Slashdot Mirror
Student Suing Amazon For Book Deletions
Stupified writes "High school student Justin Gawronski is suing Amazon for deleting his Kindle copy of Nineteen Eighty-Four (complaint, PDF), because doing so destroyed the annotations he'd created to the text for class. The complaint states: 'The notes are still accessible on the Kindle 2 device in a file separate from the deleted book, but are of no value. For example, a note such as "remember this paragraph for your thesis" is useless if it does not actually reference a specific paragraph.' The suit, which is seeking class action status, asks that Amazon be legally blocked from improperly accessing users' Kindles in the future and punitive damages for those affected by the deletion. Nothing in Amazon's EULA or US copyright law gives them permission to delete books off your Kindle, so this sounds like a plausible suit."
What class has 1984 as required reading and where can I sign up?
As cool as Amazon can be, this was a lame move by them from many perspectives, and I hope this guy wins the case. Perhaps it could set a precedent against deleting data from users' devices in general.
-Matthew Riley "TofuMatt" MacPherson
I have a website
Given the other absurdities of copyright law, and how the RIAA's lawyer think that disappearing purchases are normal in every area of life, I wouldn't be surprised to see a lawyer claim that the annotations are in fact a derivative work of the book, and that since Amazon had no right to sell the book, then the student had no right to create the annotations.
Also, there's probably some boilerplate legal language included with the Kindle that says they are not responsible for data loss, etc., or if it kills your grandmother or dog.
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
I thought when I bought something from Amazon, that I owned it!
I get the feeling that this was a decision by Amazon based on what would cost them less. Either delete these and face user wrath, or let users who have the books keep them and settle monetarily with the copyright holder. I think they may have underestimated the true cost of losing reputation with their user base, lawsuit cost aside.
The irony that Orwell's 1984 describes "Children Heroes" who snitch on grown-ups is tasting sweeter with every passing moment.
If this was anything except 1984, this wouldn't have been news at all.
Bullshit.
The company that sold it didn't have the rights to it in the US. The legal publisher complained and Amazon pulled the book.
Yes, but Amazon's solution to the "books" already sold may have been illegal.
For example, if they had sold a paper copy of 1984 illegally, they aren't allowed to burn down the house of anyone who purchased it. Certain actions remain illegal, despite the fact that they're address the copyright issue.
per the /. story i read 4 days ago
"If this was anything except 1984, this wouldn't have been news at all." I completely disagree. Let's not give up the right to keep the information we buy entirely - it's bad enough that future generations may not own an encyclopedia, dictionary, thesaurus, or, potentially, ANY books/information that cannot be instantly taken away by certain companies or even the government or hackers. Sure, if there was some absolute guarantee that this would only happen in cases where a retailer sold something they did not have the right to sell, few people would care much. It's still bad, in that case, but the real worry is that, to pull a crazy hypothetical out of my *ss, Bush got re-elected for a 3rd term in the last election, decided to invade iran, invoked some war powers act to silence the media from complaining about it, and later started quietly pulling books from the virtual shelves ... books that might start dangerous thoughts. As crazy as it may sound, it's hardly crazy at all. People who want to do this exist - these types have been in power in various countries ... these types are IN power in some countries (N. Korea, anyone? And they're not alone - the media in Iran isn't all that free, is it?)
In my opinion, this ability needs to be removed from the hardware - through the law. Simply having people complain enough that companies don't do this won't solve anything, backdoors will still exist.
Litigation happens to be the only way we get things done.
I disagree. The end user purchased the book in good faith and had absolutely no reason to even suspect that Amazon didn't have the US rights. What would have happened if Amazon had shipped physical books? Same sort of thing should happen. The end user still keeps the book, Amazon pays the appropriate damages to the rights-holders.
If you illegally sold an item, you can be required to pay punitive damages, and you can even go so far as to notify the buyers, but taking back the product (recalling it) is reserverd only for true "stolen goods" and even then only in rare cases, and usually not for retail products. Counterfeit products are often reclaimed, but not valid products sold simply without license or copywrite.
Amazon should have paid the fine (if one was even imposed by the holder). By themsleves (and not thrhrough the action of a courth or dualy authorized agency) taking back this product, they have violated multiple premises in the doctrine of first sale, the commerce codes of the United States and likely multiple state laws, and the punishment for doing so should be significantly greater than the punishment would have been simply for the infringement.
The customers though no fault of their owen purchaesed legally this unlicenced product. They did not buy it out of a truck or through some black market where a crime might be inferred, but through a well known and trusted retailer. Refund of money alone is insufficient in this case as once the product has been sold, the contract of sale is completed, and the product is now OWNED by the customer. Should Amazon want it back, the CUSTOMER becomes the seller, and has every right to set their OWN price for the return. As a student, that electronic copy might be FAR more valuable to me than a physical copy, and even if Amazon offered to replace the elctronic copy with one that WAS authorized for distribution, if it was not compatible with the Kindle, and supported the same notes file taken by the student, then it would not have been an equal value replacement, and asking the student, who was the legal woner of that product, to accept an inferior replacement, even for free after refund, may still not equate to the value of his loss (which can easily be measured in man hours repeating his effort in another form of the book, and correcting and correlating all the notes already takes, using a fair labor rate).
There is no contest in life for which the unprepared have the advantage.
And you paid for a device which was tethered to its master, which happened not to be you.
"Thanks for all the money you paid to us. We've used it to buy off ISO among other things" -Microsoft
If they didn't have the right to sell it, and it's illegal to reposess such a work through legal means, then they need to pay the copyright owner for the copies distributed. The lawyers can hammer out an agreement which will make Jeff & Co. look just a little harder the next time they go publishing a work. Of course, since Amazon knows how many they sold, that will make it easy for the copyright holder to sue for damages based on statutory infringement should the talks break down
Why is this so hard?
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
As a country, they're litigation happy. As a teenager, he's probably lazy and opportunistic. Put the two together ...
or maybe he is willing to stand up and fight for his rights, and the rights of others. There is a reason why Slashdot isn't in German. Godwin!
Imagine someone purchased a car, and spent many hours customizing and tuning it. The seller then realized he shouldn't have sold the car, so he sneaks into the garage in the middle of the night, takes the car back, and leaves the added components and the cash for the original purchase price lying on the floor.
In this case, it is obvious that the seller acted improperly, and the buyer suffered a loss. The Amazon case involves data and copyrights rather than physical property, but the same principles should apply.
Amazon didn't know that it was still under copyright in the US, and didn't have the rights to sell it. When they discovered their mistake, they took it back -- removing the books and refunding the buyers' money. Damages paid to rights-holders are given to compensate for the fact that the violator can't remove every copy of the infringing product they sold; but in this case, they were able to. If this was anything except 1984, this wouldn't have been news at all.
Perhaps it would not have been news, but it should be. The problem with e-books is that they can be edited after the fact with no reliable way to know which version is the original. This makes practical the kind of altering of history talked about in "1984".
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Really?
FTFS: The complaint states: 'The notes are still accessible on the Kindle 2 device in a file separate from the deleted book, but are of no value. For example, a note such as "remember this paragraph for your thesis" is useless if it does not actually reference a specific paragraph.'
It's a sad day when we don't even bother reading the SUMMARY any more.
I claim first use of "Error No. 0B" - or "No. 0B error." It'll be the new ID 10T!
No, that's the procedure for when they sell a paper copy of Fahrenheit 451 illegally.
Maybe he read and understood the book?
Completely agree - and you missed out China. Also, the RIAA's "educational campaign" sounds Orweillean too.
I believe that applies to the service of providing ebooks and such as well as the wireless connection. The content already on the device might be a hard sell to a judge as a service that may be modified.
It sucks, but with digital technology, it is possible to recover stolen property, which is what Amazon did and should have done.
It was not "stolen" property. It was misappropriated according to copyright law. This is sort of like the issue of illegal downloads: IP owners like the **AA like to spout about "stolen" IP, but that's not what it is. Neither Amazon nore the customer broke into anything or anywhere and made off with anyone's IP. You may debate the validity of the copyright and if the content was misused by Amazon, but nothing was "stolen".
If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
And this is where I think we all went wrong.
Why should we allow books or music to be licensed to us? or anything for that matter?
And even if we do, why for perpetual licenses do we allow them to take away all our rights?
The doctrine of first sale was created to protect us from this behavior, but we've thrown it out the window as soon as we agree to this kind of license.
Any time we agree to a perpetual license we should have certain rights that can't be signed away, and the first two I would think would be:
1) If the term is forever, you CAN NOT remove my access to the material.
2) I have the right to sell my license to someone else when I'm done with it, provided I transfer all copies of the material.
I put on my robe and wizard hat..
Amazon, and big corps in general, are NOT the police, and do not have the rights as such.
Why is that unlikely? High school kids have been known to have jobs, after all. I myself earned the $1500 necessary to buy an Apple //e system my senior year in high school, some 25 years ago. I had friends who bought cars. Cheap, worn-out cars, to be sure, but they still ran.
But either way, it doesn't matter. The Kindle is his, and contained his own work. He believes that Amazon willfully destroyed that work, and he's willing make an effort to get recompensed. Good for him! He's probably tilting at windmills, of course, but I applaud his effort.
Would a kid really care enough to do so? Why not? One of my classmates ran for mayor during his senior year. Not as a joke, either. It was a sincere attempt to fix problems he saw in the town and he put a lot of effort into it. He lost, but it was a credible campaign. I have no problem at all believing that a high school kid would feel wronged by Amazon and would make the effort to seek justice.
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
If someone buys stolen property in good faith, never believing that it was stolen then the police inform them, they have absolutely no right to keep it and in all likelihood will not get their money back.
Agreed they have no right to keep the goods, but they did enter into the sale contract in good faith assuming the goods were legitimate. If the seller had no right to sell them, the buyer has every right to compensation from the seller.
As cool as Amazon can be, this was a lame move by them from many perspectives, and I hope this guy wins the case. Perhaps it could set a precedent against deleting data from users' devices in general.
Precedent is indeed the right worry here, but not quite in the way you're mentioning.
1984 was not legally sold on Amazon.com's Kindle store. It's legal in almost every other country on Earth -- basically any country without corporate overlords demanding Copyright be extended to "Age of Mickey Mouse +20 years" in perpetuity.
No, the real precedent that is very, very bad and very, very scary is that now, now publishers know that Amazon can remotely delete items from the Kindle, without user input.
Textbook companies want to sell a textbook that's only good for 1 quarter? Why not? Not like you'll need it after this year, since we're gonna release the 351st edition to make sure students can't resell the deadtree back to the bookstore.
Someone sues Amazon cause "Twilight" offends local obscenity laws? "Well golly gee, we're seeing you're connecting to a Cell tower in Bumfuck Idaho, we'll just auto-delete that Twilight book for you to avoid offending the prudes..."
Or better yet. "Hey Apple, Amazon can just delete stuff from their Kindle remotely, why can't you delete any songs with Metallica in their filename / ID3 tags that don't match up with ones they've bought from us off iPods when they dock?"
Amazon played a very bad hand here. They admitted they can screw over users on behalf of 3rd party companies. Worse, they admitted they will if asked.
A very, very bad precedent all around.
Sounds like Gawronski had a change of heart. On Sunday he was quoted in the New York Times saying:
(emphasis added)
Except that, reading the EULA, the book is independent of the Service. The buyer has a license to read the book on the Kindle OR in other ways as provided by the Service. Bear in mind that, in licenses and contracts like this, any ambiguities will be resolved in favor of the people who didn't write the license or contract. That's how free agency came about in Major League Baseball: the reserve clause was unclear, and the courts ruled that the interpretation that favored the players was preferred, since it was a standard MLB contract. (For the baseball-deprived, individual teams used to hold players' contracts, so that they could only play for one team. The "reserve clause" gave the team the option to renew a player's contract for a year, and the courts ruled that this allowed player to play out that year and then be free agents, free to negotiate with any team.)
Even if the language was clear, the courts could rule that it was part of a contract of adhesion, and therefore invalid. They could also rule that something that looks like a sale is an actual sale. Both sorts of rulings have happened in the past.
No, I'm not a lawyer either, but I do read Slashdot.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
While you might have the technical ability to do something, it does not necessarily mean you have the legal right to do something.
Gary McKinnon had the technical ability to get into certain computer systems and look at the data (he did not delete stuff), but he didn't have the legal right to do it, so he's facing extradition to the USA and potentially quite a number of years in prison.
Amazon had the technical ability to get into certain computer systems (Kindles) and delete the data. And Amazon deleted data without permission from people who thought they owned those certain computer systems.
I'm not a lawyer but whether that's legal depends on who owns those Kindles, and whether Amazon has been given extra special powers to delete data from systems they don't own.
FWIW, Amazon says "buy" Kindle, they don't say "rent".
Car repossessors still have to follow certain steps to repossess a car - they typically cannot break into garages to repossess the car - it has to be in an open area, in some cases they have to notify the buyer that they are going to repossess the car.
Similarly when a Bank seizes back property there are certain procedures they have to follow.
Another thing - the initial problem was with Amazon's _Partner_ selling stuff they shouldn't have, not Amazon themselves.
Just because a shop in Amazon Mall sells me stuff they shouldn't have doesn't mean that Amazon can send their Mall Guards to sneak into my house and remove it on behalf of that shop, even if Amazon Mall is afraid they might get sued.
If the shop has done something illegal, Amazon Mall could report it to the police - the cops are the ones who have powers to seize and destroy stuff. Lets all only have to deal with one bunch of thugs running around ok?
This about law and order.
Hacking laws on the books make it illegal to add, modify, or delete data on another person's computer without their consent. I believe it carries a pretty stiff sentence too, because it is a federal statute. I am pretty sure that Amazon has no consent from anyone when they used their DRM to kill the book, so they could be in some deep water.
Also, since it was an an actual person that punched the enter key when it came time to revoke the DRM license, I wonder if they could be hit with the criminal hacking charge. The fact that invoking DRM controls could land you in the federal pen for 20 years might be a great way get corps to knock that shit off.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
This all doesn't matter. He paid for the book on his Kindle2. He was using that for his school work. Amazon deleted it. Amazon is totally wrong and needs to go to court.
This is why I won't buy a Kindle2.
Athiesm is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby.
Sorry, couldn't resist that bait.
None of the basic premises of capitalism has been proven faulty or unworkable by the economic realities over the last couple of years. If anything, insane monetary policy, reckless spending and the blatant corruption of regulatory bodies has demonstrated the utter failure of big central government as an institution. Perhaps your definition varies, but I don't consider "hiring people to lobby the government for favors" to be a valid business model in a capitalistic system. Capitalism is based on the means of genuine production, not money printing, paper shuffling, government spending and a system of bailouts to a select few. Suppose that we broaden the definition of capitalism to include activities like fractional reserve banking, stock trading and real estate specualtion. Even though nothing is being produced by "capital", businesses that make bad decisions fail, go bankrupt, and get replaced by smarter healthier businesses. I don't know what you call an economic system based on government stealing money from its citizens and using it for bailouts of a politically well connected elite, but it certainly is NOT "capitalism".
The other side of the coin is that we probably wouldn't need even non-corrupt regulatory bodies if capitalism didn't breed a bunch of greedy egomaniacs. Capitalism and the free market is flawed from the outset because it favors a person over the people. We're not predator/prey. We're a society of varying people who contribute in different ways, not in all monetarily significant ways.
But the difficult part is that capitalism brings out the worst in people -- you see yourself earning more because you were innovative. That's a good thing. But now you see what money can provide, but your innovative streak has run out or perhaps you're tired of being competitive...but you still want the money.
So you start to screw people out of theirs. You give them bad loans to get the bonus associated with them. You give yourself a million dollar bonus because your company went completely bankrupt but not insolvent so you "saved" it -- and you let your employees take the bullet for you.
Capitalism dates back to a less civilized structure. Let's grow up a bit.
After the JavaScript finishes, I barely have time for the headline!
APK quotes people (including myself) without context and should not be trusted. Just thought you should know.