

[ATDrake]

To check on the availability of a Kindle book in Canada, go to the Kindle Store. Far-left side at practically the top of the column is a small "Your Country or Region". Set it to Canada, and then go search for a book.

Here's an example of one that keeps getting recommended to me, but which I can't get myself: Elizabeth Peters' The Crocodile on the Sandbank. As you can see, the right-hand box where the 1-click buy option would normally be just says "This book is not available in Canada".

As for Kindle vs Kobo, well, that particular Peters book is available in the Kobo store, to Canadians.

I think there's actually better selection overall in the Kindle store, just because a lot of authors/publishers have been seeing Amazon/the Kindle as a popular device for ages, so it's their go-to option when releasing ebooks at first. That may change as the iPad gets more popular and the reader wars really kick off.

However, not all of them are releasing outside the US, so almost everything at Kobo will be available in Canada and you can get books there you can't elsewhere.

Another consideration is that the Kobo uses the popular ADE DRM, which means that you're not just limited to shopping at Kobo, but can also buy from the Sony eReader store and any other that supports the Adobe Secured PDF and ePub formats. B&N use their own proprietary DRM, so their books aren't compatible unless stripped, although you can also put regular ADE-DRM books on the Nook.

Sony store also offers a lot of free books (though not nearly as many), often the same as Amazon does (it's the publisher which determines which freebies to promote) and the Sony store prices the same for Canadian customers as US, no Whispernet surcharge, although some of their books will be US-only.

And you have to buy through their awful Reader store interface in the special software they make you download, instead of via the browser, though that's only a brief inconvenience.

I'll mention that you can read most library ebooks (often PDF and ePub) straight up with the Kobo or Nook. But you can put Mobipocket format library books on the Kindle easily enough with an easy-to-use Python script that generates a valid Mobi PID for your Kindle, and another one that tricks the Kindle into thinking it's got a compatible Kindle-DRMed file in the resulting borrowed download. No actual DRM-breaking involved.

My province pools all its libraries into its ebook lending program, so it's got a pretty good selection, and you might want to have a look at yours.

[SensualPoet]

There's a pretty large selection of Kindle books at Amazon.com. Recently (abt mid-May), the $2 Whispernet charges have been dropped for many free titles -- including free commercial works. You can also download free samples of almost every title via Whispernet direct to the device.

Kobo's titles in Canada are less extensive, but there are some things at Kobo and not at Kindle; and Kobo does NOT deliver via 3G wireless so there is no Whispernet surcharge. That makes some titles cheaper than Kindle.

Smashwords have a surprisingly robust number of titles, available as both ePub (Kobo) and Kindle formats, many under $5 (and lots closer to $1).

Barnes & Noble (and the Nook) do not sell in Canada, period.

Sony's e-reader bookstore is maddeningly designed showing many titles not available in Canada (even when the same title can be had at Kobo or Amazon).

If you buy a Kobo, you'll also have access to public library books. The library system currently supports DRM ePub and DRM PDF, but not Kindle's format. The caveat is the library selection is extremely small (but growing).

There's a rich supply of free books from Mobileread contributors, Manybooks, Munsey's, and Project Gutenberg (be sure to check out the US, Canadian and Australian websites as content is different). Generally free books are available in Kobo and Kindle formats.

I have both the Kobo and the Kindle 2i and recommend both. I like them in different ways. Kindle is the by far more robust and featured-packed (built-in dictionary, 3G delivery), but the Kobo has the same size screen and screen technology and is cheaper.

[Mazrim]

Originally Posted by ATDrake

1) Yes. All Kindle books are actually sold through Amazon.com, and you will pay in US dollars, though due to geographical restriction (publishers having local rights and so forth), there are separate Kindle "stores" for each country and some books will not be available to Canada (and other books may only be available in Canada and not the US).

To avoid getting hit on the credit card with a lot of small charges/conversion fees over time, I advise purchasing a medium-large denomination US dollar gift certificate when the exchange rate is favourable and applying it to your Amazon.com account.

I have a quick question: Am I supposed to buy the gift card from amazon.ca or amazon.com, or does it matter? I noticed that it said the gift card wouldn't work on other amazon sites if you bought from the one, so I want to make sure I buy the right gift card, especially if you're technically only buying books from amazon.com and it might not recognize a .ca gift card.

Thanks! (New user hailing from Calgary, my Kindle shipped today!)

[ATDrake]

Originally Posted by Mazrim

I have a quick question: Am I supposed to buy the gift card from amazon.ca or amazon.com, or does it matter?

Buy the GC from Amazon.com.

All your books will only be accessible from your Amazon.com account, which is separate though linked to the .ca version. So even when you're buying from the "Canada" version of the Kindle store, it's all processed from their US site anyway.

Congratulations and enjoy your new Kindle!

[Mazrim]

Thanks for the quick response!

I purchased a gift card last night, and had another question. It shows I have $100 credit under the gift card section now, but how do I ensure I am drawing from that credit when purchasing from my Kindle instead of the 1-click selection of my credit card? I noticed that I couldn't select my gift card balance under the 1-click options. Note that I haven't actually purchased anything yet so I might be missing an option later on in the buying process, but I was hoping to set it before I do any shopping so it's a care-free process. Thanks again!

[Mazrim]

Originally Posted by PhillipA82

Here is your answer:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/custom...deId=200138510

Yeah, I saw that earlier, but it doesn't quite answer how it works on the Kindle. I was hoping to find a way to automatically set it to draw from the gift card instead of my credit card in 1-click purchases under the Kindle options page, but like I said in my post I haven't done an actual purchase yet on the Kindle so I wasn't sure if I had the option there to change to the gift card balance there.

EDIT: Nevermind, found a kindle specific gift card page.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/custom...0283&sr=1-3#gc

It states: "Any available balance will be used for your Kindle store purchase before your credit or debit card is charged" ...so, problem solved.

[ChaoZ]

Just to clarify regarding the free offerings for books in the U.S. vs. $2 in Canada. If I do not use Whispernet to download the book (sync over USB?), does that mean I can download the book for free?

Also, is it possible to get access to the entire U.S. catalog or does it require a U.S. credit card? I believe I have a Amazon.com account through some purchases in the past already.

Thanks, just thinking of getting a Kindle and just doing some research.

[ATDrake]

The free books which say $0.00 on the product page are completely free, regardless of whether or not you use the Whispernet to download them.

The usual $2 Whispernet fee is included in the regular buying price of the book, as stated on the product page, which is why Canadian prices for non-free books always look exactly that much higher than the corresponding US price. It's paid regardless of your download method and whether or not you have an actual Kindle to take advantage of the wireless delivery in the first place.

You won't be given any separate charges beyond the website page's product price, besides applicable taxes.

To get full access to the US Kindle store, you only need to set your Kindle's country to the US, with a US billing address. There's a workaround with using Amazon.com gift certificates to pay for everything, so that they never actually check, much less charge, any credit card you use.

In these cases, I advise avoiding using Whispernet for purchases, and instead downloading them via computer, because it just seems like it's easier for Amazon to catch you if you use the wireless all the time from the "wrong" region.

Mind you, from time to time, some stuff shows up that's only available to Canadians, such as this currently free police procedural mystery/thriller by Peter Robinson.

You might want to try downloading one of the Kindle for PC/Mac apps and "purchasing" a few of the promotional freebies; see how much you like how the Kindle shopping/reading experience works, and if it turns out you do, then you'll have a nice stock of free books to load up on your Kindle if you decide to get one.

[babnaw]

I'm in Canada also and am trying to understand how to work around the CDN vs. US options. I have ordered from amazon.com numerous times. I have the account set up with my CDN addy and CDN credit card but when I ship I always ship to a friend in the US.

So, to avoid extra fees and to have all the typically avail. books avail. to me, do I need to set up a new amazon account with a US home addy and a US ship to addy? Then I would have to get a gc and order my kindle with a gc, or would I be able to order the kindle with a CDN credit card and then just use the gc when I want to download books from the US store? Or will it be seen as a US kindle if I order from amazon.com and ship to a US addy with a CDN cc?

I mainly want the free classics, so it sounds like it's a non-issue there, but if I order other books occasionally I don't want to pay extra fees. If I purchase a kindle in Canada and then get the free books through the kindle and not the computer, then there is no extra fee right? If I go through amazon.com directly for paid books can I download them to my computer without extra fees and then put them on my kindle?

Lastly, ATDrake, you said you can download a bunch of books before actually getting the kindle. Do I just download the kindle app and then when I get a kindle it sees all the files and copies them over for me?

[ATDrake]

1) If your US friend's shipping address also happens to be usable as your billing address, you should be fine. Get the gift certificates anyway to avoid lots of little currency conversion charges on your CC account.

3) Sometimes Canadians get books that the US people don't, and some of them are even promotional freebies. It's entirely up to you whether you want to set up a separate account for that sort of thing, or just do all your shopping under one account in the store you think you'll use most.

Possibly Amazon will one day eliminate the $2 Whispernet surcharge as they have for the UK people. But until then, it's incorporated directly into the selling price of each non-free book and you can't currently get around it unless you pose as a US customer. Downloading via computer instead of wireless does not help with this.

The free books never have any fees. The $0.00 you see is the $0.00 you pay, regardless of how you get them onto the Kindle. Unless for some bizarre reason you one day decide to have their files directly emailed to your Kindle using the Whispernet document delivery service instead of just pulling them from the Archives, and then it will cost you.

2) If you plan to go the all-US route and are paranoid about them tracking the payment method for your Kindle, feel free to buy it from your normal account using your regular CC, but have it sent unregistered as a "gift", and then register it to the new account once you receive it.

Or you could do the hypothetically anonymous all GC route if that makes you feel safer.

4) To get books before your Kindle arrives:

a) If you've already ordered it, then if the pre-order is registered to your account, you'll have the option to buy books for it on the store pages. It'll say something like Buy Now With 1-Click/Deliver to "babnaw's Kindle". When your Kindle arrives, once you turn on the wireless, all the books will be automatically delivered to it.

b) If you haven't pre-ordered a Kindle, or designated it as a gift, in which case it'll arrive unregistered, then once you install and register one of the Kindle apps, you can shop away.

The books won't automatically transfer, and once your physical Kindle arrives, you'll have to re-download the a copy of each file specially encoded for it, except in the cases where you bought a no-DRM book.

Most of the classic freebies are no-DRM, and you can just drag and drop them over.

Since sometimes people ask, I'll mention that there is no additional charge for this and you do not have to buy the books twice.

Be sure to check the sticky thread at the top of this forum for any time-limited promotional free books you might like. Most of them are also free for Canadians.

Incidentally, we have some very nice editions of many classics right here, hand-formatted by our very own MobileRead members and free to all. Though of course the Amazon versions have the advantage that you can sync your reading across several devices if that's something you think you'll be needing.

Hope this helps.

[babnaw]

Originally Posted by ATDrake

Hope this helps.

That helped tremendously, thank you.

I think ordering the Kindle from my reg. account and shipping it to my friend's US addy unregistered as a gift is simplest option. I didn't know they can preregister it before you get it. Can you explain that more please? Would the warranty still be under my name if there was an issue?

I don't care about synching across devices, though maybe I will down the road if I end up with more than one kindle, but that won't be for a while. The Kindle will be my first ereader, so after I try it out I may get one for dd (11), though I'm contemplating getting a Nook as the second reader so that I can get books from the library. I'm going to wait until closer to Christmastime though and see if B&N comes out with a Nook 2 with a pearl screen or any other enhancements.

[ATDrake]

When you order a Kindle for yourself, they automatically register it by associating the serial number with your account online (same way you'd register a Kindle without Whispernet access if you just wanted to be able to purchase, like the people outside the US who originally got those old non-3G Kindles).

It's just for convenience in shopping pre-arrival and being able to queue stuff up for auto-delivery when you get it. The Kindle itself doesn't know it's registered until you take it out of the package and turn on the wireless so it can contact Amazon's servers and tie itself into your account details.

Warranty's supposed to follow the Kindle (via serial number), not the original purchaser, unless, perhaps you got one of those special extended ones (I don't personally know how they work).

But if you were to get tired of your K3 and sold or re-gifted it to a friend, then if something happened while it was still under the original 1-year built-in warranty, they should be able to contact Amazon for repair/replacement under it, according to what the general experience on the Amazon Discussion forums has been, as far as I can tell.