A Game of Thrones discussion

I recently moved from Pittsburgh PA to Hartsville SC, so I now live ten hours away from all my friends. Reading is my favorite thing to do and I love to share books with my favorite people. So I thought the logical thing to do would be to have a Kindle and encourage friends to get Kindles so we could all lend books to each other even though I'm ten hours away. I thought 'oh how great! We can be like a big book club across the country!' I havent been more disappointed since I found out Santa wasn't real as a kid.

Out of seven pages of Kindle Books that I have purchased with money from Amazon (even though they are incredibly easy to pirate) seven pages of books I OWN, I can only lend seven titles. One book per page. That's disgusting.

I can lend any book I physically own any time I want without the publisher's consent, so why are the rules different for digital content?

I think there needs to be some kind of internet outcry over this. Why do publishers get to decide what we can and can't do with the content we legally (again in spite of how easy it would be to get them for free illegally) own?

So I have personally decided, I will not purchase a single ebook I don't get the option to loan. I'll get books I fully intended to purchase from Amazon from the library rather than give money to publishers that don't support loaning. Not only that but I'm gonna whine about it on the interent A LOT.

Is anybody with me on this? Can we get together some kind of boycott of ebooks without the loaning option? If enough people participated and made a stink about it on social networking sites, maybe Amazon could do something about it?

I have had a similar experience. A friend and I got Kindles at the same time and were hoping to loan each other books purchased on Amazon. Turns out we are not allowed because he's in the USA and I'm in Canada. They do not allow international loaning.
There are also some titles that are not available for Canadians.
And when we got the Kindles at the end of last year, I couldn't buy mine through Amazon because they wouldn't deliver it to Canada. My friend had to buy mine with his and then ship it over to me.
Isn't that ridiculous???
Digital racism??? LOL
In any case, I feel your pain....

I agree although it does seem to change when books around for a while. A book I wasn't able to lend last year I can lend this year. The two-week window is also a joke. Not every one can finish a large book in that time frame.

The ability to lend on Kindle is progress. They didn't allow that until they realized people could do it with Nook, so perhaps a public outcry would push them in the right direction.

Check out http://ebookfling.com/ I don't think you can lend to specific people, but it's a step in the right direction.

The problem here is Amazon owning the lion's share of bookselling, not publishers. Publishers have been forced into a corner by Amazon as an industry - publishing is almost always on the verge of failing due to low sales and high returns from bookstores. Amazon is underselling everyone so that they can take the business from other booksellers, and therefore they dictate the terms. Publishers are doing what they can to survive because so many people buy from Amazon where discounts are extremely deep, not because they don't want you lending books to your friends.

In any case, most of the lending has to do with the device, and since Kindle is owned by Amazon, I would suggest complaining to them, not the publishers. Publishers are looking into alternative strategies for dealing with DRM (digital rights management), but what is permitted on a device will ultimately be decided by the makers of that device. This will also vary depending on what country you are in.

I've spoken to Amazon and a few publishers on this subject since I posted this. According to them the option of whether to make a book available for loaning is entirely up to the publisher, just as the option to make a book available on Kindles in the first place is entirely up to the publisher (though the author may insist on some clause one way or the other, like Bradbury saying none of his novels except Ferenheit 451 are allowed to be sold in book format)

So I think the problem is that the publishers have a choice at all. It should go without saying, it should be mandatory that books be allowed to be shared.

At first, Amazon made it an option instead of mandatory because a lot of publishers didn't want their books available digitally at all for financial reasons. But with the ebook success of franchises like 50 Shades, I think it's clear how valuable the ebook market is, and I doubt publishers would withhold their content even if loaning is made mandatory.

I think this is a very, very important issue. With the growing popularity of ereaders, the way we treat rules about digital content now could drastically affect the future of literature as a form of media.

Bradbury's novels aren't allowed to be sold in ebook** format. Stupid autocorrect!

Jess wrote: "Bradbury's novels aren't allowed to be sold in ebook** format. Stupid autocorrect!"

???? In that case he is only encouraging piracy. I have 20 Ray Bradbury titles as ebooks. I don't have a problem lending people ebooks because all of mine are stored on my computer, so I simply copy the file for friends. I have been disappointed many times with ebooks I have bought from Amazon, many are so garbled they are unreadable, and I think it is shameful that they SELL books that are freely available at Project Gutenberg.

this is the one thing that really pisses me off with Kindles - i was reading the excellent Ready Player One and was telling me co workers how good it was. they wanted to read it too and in an old school way i'd have just leant to to them. now they had to buy their own copies and i found myself really talking the book up to convince them to buy it so we could then have the geek chat about it.

it's very frustrating.


***
spruiking myself - read The Meaning of Life at http://atheistdad74.blogspot.com.au/

I don't have an e-reader, but that is pretty messed up...

Danielle wrote: "Jess wrote: "Bradbury's novels aren't allowed to be sold in ebook** format. Stupid autocorrect!"

???? In that case he is only encouraging piracy. I have 20 Ray Bradbury titles as ebooks. I don't h..."

see thats how mine are and several ppl in my online book club we have them saved on the computer which makes them easier for sharing. and u dont have the bogas 2 wk limit period which yea its piracy but hell who hasnt done that with either books or movies or music in todays times lets face it things are expensive and we like cheap things lol

what's this 2-week limit thing y'all are talking about?

well i dont know about the kindle i have a nook but u can by ebooks on barnes and noble and some are "lend me" books and u can lend them to your friends but they will only have it on their ereader for 2 wks then it disappears

Jenna wrote: "well i dont know about the kindle i have a nook but u can by ebooks on barnes and noble and some are "lend me" books and u can lend them to your friends but they will only have it on their ereader ..."

oh, I see- thank you! that kinda sucks too...

The other issue that is really ticking me off with my Nook is the Nook prices are getting really out of hand. I can't speak for Kindle owners, but I'm getting sick of seeing $12.99, $13.99, $14.99 for Nook titles (J.K Rowling's book coming out in Sept - $19.99 for the Nook). What's even more irksome is the $9.99 Nook price for a title that has a paperback price of $10.98! You can't tell me it only cost $0.98 to print, bind, and ship to stores! I picked up a hardcover Lisa Scottoline in the bargain bin for $6.98. I got home and checked the Nook price - $9.99. I've really limited my purchasing from Barnes and Noble because of this. If I want to read something, I check if my library has it in eBook format first. If not, I'll check out the printed version before spending the money on the eBook. When I looked into getting a Nook, the prices were mostly in the $7-10 range. Now, they are ridiculous. I think if I am going to invest greater than $12-13 on a book, I'll pick up the printed version and have a physical book I can actually lend to people.

that is a downside the ebooks are becoming more expensive which is why i dont feel bad when friends give me ebooks or give me good sites to get free ebooks which doesnt mean i get all my books for free i still buy plenty like everyone else i like gettin the ebooks to test them out then if i like them i buy the physical copies I love books and i love having them on shelves

www.epubbud.com
www.4shared.com

This one isn't free but for the small monthly charge (about $9.00)it's absolutely worth it, but if you pay via Paypal they set up a perpetual monthly payment so make sure you cancel it on your Paypal page after the first payment goes through.
http://www.pdfbook.co.ke/top100.php

When the book isn't in the format I want I convert it using Calibre which you can get here
http://calibre-ebook.com/download

Thanks for the sources Jenna and Danielle! I will definitely check them out. I hate not using my Nook, but I am trying to boycott BandN prices. Not that my lonely self will have an impact :)

Shélah wrote: "The problem here is Amazon owning the lion's share of bookselling, not publishers. Publishers have been forced into a corner by Amazon as an industry - publishing is almost always on the verge of f..."

I'm not sure if this is accurate. Publishers have the control. Not Amazon. Not B&N.

Amy wrote: "The other issue that is really ticking me off with my Nook is the Nook prices are getting really out of hand. I can't speak for Kindle owners, but I'm getting sick of seeing $12.99, $13.99, $14.99 ..."

Publishers set the rates!

The publishers are really digging their own graves here; they only encourage piracy by setting such high prices. It's a shame, really. They need to get with the times and evolve to fit today's market (see: Louis CK's new distribution models)

Just to add to the whole kettle of fish...libraries are having trouble with publishers for both e-books and audio books. Here's a link from my local library that expalins the problem. They are also asking patrons to join a letter writing campaign.

http://more.ppld.org:8080/eNOUGH.html

Benjamin wrote: "Just to add to the whole kettle of fish...libraries are having trouble with publishers for both e-books and audio books. Here's a link from my local library that expalins the problem. They are al..."

How horribly greedy of the publishers! No wonder I couldn't find most of the books I wanted to read in eBook format at my library in SD. I was wanting to blame the library, but I see the issue is with the publisher. Thanks for sharing that Benjamin!

Leon wrote: "Amy wrote: "The other issue that is really ticking me off with my Nook is the Nook prices are getting really out of hand. I can't speak for Kindle owners, but I'm getting sick of seeing $12.99, $13..."

Thanks for clarifying. I have a related question maybe you or someone can answer. Why are there price differences with the same titles between Amazon and Barnes and Noble then if publishers set the price? For instance, a friend of mine recommended Those Who Save Us. She paid about $4 less on her Kindle than I did on my Nook.

Apparently publishers set the prices, but the stores are allowed to put them on sale and take whatever loss they're willing to. Amazon has tons of books on special every day, they're constantly changing, so a book that was 9.99 yesterday may be 3.99 today. (I think they have some kind of refund for the difference if it changes within 24 hours of purchase, but that might not be the case anymore)
The price difference in a lot of cases is just Amazon willing to take a larger loss per book, probably because they're anticipating selling a lot more copies on sale than they would have at full price.

Anyways, I understand ebooks not being super cheap even though you don't get a physical copy. It's the same as things in a gas station being more expensive than at a grocery store, you're really just paying for the convenience. And I honestly wouldn't mind the prices at all, I'd gladly pay for he convenience of getting a book delivered right to me on my couch... (not to mention all the cool features like popular highlights, I live that) *IF* the same ownership rules applied to my digital copy as to a physical copy and I had the option to lend it out.

Jess wrote: "Apparently publishers set the prices, but the stores are allowed to put them on sale and take whatever loss they're willing to. Amazon has tons of books on special every day, they're constantly cha..."

Thanks, that makes sense. I sort of wondered if it had to do with the profit margin of the store. I do agree with the fact that the prices for everything are going up, and like you, if my eBooks were available for me to lend to anyone (including Kindle users when I have a Nook), I'd be more inclined to purchase. But, at this point, if there is only a dollar or two difference between the price of the printed version over the eBook version, I'll buy the printed version so I can share it.

Under most TOS & EULA, you don't own the book you've purchased. What you've purchased is a license to access that content in specific ways that the publisher has defined.

Unlike a "real" book, where many rights that you as a consumer have are established by laws and legal precedents concerning them.

I think this is beyond even a big player like Amazon to influence. Even if they had a reason to, which they really don't.

The grassroots push needs to come in the political (I know, >groan<) arena. People need to pressure their lawmakers to extend their rights over digital content to the type of ownership rights we are used to with physical analogs to that content (books, CDs, DVDs, etc.). But Big Business has been steering the course of IP law for some time now, with extension of copyright terms, DMCA, etc.

You want to "own" your e-books? Have the right to lend or re-sell them? Contact your representatives. Let them know how you feel and that you vote.

You could not be more right. It is completely unfair of Amazon to have this policy. Publishers are terrified to go up against Amazon because they have a near-monopoly on the market. You can't pull this crap, not with books. We've had libraries since we began writing and trying to control information is the biggest afront to our right to free speech. Call the ACLU, they'd be all over this.

@Sue- I don't see this as an Amazon policy or publisher fear of the big bad causing it. This is publisher-driven. They want to make as much as they can while giving consumers as little as possible. In this Amazon and the publishers are together.

Where Amazon & publishers tend to disagree is over pricing. Amazon wants to set its own, the Big 6 like the Agency model just fine. Hence the current DOJ case against Apple & the publishers.

Amazon doesn't really care about your rights, just what you buy. And they think you'll buy more if the prices are $9.99. If they ever do the math and see that enough extra people would buy for other reasons (no DRM, more liberal lending, etc.) then maybe they'd pressure the publishers.

Till they can figure out how to make more $$ off it, Amazon really won't care.

Its sad to say, but in the Past year where I live, we have all the major chain bookstores closed down except for one. So now one bookstore has the entire book market, except for the teeny independent stores, which usually cost a little more because of not having the advantage of being corperation. Its not like I live in a tiny town either *6 million* but because of the cheapnesss, and convienece of ebooks, they have been forced to close down. which sucks!

Unfortunately this is a sign of the times. We the consumer will no longer own what we purchase. This will go for books, music, movies...all the toys we once took for granted. Cloud technology is most definately a monster in disguise. The idea of not owning anything of physical substance irks me. I am admittedly a sucker for leafing through the covers and packing inserts in my recent purchase or past purchases. I have a media room in my house that I have gotten lost in at times when I find a cd I havent seen in years and decided to reading through the inserts thus resulting in exploring more of my collection. Unfortunately we as consumers took for granted the ability we had to essentially own data and share it freely with others at will. This has always infuriated the corporations because sharing with someone doesnt always mean that a purchase of that item from a store would follow thanks to blank audio cassettes, burnable dvds, or instant dl's to a pc. Understand that in many cases the items you have purchased and think you in the cloud including documents and identity data can all be quickly lost due to the owner not having a physical ownership of that item anymore. Everything is digital, virtual, and paperless anymore and the thrill of a saturday trip to the mall, bookstore, videogame store, electronics store, clothing store are quickly coming to an end. People are becoming more and more comfortable buying items without seeing them first hand or at all anymore and with widgets such as Amazon now testing SAME DAY delivery, the folks blasting the harmful operations of Wal Marts will be in shock at what Amazon is becoming. My advice to everyone...including myself is to really consider your options when you have the option to purchase an item digitally or physically. Change is a coming.

I own 2 kindles. My first one was a xmas present from my son and daughter and it came to me with 980 books already preloaded. I've bought some books also. I think you should be able to trade or send a book to your friends or receive without any reprecussions.