Getting ready to settle down with my #Kindle paperwhite and read when I noticed something weird. The book I downloaded at work was missing. So I went to my library and it showed about 45 books. Then 32. Then 14. What the fuck—my books were vanishing from my kindle while I watched. I checked that all the books are still in my account so I’m currently doing a factory reset. But 🤬?! Anyone ever experience anything like this?
@redenigma @MotherDucker Yup.
Much of the digital media people "buy" (it's not really a purchase if they can take it back whenever they want) these days comes with EULAs that give the company the right to unilaterally take people's "purchases" away at any point for any reason (or even no reason at all) with no compensation and no recourse.
If you want to ensure that can't happen to you, don't "buy" DRM-enabled products & avoid always-online/"cloud" services that rely on streaming.
@redenigma @MotherDucker Why do companies do such horrid things?
There are three main reasons: Money, power/control, and "fuck the poors".
Money: So they can make you buy it again - or save money on licensing agreements, sell you an inferior (disappearing) product for full price, and pocket the difference.
Power/control: They want to be able to use the power to take away the things you paid for as leverage to force you to do or not do things - eg: not publicly say negative things about them.
@redenigma @MotherDucker And, of course, the third one... because a lot of the execs (read: soulless crooks, slick con men, and assorted sociopaths) who make those kinds of decisions genuinely seem to hate the "unwashed masses" - ie anyone who's not uber-rich.
Presumably for a variety of reasons, likely including the fact that the rest of us didn't (metaphorically speaking) sell our souls for wealth that - as it turns out - cannot truly buy happiness.
@MotherDucker you do not "own" kindle books, & they can just disappear at any time