Libra 2 No Registration 2023, (FW 3.19 +)

[Ned]

I've registered with Kobo and seen nothing disadvantageous - and I have no moral stance against it either

It's helpful when contacting kobo for replacement of a faulty reader.
They offer a two year guarantee - and honour it with no qualms - and the registration will confirm your date of purchase for them. I had a Forma replaced at over 18 months old.

I'd just get on with it.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by komali_2

Thanks for those that offered tips on using the device without registering.

For those confused, "what's the big deal, just register!" :

Cory Doctorow says it better than I ever could. He gets into it a bit here https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/13/kitbashed/ but I also recommend his book "Chokepoint capitalism" https://chokepointcapitalism.com/

Basically, it's unjust to demand user's information in return for the right to use the device they already gave you money for. Once a company gets paid for hardware, that should be the customer's computer to do whatever they want with. This is the core belief of the open source movement.

It's not "just nothing." It's the equivalent of giving a company 400$ or whatever, them giving you a product, and then them demanding another 5$ to turn it on. Your email and attention have value (more than 5$ mind you), and it's unethical for companies to demand these of you.

I can't speak for kobos TOS but basically in 2023 if you give your email out, you're getting marketing email spam, not just from that company, but to all the companies they sell your email address to, or your reading habits or purchase history or whatever else. That's unethical. I don't want kobos friends to know anything about me. I want to give kobo 400$, get an e ink computer, shake hands, and never talk again. That should be the extent of our relationship. If other people want to engage in a further business relationship with them to buy ebooks, fine, but if I don't want to I shouldn't have to.

So it's not "just an email." It's another company with your contact information happy to give it away at the drop of a hat, it's another account waiting to be hacked, it's another password to keep track of. And also, who knows what kind of data analytics they're doing and cross associating with other places I use that email address (famously Facebook tracking is now so good they're aware of you even if you never VISIT the site, because of tracking data sharing).

No thanks. Customers should be able to hard opt out.

Sorry, but you are so way off-base and very wrong here. I've had an account at Kobo for about 9 years. I have never gotten email from some other company because I created a Kobo account. You should ask about registering before going on a tirade that's all wrong.

If you look at what Amazon collects from Kindles, you'd never buy one. Kobo is a lot less invasive.

The thing is, if you buy any eBooks, you have to give your data to whatever store you are shopping at be it Kobo, eBooks.com, Google Play Store, Amazon, Smashwords, etc. You cannot buy an eBook and get away without sharing any data. In fact, you give more information buying an eBook then you do registering a Kobo Reader.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Idleaid

Thanks Rashkae, great info!

It's 100% rubbish. Kobo has made chances in the firmware 3 or 4 times that has caused these registration hacks to fail. When the firmware got installed, the database was reset and you lost everything on your Kobo that the database gets track of. That meant you basically has to start over and had to register.

There's no reason not to do a proper registration. Kobo does not do anything with your data that would cause any sort of privacy concerns. Besides, you give more information to have a bank card or credit card and there is a lot more chance of your bank or credit card company being hacked and your data stolen.

[gbm]

Stop


Its MY device and MY data I will do what I want with them.

The reason I have bypassed reg is I do not want or need the reader to do synchronization.

About that database it does not bother me if I have to reset and have to start over.

bernie

Originally Posted by JSWolf

It's 100% rubbish. Kobo has made chances in the firmware 3 or 4 times that has caused these registration hacks to fail. When the firmware got installed, the database was reset and you lost everything on your Kobo that the database gets track of. That meant you basically has to start over and had to register.

There's no reason not to do a proper registration. Kobo does not do anything with your data that would cause any sort of privacy concerns. Besides, you give more information to have a bank card or credit card and there is a lot more chance of your bank or credit card company being hacked and your data stolen.

[Quoth]

sideloadedmode=true after registration with a fake email address and there is no full sync. It will still download updates on Sage & Elipsa to Nebo handwriting subsystem, but only if you tap sync in the Notebooks section.

Indeed you do what you like with it, but if the average person wants it to actually work reliably they need to register at least once, which can be a fake non-functional email address. The Sage and Elipsa notebooks don't work without one initial registration.

I agree you shouldn't need to, but advising people to fiddle with the database instead is bizarre.

The Libra 2 might get notebooks eventually, because the Sketchpad app behaviour shows it has a digitizer and uses it with the Kobo/MS compatible Pen. One button erases and the other gives fat. Also higher resolution than finger drawing.

There is no downland and USB transfer for the Handwriting-Nebo-Notebook software. The SW is only OTA updates. Copying the files from one Sage to another is fraught, though just about possible.

[RobertJSawyer]

Remember, Kobo is based here in Toronto and is subject to Canadian privacy regulations, which are much stricter than American ones. They aren't doing anything nefarious with your registration info, and they can't — and don't — share that info with anyone.

[rashkae]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

It's 100% rubbish. Kobo has made chances in the firmware 3 or 4 times that has caused these registration hacks to fail.

No, your statement is rubbish and we've had this this dicussion.

The techniques I've shared have never failed on any firmware update. period. If you think you can find a case that disproves this, put up or stop harassing my posts with repeated misinformation.

And even in the *worst* case where the firmware suddenly.... demands registration and you're exactly right back where you started. Sign Outs / Database resets are *extremely* common events on Kobo devices, often the 2nd troubleshooting step for *any* issue (after power off restart.).

Your welcome to a different opinion, (as the saying goes, similar to other anatomical features, everyone has one.),, but your haranguing is over the top and frankly I think worthy of moderation.

[rashkae]

Originally Posted by Quoth

I agree you shouldn't need to, but advising people to fiddle with the database instead is bizarre.

To be clear, I do *not* advise people should fiddle with their database... There are times I think I should, but am not sure, so refrain. If people ask how it's done, however, I am happy to share and preserve this knowledge.

[Quoth]

Originally Posted by rashkae

To be clear, I do *not* advise people should fiddle with their database... There are times I think I should, but am not sure, so refrain. If people ask how it's done, however, I am happy to share and preserve this knowledge.

That's fine.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by RobertJSawyer

Remember, Kobo is based here in Toronto and is subject to Canadian privacy regulations, which are much stricter than American ones. They aren't doing anything nefarious with your registration info, and they can't — and don't — share that info with anyone.

Thank you for that. Very well said!

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by rashkae

No, your statement is rubbish and we've had this this dicussion.

The techniques I've shared have never failed on any firmware update. period. If you think you can find a case that disproves this, put up or stop harassing my posts with repeated misinformation.

And even in the *worst* case where the firmware suddenly.... demands registration and you're exactly right back where you started. Sign Outs / Database resets are *extremely* common events on Kobo devices, often the 2nd troubleshooting step for *any* issue (after power off restart.).

Your welcome to a different opinion, (as the saying goes, similar to other anatomical features, everyone has one.),, but your haranguing is over the top and frankly I think worthy of moderation.

Fake registering has failed. You may not believe it but it's true.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by rashkae

No, your statement is rubbish and we've had this this dicussion.

The techniques I've shared have never failed on any firmware update. period. If you think you can find a case that disproves this, put up or stop harassing my posts with repeated misinformation.

And even in the *worst* case where the firmware suddenly.... demands registration and you're exactly right back where you started. Sign Outs / Database resets are *extremely* common events on Kobo devices, often the 2nd troubleshooting step for *any* issue (after power off restart.).

Your welcome to a different opinion, (as the saying goes, similar to other anatomical features, everyone has one.),, but your haranguing is over the top and frankly I think worthy of moderation.

My opinion is that several years back, there were complaints that people who had faked their registrations has their Kobo—unexpectedly—factory reset after a firmware update. At that time, I tested and could duplicate this on a Kobo Glo.

It did not damage the Glo and I simply replaced the contents of the exposed storage from my backup. Some people who did not have those backups were very upset over losing their reading stats and awards.

As for sign outs and various levels of factory resets being "*extremely*" common events on Kobo devices? Since I first owned my Kobo N416 (D-pad, Bluetooth to a Blackberry) up to my Sage, factory resets have not been all that commonly required. At times, I am rather surprised that given the number of firmware updates I've installed, that I haven't needed to do so more often. Never mind playing with alternate renderers and launchers.

[MGlitch]

Let people do what they will with their devices. The level of urgency Jon always attacks threads or posts dealing with bypassing registration far exceeds the level of risk. As has been noted we’ve not seen this happen in years and Kobo have certainly not been stingy with firmware updates over those years, nor have those updates all been minor 0.00x ones.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by MGlitch

Let people do what they will with their devices. The level of urgency Jon always attacks threads or posts dealing with bypassing registration far exceeds the level of risk. As has been noted we’ve not seen this happen in years and Kobo have certainly not been stingy with firmware updates over those years, nor have those updates all been minor 0.00x ones.

But giving people bad information that can cause problems is not a good thing to do. So the solution is to never give information on how to hack the database to register because when that fails, that buggers the works.

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

But giving people bad information that can cause problems is not a good thing to do. So the solution is to never give information on how to hack the database to register because when that fails, that buggers the works.

Yes giving people bad information is a bad thing. Please stop doing it.