Amazon removed books from my Kindle

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by DNSB

I haven't seen a report that where if you leave WiFI on continuously, books were deleted. It seems to be tied to having WiFi off for a long period, having ebooks on your Kindle that have an ASIN that matches an existing Amazon book and not having that matching book as a purchase/KU loan/whatever in your account.

My suspicion is that it is intentional to remove books from a device that have been removed from the account while WiFi was off but has the side effect of removing sideloaded content that was never in the account.

AFAIK the book may well be on your account, but it will be removed if it's not supposed to be on that specific device. For example, deDRMed and sideloaded Amazon purchases would be removed, unless Download & Transfer was used for that specific Kindle.

Mind, I can't check this, as I no longer own a modern Kindle. I only think this is the case.

[j.p.s]

I still think the probable cause is a buggy poorly designed poorly implemented synchronization scheme coupled with a time error on the kindle.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by j.p.s

I still think the probable cause is a buggy poorly designed poorly implemented synchronization scheme coupled with a time error on the kindle.

Agreed, but in that case, why don't they fix it? Oh wait... they don't really want us to sideload, so they're going to drag their feet on this bug indefinitely.

I hope not, of course, but I'm pretty pessimistic at this point.

[j.p.s]

Before it gets fixed, someone in the sw development hierarchy has to be aware of it, it needs to be confirmed, a priority has to be assigned, and higher priorities need to be cleared first. If the number of people affected is small they might never get to it.

If customer modified metadata is involved, all they have to do is declare it unsupported.

Whether they consider discouraging USB transfer a plus is not needed, but it might tip the balance.

Of course, if they actually cared about quality, they would try to fix it. There is a tiny possibility that they are trying and it will eventually, perhaps silently, be fixed.

[Frogm4n]

Content without the metadata tag set, or with it set to PDOC, were untouched in the testing earlier in the thread. That says to me that they aren't discouraging sideloading.

[Sarmat89]

Originally Posted by Sirtel

I'm pretty sure most of those sideloaded books were not published by Amazon, only sold by them. The bookstore doesn't own the copyright of the books it sells.

Bookstores do not deal in intellectual property, publishers (like Amazon) however do.

Originally Posted by DNSB

What is the logic behind stating that using EBOK as the book type make it copyrighted content produced by Amazon?

No publicly accessible tools create AZW files with that field set to any other value than PDOC. The part of the format that field resides is defined exclusively by Amazon.

The copyright resides with the copyright owner. Allowing Amazon to publish your copyrighted material does not grant Amazon a copyright.

Every publisher retains the copyright to its editions and has an exclusive right to distribute it.

[gbm]

The only ebooks that Amazon has exclusive rights to are the one published by Amazon's publishing imprint Amazon Publishing.

Amazon Publishing (or simply APub) is Amazon's book publishing unit launched in 2009. It is composed of 15 imprints including AmazonEncore, AmazonCrossing, Montlake Romance, Thomas & Mercer, 47North, and Topple Book

It does not own the copyrights of those books only a license for a set length of time or as long as the book is in print.

Originally Posted by Sarmat89

snip

Every publisher retains the copyright to its editions and has an exclusive right to distribute it.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Sarmat89

Every publisher retains the copyright to its editions and has an exclusive right to distribute it.

Again, while Amazon does have a publishing imprint, the vast majority of the books they sell are not published by them. In those cases (as I said, the vast majority) the copyright belongs to the author or the publisher, not Amazon.

You seem to think that Amazon has published all the books they sell. They haven't.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by Sarmat89

No publicly accessible tools create AZW files with that field set to any other value than PDOC. The part of the format that field resides is defined exclusively by Amazon.

So calibre and it's plugins are not publicly accessible tools? Did you mean to weasel word by saying AZW files? Since an AZW file is a mobi file with DRM, were you deliberately excluding mobi, KF8/azw3 and KFX formats?

[haertig]

Removing books from my Kindle? I don't want that. Updating firmware on my Kindle without my permission? I don't want that. Deleting book covers from my Kindle? I don't want that. The easiest way to prevent all these undesirable things is to prevent Amazon from being able to ever touch my Kindle. And the easiest way to do that is to cut the network connection (most easily done by leaving the thing in airplane mode permanently).

There are a few things I lose out on by keeping my Kindle "network free". Syncing reading position, notes, etc. But I don't care about that (though others might). As I understand it, back when I was still using KU (I would "download for USB transfer" and then side load them), authors were probably not getting paid due to Amazon agreements to only pay them for pages read. Again, I don't care about that. That's between the authors and Amazon - nothing in their agreement mandates that I keep my Kindle online.

Since none of the things I lose being off-network matter to me, the perfect solution (for me) is to always keep my Kindle offline. I can side load all my books. And I can manually update firmware, not that I think I'd ever want to do that and possibly give Amazon a back door in, but I could.

This is my permanent "fix" for my Kindle. It will remain this way until it dies. It works fine for my needs exactly as-is. It's not a bad device. Hardware-wise, and software-wise (firmware 5.9.4) I think my Paperwhite is a fine device actually. It's the Amazon mothership hovering overhead that is the bad part - the part that needs to be cut off from access.

[odamizu]

Originally Posted by Frogm4n

Content without the metadata tag set, or with it set to PDOC, were untouched in the testing earlier in the thread. That says to me that they aren't discouraging sideloading.

This ↑↑↑

Amazon is fine with sideloading "Personal Documents" (PDOC) via USB and Send-to-Kindle. They're even fine with people stripping DRM from purchased Kindle books, editing them, then transferring them to your Kindle library using Send-to-Kindle.

As I understand it, things only get messed up if you change PDOC to EBOK and sideload via USB. Then Amazon's system goes wonky because it identifies that book as a purchased book and it tries to sync it with their records and can't.

As @Frogm4n says, that's not Amazon discouraging sideloading.

[haertig]

Originally Posted by odamizu

As @Frogm4n says, that's not Amazon discouraging sideloading.

What it is, is Amazon making an incorrect assumption and acting on it. I am saying "acting on it" because I no longer believe this could be a bug. It's been going on for so long now, that it has proven itself intentional behavior IMHO.

So, the ebook's metadata says "EBOK". There are many tools that allow people to edit ebooks. Amazon cannot claim that as "their book" simply because it says "EBOK". Maybe they were the first to use that term. But who cares? They don't own it. There may be benefits to the way Kindles handle books labeled "EBOK" (I don't know if there is or isn't). Great. People should be able to grab that advantage if they know how to change their book's metadata. It's their Kindle and their book after all - not Amazons.

Amazon is operating on the incorrect assumption that if a book says EBOK and they don't have a record of the sale, that the book is theirs and they are free to delete it from your Kindle. Wrong assumption. Wrong actions taken by Amazon based on that wrong assumption.

[BionicGecko]

Originally Posted by odamizu

As I understand it, things only get messed up if you change PDOC to EBOK and sideload via USB.

I don’t tend to sideload via USB much so I’m not too familiar with the details here, but what is the benefit of setting the book type to EBOK instead of PDOC?

Personally I can’t see much of a difference between my Amazon-purchased books and personal documents I send via Send to Kindle (so presumably with book type set to PDOC during the conversion), especially since Amazon started converting personal docs to KFX.

[Sarmat89]

Originally Posted by haertig

Amazon is operating on the incorrect assumption that if a book says EBOK and they don't have a record of the sale, that the book is theirs and they are free to delete it from your Kindle.

It is not incorrect assumption. There is no way to create an AZW file which has the type 'EBOK' other than reverse engineering the resulting file to misrepresent it as an Amazon product. That is neither supported nor endorsed by Amazon.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by DNSB

So calibre and it's plugins are not publicly accessible tools? Did you mean to weasel word by saying AZW files? Since an AZW file is a mobi file with DRM, were you deliberately excluding mobi, KF8/azw3 and KFX formats?

Actually, .azw is a generic files extension used by Amazon. It could be Mobi or KF8. It could have DRM or not.