seam_carver 2 minutes ago

Side tangent: I’m the developer of Kindle Comic Converter. Kindle updates 5.19.2+ have completely broken the sideloaded manga reader with bugs like huge margins, pages being on the wrong side in 2 page landscape mode, no panel view, no % read tracker, and laggy page turns. I’ve documented the problems here and the first report was 50 days ago. https://youtu.be/Eo6K7omlE7g

And I haven’t even touched all the problems with normal sideloaded books like broken embedded/publisher fonts.

sigzero a minute ago

The 5th generation kindle came out in ... 2012. That's a pretty good run.

Havoc 22 minutes ago

The old kindles only support the book format with the weak encryption. ;)

They also killed the ability to download books from the website a while back so directly of travel is pretty clear here.

  • rationalist 14 minutes ago

    Yep, I will never buy another Kindle.

    I can't even read the novel I bought from one author who only sells on Amazon because they removed the download option.

    When I sent them a message, I never heard back. If they think I'm too insignificant to respond to, then my pirating of their others works must also be too insignificant for them.

neilv 12 minutes ago

I don't approve of a company shutting off network service for a device it sold, but...

If this is a hint at much more formidable DRM coming out, could a silver lining for authors and publishers be more sales?

Or is mass piracy going to just continue, full steam ahead?

(Authors and publishers need any bit of good news they can get right now.)

  • Beretta_Vexee 2 minutes ago

    DRM has always been a means of protecting a monopoly; copyright protection is merely the excuse given to justify the measure and the monopoly.

  • yjftsjthsd-h 10 minutes ago

    Does stronger DRM lead to more sales? It was my impression that actual studies were at best pretty mixed.

    • sbarre 9 minutes ago

      Anecdotal: DRM actively discourages me from purchasing digital goods.

  • TimorousBestie 6 minutes ago

    > (Authors and publishers need any bit of good news they can get right now.)

    Amazon accumulating even more control over the ebook market is not good news for authors and publishers.

AdmiralAsshat 8 minutes ago

Man, Amazon is really going above-and-beyond to cripple the last bastion of Kindle devices that carry a DRM scheme we can crack.

Nicholas_C 15 minutes ago

This kind of stuff is why I no longer use a kindle. I use a kobo which IMHO is not as good of a product but it's worth not supporting this behavior.

  • kolinko 6 minutes ago

    Because Amazon stops supporting devices after 14 years? (while they can still be used to read books already downloaded)

    Really?