Flash! A Scattered Life not available for redownload to new Kindles?
This is an interesting thing that I’m seeing reported in the Amazon Kindle forum. One of the reporters is a very active and reliable member of that community…we disagree about some things, but I would be quite surprised if this person isn’t reporting this accurately (and it’s not just one person reporting).
I believe the book (A Scattered Life by Karen McQuestion) was first published independently in the Kindle store, and as I recall, it was even optioned as a movie.
Then, it was republished later under Amazon’s own AmazonEncore program.
A couple of people have said that when they went to put it on their new Kindles or to download it, it was unavailable.
In this
Amazon Kindle community thread
one poster reproduces a claimed Customer Service response. In it, they say that they are unable to make it available “…because we believe the third party who listed this book in the Kindle Store did not have rights to make this book available for sale.”
That would be the right thing for them to do, based on what they’ve said on the Help pages.
They say:
“There are rare circumstances in which content may not remain available for re-download. For instance, if the publisher who originally made the content available to us for sale on the Kindle Store did not have the right to do so or is sued for defamation in connection with the content, we may be obligated to stop making it available for re-downloading from your library. Any copies you already have on your Kindle devices will not be affected.”
Note that they are reported as having removed the book from devices…they said they wouldn’t do that again after the George Orwell flap. If you had the book on your Kindle, you would still have it and your notes. You just couldn’t download it again (to that Kindle or a different device).
This is one of the reasons I recommend you back up your documents folder from your Kindle from time to time. That way, if there is some archives problem you have the file…as long as the device for which it was downloaded survives.
My guess is that Amazon is wrong on this one…not in what they did, but in thinking the first copy was illegitimate. My best guess is that they will restore it after an investigation (although that’s only a guess).
If you bought A Scattered Life (especially a while back), you might want to check your archives…
UPDATE: Amazon has admitted a mistake and fixed the problem with A Scattered Life…now that’s Customer Service! http://bit.ly/91fYBD
This post by Bufo Calvin originally appeared in the I Love My Kindle blog.
August 29, 2010 at 12:27 pm |
I wonder if this will happen with the Andrew Wylie Odyssey editions that Random House has now scoped up. If you purchased them, as Andrys Basten has suggested, back them upon your computer- BUT you will be NOT able to re-download them to another kindle, due to their being tied to the particular device.
August 29, 2010 at 12:44 pm |
Thanks for writing, Richard!
Mechanically, it could happen that way. If Random House is asserting that Wylie didn’t have the right to publish those editions (and they have made similar claims), yes, that wouldn’t surprise me. I hope it doesn’t happen that way. I would think there would be refunds in that case (as there may be in the A Scattered Life case, unless that turns out to just be an error). We are supposed to be able to download to different devices and redownload to the initial device: if we can’t do that, I think some recompense is in order.
August 29, 2010 at 3:31 pm |
I did read A Scattered Life, and as is my habit, deleted it from my Kindle when I had finished it. Right now I have a K3 in addition to my K2. Went to the archives on the K3 and it is listed in the archives as: A Scattered Life (author missing). What does THAT mean? Anyway, I clicked on it to download and got the usual “Now downloading the selected item…” but it just sits there for some time like that and then reverts to the archive where it is still listed. Tried this twice and still couldn’t pull it up. Now it gets curiouser and curiouser. I picked up the K2, went to the archive and it wasn’t listed in the archive AT ALL. Then I went to my Amazon Manage your Kindle account, found the book and sent it to the K3. Voila, there it was (complete with author). Something odd is going on for sure.
As to backing up things you have read, the problem with backup only your computer, as you suggested, is that it would only be good for the original device you downloaded it onto. But maybe we should be doing this anyway. At least it would be available as long as you own that device (or a family member does).
August 30, 2010 at 3:02 am |
Thanks for writing, Mary!
I always love field reports…thanks! A Scattered Life wouldn’t be in the archives on your K2…if it was on your K2 at the time. When you remove it from your Kindle, I think you may have to sync before the archives realizes that the book isn’t on the Kindle any more, although I haven’t tested that.
Regardless of whether or not it is on a specific device, it should always be at that
http://www.amazon.com/manageyourkindle
page, unless you deleted it from there as well.
I usually recommend backing up the entire documents folder, and point out that is particularly important if you personal documents. In terms of what you are backing up, these are my concerns:
1. Your notes (your “associated information” files, .tan or .mbp). It’s really nice to be able to put your notes file on that Kindle or a different one. It can save you if there is a problem with an update. The other piece of that now is that some people turn off annotation back up so as not to participate in the Popular Highlights
2. You personal documents (including books you got from non-Amazon sources
3. Your Kindle store books. This one will be the least likely to come in handy. However, if you bought a book and it was withdrawn due to be illegal, you would only have access to it if you had that file (on your Kindle or backed up). Yes, if that kindle was lost/stolen/died, you wouldn’t have legal access any more, but until then, you would…
August 29, 2010 at 4:22 pm |
I have redownloaded all my books to my new Kindle 3. I thought I might have some problems with those books that are no longer offered for the Kindle: The Cairo Trilogy by Naguib Mafhouz, or Cancer Ward and the Gulag Archipelago by Solzhenitsyn, but they downloaded just fine. A Scattered Life was the only one I couldn’t download. It said that the author was unkown.
BTW, my new Kindle has not frozen up yet.
August 30, 2010 at 3:10 am |
Thanks for writing, Karin!
If a book is normally withdrawn from the Kindle store, you’ll still have access to it in the archives. I have a book where the author withdrew it, but I’ve still had access. The withdrawal from the archives thing is supposed to happen in the case of unauthorized copies.
August 29, 2010 at 5:32 pm |
Bufo, the issue has been resolved. It was an error (whether human, or computer glitch, I don’t know). The fix required both an action from their side and, for some users (myself included) Kindle reboot. But all is well now.
August 30, 2010 at 3:11 am |
Thanks for writing, Dragi!
I’ll send out an update…I’ve been out for the day. Did Kindle Customer Service announce it publicly?
August 30, 2010 at 12:01 am |
Hmmm, I never would have known if you hadn’t written this but I did download this book (can’t remember if it was free or just very cheap) and it is no longer in my archives. Well!!!!!!! I actually found the book depressing as all get-out but it still kinda ticks me off that it’s gone.
August 30, 2010 at 3:12 am |
Thanks for writing, Candace!
One of my other readers, Dragi, tells me it has been resolved. It sounds like you have to contact Amazon Customer Service, and then they do something, and then you restart…I need to research that a bit more.
August 30, 2010 at 12:16 am |
Well, how strange. I went to Manage My Kindle and it was there so I re-downloaded it (on principle) and then removed it to my archives but it never went to my archives. So I went back and downloaded it yet again. For some reason, I can’t put it in my archives without losing it. They are saying on the kindle thread that CS said it was a glitch and made it available again through MYK if you had lost it.
August 30, 2010 at 3:52 am |
This was resolved a couple hours after it occurred. The information I saw both from CS and from Karen McQuestion implied that there was a software bug that caused the problem. It has since been resolved, though.
August 30, 2010 at 3:58 am |
Thanks for writing, tuxgirl!
Yep, I’ve just posted and tweeted that one, and updated the old post.
I appreciate the heads-up!