undefined | Better HN

0 pointshobbes13y ago0 comments

You did read the Terms and Conditions before you "bought" the books, didn't you?

If you bought the books, you agreed [in the eyes of the law] to this kind of eventuality..

I'm as guilty of this kind of thing as well. We tend to assume an imaginary T&C that conforms to we think is fair when we buy things online - and we have to learn the hard way that the real T&C's are very much more dubious.

Here's the relevant bit in the T&C's:

"Upon your download of Digital Content and payment of any applicable fees (including applicable taxes), the Content Provider grants you a non-exclusive right to view, use, and display such Digital Content an unlimited number of times"

"Your rights under this Agreement will automatically terminate if you fail to comply with any term of this Agreement."

The key points is that this is a "license agreement" that grants you rights on the payment of applicable fees.

TL;DR: You don't own any content you licensed to read on your kindle.

0 comments

josephlord13y ago

If you read and actually considered the worst case in every contract/website terms and conditions/software licence that you come across it would probably take about a day a week and you would never actually agree to anything that wasn't a GPL/BSD/MIT... software licence. For one thing most give the party offering the agreement rights to change it which should be an absolute no-way.

For most things such as online purchases I tend to rely on law and reasonableness of people and take the chance without reading expecting the maximum downside to be tens of pounds related to that purchase. I am a little more careful when locked into eco-systems (Kindle/app-stores) but still go a fair bit on taking the risk with the reputation of the provider and the size of the risk and the cost of getting the content another way.

hobbesOP13y ago

The kindle license agreement is relatively short and perfectly understandable.

The moral of this story is: if you give a website some money, find out what you are getting for your money.

rmc13y ago

Laws trump contracts. You cannot sign away what the law says happened. It's just a matter of convincing a judge that you bought the book. They Amazon's T&Cs are irrelevant.

hobbesOP13y ago

And, how, pray tell, will you convince the judge of that? You didn't purchase a book, as the T&C's make clear - the contents of which you agreed to by entering into the said agreement.

You paid applicable fees to enter into an agreement to view digital content. Nothing more. There was no purchase of a book.

Where's your evidence to the contrary?

losvedir13y ago

> Where's your evidence to the contrary?

Oh, I don't know. Maybe when he visited the website of one of the largest retailers in the world, broke out his saved credit card like usual, and clicked the gigantic "Buy now with 1-Click" button?

I would love for this to get tested in court. Has it? My understanding (I'm not a lawyer, but heard this from a lawyer) is that the purpose of, say, signing a release form before playing paintball is not because it provides any real protection to the paintball company, but because it makes the signer less likely to sue.

I feel like maybe this is a similar situation? It seems very much like Amazon is "tricking" you into signing away the fact that you "bought" something since the whole experience of the site is devoted to making you think you're buying it. Throwing in a hidden paragraph at the end doesn't change everything.

1 more reply

rmc13y ago

You did purchase the book. It says "Buy" on the website.

Amazon: "Would you like to Buy this book for your Kindle?"

Customer: "Yes" click

Looks like a sale to me. They don't use the word "Rent" or "Borrow". You "buy" it.

1 more reply

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

0 pointshobbes13y ago0 comments

You did read the Terms and Conditions before you "bought" the books, didn't you?

If you bought the books, you agreed [in the eyes of the law] to this kind of eventuality..

Here's the relevant bit in the T&C's:

"Your rights under this Agreement will automatically terminate if you fail to comply with any term of this Agreement."

The key points is that this is a "license agreement" that grants you rights on the payment of applicable fees.

TL;DR: You don't own any content you licensed to read on your kindle.

0 comments

josephlord13y ago

hobbesOP13y ago

The kindle license agreement is relatively short and perfectly understandable.

The moral of this story is: if you give a website some money, find out what you are getting for your money.

rmc13y ago

Laws trump contracts. You cannot sign away what the law says happened. It's just a matter of convincing a judge that you bought the book. They Amazon's T&Cs are irrelevant.

hobbesOP13y ago

And, how, pray tell, will you convince the judge of that? You didn't purchase a book, as the T&C's make clear - the contents of which you agreed to by entering into the said agreement.

You paid applicable fees to enter into an agreement to view digital content. Nothing more. There was no purchase of a book.

Where's your evidence to the contrary?

losvedir13y ago

> Where's your evidence to the contrary?

Oh, I don't know. Maybe when he visited the website of one of the largest retailers in the world, broke out his saved credit card like usual, and clicked the gigantic "Buy now with 1-Click" button?

1 more reply

rmc13y ago

You did purchase the book. It says "Buy" on the website.

Amazon: "Would you like to Buy this book for your Kindle?"

Customer: "Yes" click

Looks like a sale to me. They don't use the word "Rent" or "Borrow". You "buy" it.

1 more reply

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse