Lose Your Amazon Account and Your Kindle Dies

Mike writes "If you buy a Kindle and some Kindle ebooks from Amazon, be careful of returning items. Amazon decided that one person had returned too many things, so they suspended his Amazon account, which meant that he could no longer buy any Kindle books, and any Kindle subscriptions he's paid for stop working. After some phone calls, Amazon granted him a one-time exception and reactivated his account again." Take this with as much salt as you'd like.

Comments

Just another reason to not support DRM

[TheLinuxSRC]

This is just another reason why DRM is not a benefit to the consumer and why consumers should *not* support DRM.

Re:Just another reason to not support DRM

[pleappleappleap]

Indeed. I was planning on buying a Kindle (I read a LOT), but now I'm not going to. This is inexcusable, even if the complainant in the thread is in the wrong.

Re:Just another reason to not support DRM

[TheLinuxSRC]

Can you show me somewhere that the guy was being a dick? He returned some items. Apparently there is an unwritten policy at Amazon that if you return X number of high-ticket items (regardless of whether the CS rep says to do so or not) you are banned. No warning, nothing - just banned.

Regardless there is no reason his Kindle should be effectively bricked. Yes, he can use the content he has already purchased, however he can never (legally) obtain any new content for that Kindle; a "feature" designed into the Kindle by Amazon. This sounds like a fundamental problem with DRM to me. Where do we draw the line? Also, not only can he not purchase new content, he cannot even use the warranty on the Kindle should he need to. All at the whim of Amazon.

As far as karma goes, mine is excellent and I don't need it. Why don't you quit being an asshat and go read the article?

Re:Just another reason to not support DRM

[nine-times]

What are you talking about? The guy bought books for his Kindle. He *bought* them. Say what you will about, "No, this is licensing," but check Amazon's website and there's a button that says, "Buy now with 1-click". *Buy*.

So he bought these books, and now because Amazon doesn't like his behavior, they're denying him access to books that he bought. Of course this is an example of why DRM is bad. Imagine you went out to Barnes and Noble and bought physical books. Then, later, because you returned too many purchases to Barnes and Noble and they didn't like that, they went into your house and took back the books you previously purchased without giving you a refund. After complaining, they said, "Ok, we'll return these books, but just this once!"

Re:Just another reason to not support DRM

[sfbanutt]

Actually, not even that's true. It's perfectly possible, and not even terribly difficult, to put non-DRM content onto a Kindle. Fictionwise will tell you how to do it, as will Baen books. Basically, losing his Amazon account just made it difficult (but not impossible) to put DRM'ed books on the Kindle. I'm not sure that's a minus..

Re:Just another reason to not support DRM

[mikec]

Not to defend Amazon, you have misstated the situation. They books he bought are still on his Kindle and still readable. He can't buy any new ones, and his subscriptions are canceled -- meaning he doesn't pay for them, and he doesn't receive them. The stuff he *bought* is all still there.

Re:Just another reason to not support DRM

[Blue Stone]

I wonder what the Office of Fair Trading or Trading Standards would have to say about Amazon UK banning people's accounts for returning defective goods.

I know companies are free to serve people or not at their own discretion, but that right is not absolute (racial discrimination etc.).

If a company were explicitly banning a person because they were a victim of that company's repeated shipping of defective goods, I'd like to think that would be unlawful. Perhaps I'm being too idealistic.

Re:Just another reason to not support DRM

[commodore64_love]

You're right - it's not a DRM problem.

It's a rental problem wherein our corporate overlords are trying to convince us we are "buying" books when it fact we are only renting them, until the corporation decides to block access to the servers (or the company goes out-of-business). Now there's nothing wrong with renting, but the overlords should be honest about it, and the rental rate should be lower than if I bought the physical book. In most cases, neither is true.

Re:Just another reason to not support DRM

[BrentH]

We don't take kindle to DRM around here!

Re:Just another reason to not support DRM

[Culture20]

Please don't mod me redundant; I feel that if someone from Amazon sees this, they need to see multiple people saying it:

I too was planning on buying a Kindle, but will never do so if my ability to use it is at the whim of someone other than myself.

Re:Just another reason to not support DRM

[witherstaff]

I agree also - I was looking forward to a Kindle as my next gadget purchase. I'm actually rather tired of physical books lately. For some reason hardcovers are not a standardized height meaning bookcases end up with a lot of wasted space. Why are they all over the place? I go on reading binges when time and work allow and it's way too easy to have a pile of books but no two are the same. Storage is a pain! I'd rather just have a good electronic reader.

I can only hope the success of the Kindle and the projects like Openmoko means an open source type will come along.

Not Entirely True

[eldavojohn]

Maybe he should have followed the link of the first reply's signature? From that site:

Myth:

If you buy a Kindle, you are locked into Amazon's Kindle store.

Truth:

There are many sources for books that can be read on the Kindle.

Some Free Sites (Public Domain / Creative Commons)

MobileRead.com (look for .mobi books you can download to your computer or download the MobiGuide and get your books via Whispernet) Feedbooks.com (books can be downloaded to your computer or if you download their Kindle Guide you can get your books via Whispernet - they even have a video on how to use the guide) Manybooks.net (when you download to your computer, look for Kindle format or Mobipocket) 1001Books (download books to your computer or directly from your Kindle browser)

Some Pay Sites

Fictionwise.com (look for .mobi books but NOT Secure Mobipocket books) BooksonBoard.com (register your Kindle's PID and you can download any .mobi from their Overdrive servers - to learn more about this see the Visual Kindle Guide wiki) Baen.com (great site for Sci-Fi books which offers free as well as low cost books)

So your Kindle is still somewhat useful. I would hope that more competition arises and Amazon removes its Kindle services from its e-book services so as to avoid a nasty inevitable anti-trust suit.

Re:Not Entirely True

[nahdude812]

In addition, you can back up your books from your Kindle, transfer the Kindle to a different account, and restore your books to it.

A right to do what?

[brunes69]

So you are saying if I buy a lawn mower from Home Depot and then I go in the next day and streak the place and get banned, they should also have the right to re-possess the lawn mower I legally purchased?

How is this any different? He bought a kindle, he bought books for it, then did something totally unrelated Amazon did not like, and they essentially remotely deactivated his device.

Re:A right to do what?

[Amazing Quantum Man]

No, because the stuff you bought at Costco will still work, even if your membership is canceled.

Re:A right to do what?

[MBGMorden]

On the third hand, if your ebooks are already on the Kindle they cannot be removed by Amazon. So they're removing the privilege of buying more from them. Oh no!

But DRM ensures that just because you have a file doesn't mean that you can use it. Depending on the scheme (I have the Kindle Software for my iPod Touch but haven't used it so I'm not really familiar with it), losing your account can make the file you purchased stop working. DRM applied to subscription music services works that way (ie, if you cancel your service the music that you downloaded might still be on your computer, but it won't play), but in those cases it was understood that it was a SUBSCRIPTION service and losing access was to be expected. In this case it appears that Amazon cut him off from using PURCHASED content. That IS an "oh no" situation.

Re:A right to do what?

[HiThere]

However note that they COULD deactivate books he had previously purchased. That means that in the future they could do it intentionally for whatever reason suited them at the time.

In the past week they have demonstrated the ability to censor a large swath of publications and now to deactivate the right to read already purchased works. I.e., they have intentionally built the capabilities to do such things.

You can think whatever you want about the particular events that caused these capabilities to become evident, but they WERE revealed. Publicly.

Perhaps these two times were accidents. Next time it might not be. Next time it might be removing the ability to either read or purchase politically inconvenient items. Or religiously inconvenient. Or commercially. Or any other reason that suited them.

Decide for yourself if you want to trust a company that has intentionally implemented such capabilities. It's up to you. But if they've built the capability don't be surprised if they use it.

Re:A right to do what?

[PopeRatzo]

As for his kindle stuff not working, that sucks, but he got them back in the end.

No. He "got them back in the end" because he was aggressive enough to make what was probably multiple phone calls, having to wait in queues and talk to "supervisors". Not all consumers will go to those lengths (nor should they have to).

As long as corporations are going to use "licenses" and "copyright" and DRM in such a punitive way, the most appropriate response is to punish any company that does so by not using their products or services. Further, I applaud all efforts to defeat DRM in all its forms.

There is a shocking level of hostility toward consumers coming from many of the most successful corporations. Unfortunately, the only way for corporations to learn is when their bottom line is affected negatively. As long as they're making money that have absolutely no incentive to treat customers decently.

Re:A right to do what?

[PopeRatzo]

However note that they COULD deactivate books he had previously purchased

It also means that if the company you purchased a DRM-infected product from goes out of business, you will have a problem using the products you purchased. Ask the people who once used the "Urge" music system to buy what they thought was music they'd always be able to play. Yes, there may have been some little-known and difficult way to get your "licenses" renewed, but the people who bought those mp3s did not think they would someday have to work so hard just to keep playing them.

Buying a product with DRM is as dumb as buying a car from a company that's about to declare bankruptcy. Sure, you might be able to get it fixed in the future, but do you really want to go through all that?

Re:A right to do what?

[undercanopy]

you CAN add new things, just not from amazon. One can add non-amazon content to the Kindle

Re:A right to do what?

[Ironica]

What use is a electronic reader if you can't add new books to read?

Honestly, I don't quite get the point either... I have a Kindle, and I have a bunch of stuff on it that didn't come from Amazon.com. Sure, it's more hassle to put things on it if you don't have a working Kindle account; you can't just pay the 10 cents each to email things directly to the device, and instead have to hook it up to the computer... but you can get legitimately free books from, say, baen.com and load them on to your heart's content. the Kindle will *read* a variety of formats, not just its own.

The most valid point the guy has is "what happened to the warranty?" Since the warranty is used by contacting Customer Service, and he no longer has that right, he can't get warranty service on his $350 electronic device, and that does suck. It could even be illegal.

But, come on, it is so NOT true that a Kindle becomes useless if you can't access the Kindle store. It's the other way around: the Kindle store is of no use if your Kindle doesn't work.

Online accounts and other devices - G1, etc.

[Kelson]

This makes me wonder what would happen with my G1 if for some reason I lost access to my Google account. (You basically can't do anything on the phone without being signed in, though you can create a new account from the phone itself.)

I suspect I could just link it to another account and re-sync contacts, calendar, etc. But then there's the question of purchased apps. Are they linked to the phone, to the cellular plan, or to the Google account? It's something I hadn't thought about before.

Re:Kind-le?

[DinDaddy]

Sw-indle?

Read through his posts...

[PrimalChrome]

He clearly states that he regularly returns big ticket items because they're 'defective'. I know a number of people that utilize this same exploit on a regular basis. They only shop at places with excellent return policies. They order big ticket items and when they realize they maxxed their CC or decide the novelty has worn off, they return them because suddenly they notice a defect. Most of the time this defect was either imaginary or simply the result of several days/weeks of playtime.

As this becomes a hit to company profits, they will have to be much more careful on returns....making it much harder on those of us with valid returns. Too bad they reinstated his account.

Re:Read through his posts...

[barik]

It's one thing to tell someone that they're no longer welcome to order anymore, but it's quite another to retroactively disable anything that they've previously purchased. That's the distinction.

Many people abuse the flexible Costco return policy. Some of these people get their memberships revoked. At no time does Costco come in and say that they can no longer use items they've already bought.

KindlePID deletion

[tepples]

register your Kindle's PID

How do you find your Kindle's PID when Amazon makes sites delete information about KindlePID?

Dont be a dumbass

[Hadlock]

If your account is flagged for returning shit, you're just dumb. Don't buy crap and then return it and expect to stay in a company's good graces for long. I think I speak for all people who ever retail when I say this to people who return more than 1 item every 6 months: Eat Shit And Die. You wouldn't abuse your friends and family like that, so why harrass stores and their employees, even if they're owned/employed by a soulless corperation. Something like 15% of items are returned (dollar amount perhaps), which significantly cuts into profits and drives up prices for everyone else. Fuck You.
 
/rant off.
 
i would kill myself before working retail again.

iKindle

[janwedekind]

Any device which comes with this much DRM should be prefixed with "i".