Ranting about the news
I've got a couple of news-ish tidbits for you today. First of all, Barnes & Noble is excitedly announcing to anyone who'll listen that they've opened their e-book store. They've even got downloadable e-readers on their site, stuff to work with your PC, Mac, Blackberry, or iPhone, with promises to add applications for more types of phones soon. The site says US downloads only, so I can't confirm, but it looks to me like they don't have much variety in format. Can anyone confirm/deny?
On the subject of e-books, Amazon deleted copies of George Orwell's 1984 from their customer's kindles last week. My initial reaction upon hearing the news was something like this: "Wait, really? Are they serious? It was 1984 they deleted? AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, of all the books to delete..." Once the laughter had died down, I was left shaking my head. That is not a classy act, Amazon. People paid for that, and with no warning or even any implication in the kindle "contract" that you had the right to do any such thing, you forced back their merchandise. Yes, piracy is bad. Very, very bad, and steps should be taken to remove all piracy from your system. But you ate some poor kid's homework! Was that necessary? You know what would have been a better solution, Amazon? It's this thing called customer relations, where you talk to the people who buy stuff from you and let them know what's going on. Tell them the copy they've purchased is pirated, and offer them the choice of a rebate or a legitimate copy of the book. These aren't people who have gone and looked up a pirate site to download illegal books; these are people who have come to your site, to buy things from what they believed to be a legitimate seller. The least you could do is treat them with the respect every customer deserves. You give e-books a bad name.
And now I'm going to have Bon Jovi in my head all evening. Thanks for that.
On the subject of e-books, Amazon deleted copies of George Orwell's 1984 from their customer's kindles last week. My initial reaction upon hearing the news was something like this: "Wait, really? Are they serious? It was 1984 they deleted? AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, of all the books to delete..." Once the laughter had died down, I was left shaking my head. That is not a classy act, Amazon. People paid for that, and with no warning or even any implication in the kindle "contract" that you had the right to do any such thing, you forced back their merchandise. Yes, piracy is bad. Very, very bad, and steps should be taken to remove all piracy from your system. But you ate some poor kid's homework! Was that necessary? You know what would have been a better solution, Amazon? It's this thing called customer relations, where you talk to the people who buy stuff from you and let them know what's going on. Tell them the copy they've purchased is pirated, and offer them the choice of a rebate or a legitimate copy of the book. These aren't people who have gone and looked up a pirate site to download illegal books; these are people who have come to your site, to buy things from what they believed to be a legitimate seller. The least you could do is treat them with the respect every customer deserves. You give e-books a bad name.
And now I'm going to have Bon Jovi in my head all evening. Thanks for that.