All Your Content Now Belong To Us (Says Amazon)
July 20th, 2009 by spk
If anyone was ever tempted to buy the ugly Amazon Kindle, then they might like to think again. Among other sources, The Guardian Reports that in a move laced with unintended irony, Amazon deleted copies of George Orwell’s 1984 from customer’s devices! Clearly the books had become doubleplusungood.
So how was it that Amazon broke into people’s private property and censored a book that is itself about the evils of such things?
It seems that Amazon had distributed books for which the producer of the book did not have appropriate permission in the United States of America, where (like Europe) copyright law is several degrees beyond sensible. Whereas many people in many countries have freedom to read 1984 for free, as it has entered the public domain, in the USA many more years will pass before the book will be deemed to be in the public domain.
The upshot of this is that even though you can download a copy of 1984 from sites in such enlightened countries as Australia, you may not make that work available in the USA. Or rather, you may not *sell* that work in the USA. As Amazon only sells their ugly e-reader in the USA to date (leaving the rest of the world with the much better offerings from Bookeen, Irex and others), all books downloaded to the Kindle were deemed to be sold into the USA and thus the work was not in the public domain.
Thus there was a clear legal issue. Amazon were liable for selling works to customers over which they had not secured the rights. This book and others were produced by third parties who merely used Amazon as a distributor.
Amazon on discovering they had sold these books in contravention of the law then went into people’s private property and deleted the items – sometimes when customers were in the middle of reading them. They provided a refund, but that is really not the point!
Suppose someone did this with a paper book. I can upload a copy of 1984 and self publish through a service such as lulu.com, who will distribute to Amazon and thus I can sell the book through Amazon. Suppose I do this, and people buy the book, and then the evil deed is discovered. What should Amazon do? Do they send in thugs to break into your home and destroy every last copy of the book?
Of course not! Copyright theft is only theft inasmuch as it deprives someone of legitimate income from their work. The estate of George Orwell, assuming we accept their continued income is completely legitimate, is deprived of money if I do this, because buyers of my book would presumably have paid for the legitimate work instead.
Thus I would clearly be liable to the estate for damages. I can be prosecuted for my criminal actions and sued for damages. I should, of course, pay reparations for the loss by the legitimate rights holder. Amazon likewise have some liability here, and should make reparation. But the books that were sold were sold. No one will attempt to recover them – after all, what is the point? Once reparation is made, there is now no loss and thus the theft is rectified.
So why would Amazon think they can break into someone’s private property and delete their digital books? Oh – because they are digital! And that means people have signed their rights away when they clicked “I agree” on their setup screens. They gave Amazon the right to invade their property at any time and to remove anything that is doubleplusungood.
So if you are tempted to buy an Amazon kindle, think in this carefully. Do you want to buy a device that is not really your own, and that is forever at the mercy of a company who could delete all your books without even asking you? Amazon are late into this game anyway. There are plenty of book readers that have no such restrictions. Or you can use dead trees. But I for one don’t now want anything to do with the Kindle. And not *just* because it is so terribly ugly.
