GBTV #597 | Amazon Takes Back Kindle Books It Sold, HTC Hero, CinemaView TV, Samsung HMX-U10
Posted on: July 17, 2009
Posted in: Video
Posted by: Cali Lewis
Shownotes:
Amazon caused all kinds of controversy today when it took back books Kindle users had bought. The books in question were George Orwell’s Animal Farm and 1984 from publisher MobileReference. Amazon later released a statement saying that the books in question were unauthorized editions and they wouldn’t do the same thing in the future.
Because Amazon didn’t come out right away and explain what was going on, all of tech media, and many of Amazon’s customers were upset, and every story written about the situation got it wrong. Amazon should have released an explanation ahead of time saying that the publisher didn’t have the right to publish those books, and they were going to take those books off people’s Kindles and replace it with an appropriate version.
John Biggs over at CrunchGear has his hands on an HTC Hero and it looks good from the intitial unboxing. He’ll have a full review next week.
In January, Collins America will release a 47″ display and an external dual HDTV tuner. It’ll have both HDMI and Mini DisplayPort out.
Samsung announced a small 1080p camcorder called the HMX-U10. It comes with conversion software that will convert your footage to be YouTube ready.
Save money at Petco.com using our promo codes. BRIEF offers 10% off and free shipping on orders $65 or more. BRIEF10 offers 10% off with no minimum order.
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July 18th, 2009 at 7:48 am
Hi Cali/Neil,
Nice brief as usual. what are the camera you shoot the update? Why you didn’t shoot all Geekbrief with it? The image are much more realistic (cinematic) and vivid than the one you use normally (standard color, no depth of range,etc).
It could add a nice twist to geekbrief, don’t you think?
keep on your good work & have a great day,
David
July 18th, 2009 at 3:26 pm
While Amazon probably had no choice but to pull the Orwell books, it is yet another example of DRM being pure evil. In my opinion, no one should be using or advocating the use of devices whose primary use is to reproduce works which are DRM encumbered. DRM punishes only the legitimate consumer.
Also, nobody should look up to Steve Jobs. His authoritarian management style did save Apple, but is wholly anti-choice and I’ll stop there, before I really get into a rant.
Love the show. Keep it up!
July 18th, 2009 at 7:57 pm
Cali – I’ve got to side with nick on this one. DRM is evil. As long as Amazon has the ability to yank items purchased from their store, then you’re only renting the item. You don’t own a book if it can disappear without your consent. You don’t really own the Kindle if someone else controls what you can and can’t read on it. However, I never would’ve purchase the Kindle in the first place. I just can’t imagine reading a great book – and then being unable to loan the book to a friend.
July 18th, 2009 at 8:35 pm
Cali, I think you were a bit too quick to forgive Amazon’s transgression. Ars Technica has a fantastic write up (as usual) about the incident and the issues it raises. However, check out the comments to the article, which clearly indicate the level of damage Amazon has done to its reputation with this move. I’m a big Amazon fan, too, but there’s no way to sugar coat this one. Given the Brief’s continual recitation of the Geek Manifesto (what we want, where we want, when we want, how we want) I’m disappointed to not see a more thorough chastisement. Amazon’s gaff is phenomenally bad.
http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/07/amazon-sold-pirated-books-raided-some-kindles.ars
July 19th, 2009 at 5:02 pm
Great brief as usual Cali, it is also good to see that I could get to the site. Not sure what was going on, but it did not want to bring me here. Thanks for your help.
July 19th, 2009 at 9:16 pm
Safari can’t open the page “http://m.podshow.com/media/382/episodes/165608/hd-165608-07-17-2009.mp4” because Safari can’t find the server “m.podshow.com”
everytime i try the link
July 20th, 2009 at 6:19 pm
feature request: pull down menu to quickly access recent episodes on an episode page … ‘related posts’ don’t do it for me.
as a matter of fact, it’s be really neat if you’d just use some url magic to point ‘geekbrief.tv/### or gbtv-### or what not to the episode page … its nice to get the title in the url but not very convenient… remember, url’s are part of the web ui too !!
(this is something i wish all podcasts would do actually … it would be so much quicker to access a specific episode that way )
July 21st, 2009 at 10:35 pm
It really shows your naivete when you constantly gush over Steve Jobs, and constantly praise of all things form over function.
If it looks good you love it. It doesn’t matter if it’s actually a good product or not.
Apple make great stuff, but they stumble and make the same amount of mistakes as anyone.
January 29th, 2010 at 4:02 pm
Thank You 4 A Good Post I heard Online Free Credit Report is definitely a great website to check my credit and see my score 4 free. Has Someone else tried them?