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theweaselkingPiracy is, once again, the only way to be sure you can actually get the product you want and that you'll get to keep it.
I have to say, if you're going to get into the business of unpublishing books and making them into non-books, 1984 *and* Animal Farm, both at once, as your first foray? AWESOME.
I have to say, if you're going to get into the business of unpublishing books and making them into non-books, 1984 *and* Animal Farm, both at once, as your first foray? AWESOME.
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Date: 2009-07-18 02:40 am (UTC)(no subject)
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Date: 2009-07-18 02:23 pm (UTC)Just like everything else.
Industry gets away with this shit because the public has acquired the memory of a goldfish.
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Date: 2009-07-19 10:59 pm (UTC)#2: Yes, in fact, their making changes to your device without telling you what is being done, or why, is bad. Same as if the cops picked your lock and carried off your TV.
#3: Amazon's claim that their actions were legitimate, apart from being transparently not the case (see #2), do no change that their *capability* to do this is an *objectively bad thing*.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-07-19 11:43 pm (UTC)And, in this case, I disagree with you about whether the actions are good or bad.
If Best Buy had unknowingly received a bunch of receivers labeled Sanyo, that they believed to be and sold as Sanyo, then as soon as they found out that they were unwittingly selling either third party knockoffs or outright stolen material, they'd pull the rest from their shelves.
And had they kept a list of the unwitting recipients of these illicit goods, it is completely plausible that either they or Sanyo would send the police with instructions to retrieve both the receivers and whatever monies had been paid out to the suppliers of the illegitimate receivers. That's effectively what happened.
If the cops had a warrant to enter my house and carry off my stolen TV, I wouldn't call that either good or bad either. It's not the best state of affairs, but I don't know that anyone has yet come up with a better way to deal with the fact that some people routinely sell things that aren't theirs to sell in the first place.
If I knew of a good way to handle the situation, I'd be promoting it. But I don't.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-07-20 08:50 am (UTC)Try returning home to find your new stereo, bought in good faith, gone, and only when you try to file a B&E report the police say "Oh, sorry, we believed it to be stolen so we went and got it back."
You have heard of the term 'warrant', right?
(no subject)
Date: 2009-07-20 08:54 am (UTC)And no, neither Best Buy nor Sanyo would send the police with instructions to retrieve the accidentally sold receivers. NOT. Not only is it not cost-effective & incredibly bad PR, they're not even allowed to do it. Certainly not without a warrant, and I do mean an *individual* warrant.
What they can do is contact the copnsumer and say "sorry, you were accidentally sold fake goods. Please let us refund you your money."
Which is VERY DIFFERENT.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-07-20 09:20 am (UTC)Hell, if it were an operation like the one we'd described, it would be the FBI, not the local police, in the US.
I'm not saying it's a good or bad thing. I'm saying it's how things are. The Best Buy example I mentioned is a poor one, but *only* because they don't keep a list of customers. If they did, legally, it would be precisely the same situation.
It's different because every Kindle buyer "signed" an agreement that allows "the Man" (Amazon, in this case) to do that.
It is a PR nightmare. That's why Amazon has agreed to not do it again the future. It's a PR nightmare even though they gave the money back.
If someone published a paper book that they didn't have the rights to, and the rights holder found out, all unsold copies would be destroyed and sold copies would be bought back from where they were purchased. The only thing out of the ordinary is that this was done automatically, which is slightly disturbing, but not as crazy as people are making it out to be...And as I said earlier, the only thing that differentiates these scenarios is that Amazon keeps a list of its customers and Barnes and Noble doesn't.
The book is available on Amazon, legitimately, *for less money* than the third party publisher had it listed for. So who exactly is losing out here except the people who sold it without having the rights to it in the first place?
And I think you have an inflated idea of the rights of the consumer when they're suspected or implicated in receiving of stolen property. For reasons that I'm not willing to branch into, receiving of stolen property is a crime even when it can't be proven that the recipient was aware of the status of the property.There's a major philosophical problem for you, and it's one that is far more important and far more difficult to fix than Amazon's recent kerfuffle.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-07-20 09:52 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-07-20 12:50 pm (UTC)And then they need to *serve the warrant legally*.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-07-20 01:49 pm (UTC)Yes... but on the other hand taping the search warrant to the banister on your stairway if you weren't there when they came knocking counts.
But the LAW ENFORCEMENT PROFESSIONALS *need to get a warrant*. Best Buy does not send the Geek Squad with a crowbar.
Buttttttt.... you don't sign a contract that says Best Buy *can* send the Geek Squad with a crowbar. If you did, they could. This is part of the ridiculousness of EULA and TOS, that noone reads them and that companies routinely bury ridiculous terms in them that most people if they were read to them would *never* agree to.
However, as long as they exist and count as contracts you can definetly gripe about the suckiness of Amazon reclaiming content but you have no point to argue the legality / legitimacy. It was a legitimate invocation of a crappy capability and agreement.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-07-20 04:05 pm (UTC)*I* don't know why people use DRM'd material when there are better options, but they do. Well, actually, I know why I use, for example, Windows instead of Linux, but it's irrelevant to this conversation; however, as long as I continue to use Windows, I'm aware that the OS doesn't belong to me and that MS can take it back at any time.
Generally, MS doesn't, because it would be dumb to. But Kindle users and Windows users agreed up front that they were OK with that situation. Now they're yelling because a provision they agreed to has been enforced.
I just can't bring myself to get up in arms over it.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-07-20 06:07 pm (UTC)"Hello Fish!"