Amazon is giving prospects but another excuse to not belief them with e-book purchases. Over the previous couple days, social media and reddit is suffering from stories of individuals getting locked out of their Amazon accounts, and consequently being unable to entry their bought ebooks on Kindles and Kindle apps as a result of they get locked out too.
Lots of people assume the lockouts had been triggered by downloading free ebooks throughout Stuff Your Kindle Day, which Amazon was promoting on their web site so it’s not like they shouldn’t have anticipated individuals to obtain a bunch of freebies.
Some individuals downloaded dozens of free ebooks in order that in all probability set off Amazon’s radar for potential fraudulent purchases, however there are stories of individuals solely downloading a couple of freebies and nonetheless getting locked out so who is aware of what’s actually occurring.
This highlights a significant issue with Amazon’s system and the way in which they insist on locking customers into their proprietary platform. At any time they’ll take aways years or many years of bought ebooks and different digital media on the drop of a hat for any motive they deem obligatory.
You’d assume that in these kinds of circumstances you’d nonetheless be capable of entry your bought and obtain ebooks, but when your Kindle ereader or app is on-line and syncs with a locked out account, it would get locked out too. Maintaining your Kindle offline is the one technique to defend it from this sort of nonsense.
This is the reason individuals ought to all the time make backups of their bought ebooks, particularly in relation to Kindle ebooks. Sadly Amazon is making that harder on a regular basis. For instance, the brand new Kindles for 2024 don’t assist obtain and switch so you’ll be able to’t obtain your ebooks from Amazon’s web site anymore except you’ve gotten an older mannequin.
At the moment there are loads of stories of individuals getting their accounts again. Some needed to contact assist or ship in financial institution statements to confirm their latest purchases, and others have gotten their accounts unlocked by doing nothing. It appears to be a reasonably large subject that Amazon is working by way of, nevertheless it sounds just like the worst of it’s over now. But it surely left lots of people being uncomfortable with Amazon’s management over their e-book purchases, and a few are afraid to obtain free ebooks now for worry of getting locked out.
In some unspecified time in the future individuals are going to must take a stand towards Amazon and e-book publishers about the way in which e-book purchases are dealt with and the way all the pieces is crippled with DRM the place the entire system is designed to screw over paying prospects. DRM isn’t a deterrent to pirates within the slightest. It’s simply circumvented for people who need to get round it. All it does is lock in reputable prospects so these multi-billion greenback firms can management our buying habits and our information, and it wants to finish.
