Wired Epicenter on Amazon Kindle vs. open standards
TeleRead, MobileRead, and other e-book advocacy sites and blogs have complained about Kindle’s format lock-in for a long time. Sometimes it seems as if no one has been listening, as other complaints such as the brouhaha over text-to-speech take center field. However, Chris Snyder at Wired’s “Epicenter” blog has taken notice with an excellent article examining the issue from all sides.
The issue isn’t about DRM protections on the books themselves, but on Amazon’s decision to create — and now perpetuate — a non-portable format that a) denies readers the ability to read e-books they buy from the company on another device and b) books they might buy from an e-books competitor on the Kindle.
It’s a high-stakes strategy that has the potential of creating a standard by the scale of adoption — or join the lengthy list failed attempts to impose a format on market willing to put up with it only until a better alternative comes along. And, it almost always does.
Although TeleRead is not itself mentioned, one of the interviewees uses the term “E-Babel”—which was, as far as I know, coined by our very own David Rothman. (I do not remember ever seeing it in use anywhere before he started using it.)
The article also quotes an Amazon spokesman that Amazon is “agnostic” about e-book DRM, but notes that most publishers still want DRM because of what happened to the music industry.
The push to have Amazon adopt ePub compatibility is also mentioned, as is Tim O’Reilly’s belief that if Amazon does not open up, “the Kindle will be gone within two or three years.” And, for the first time as far as I know, an Amazon representative has responded:
“We are open to making that happen if we can make it a truly seamless and easy experience for customers,” Amazon spokesperson Portugal told Wired.com. “But today that format doesn’t allow us to offer a seamless customer experience on all our titles for Kindle.”
Finally, it mentions Amazon’s plan to make Kindle books available for mobile phones, though Amazon is still not saying what phones or when.
Kindle vs. Mobipocket: Broken Compatibility
One thing missing from the article is any questioning of Amazon about its policy of breaking compatibility between the Kindle’s format and encrypted Mobipocket from other stores. This is a big issue for consumers who already have Mobipocket book libraries bought for other devices that they would like to be able to read on their new Kindles.
It is technically possible to lock a Fictionwise or other store’s Mobipocket titles to a Kindle, using the Kindle’s serial number as the device ID. (Or at least it used to be. Some Mobipocket DRM servers have reportedly locked out this ability.)
But these files also need to be run through a converter to set a software flag that Amazon uses but nobody else does. It would actually be simpler to remove the DRM altogether than to go through the rigamarole of re-locking an existing book to the Kindle’s serial number and then converting it to be readable while keeping the DRM.
Thus, not only did Amazon buy a proprietary e-book format in the form of Mobi, but it made it even more proprietary by creating its own incompatible version for the Kindle.
And this is just speculation on my part, but it is even possible that this might be the reason Amazon allegedly prevented Mobipocket from releasing its iPhone reader application—that Amazon knew it was going to be releasing a Kindle reader for iPhone later and did not want confusion (or competition for iPhone space from other Mobi-selling stores).
It is good to see these “E-Babel” issues with the Kindle getting attention—but they will need not just attention but action if consumers are to have the kind of device-agnostic e-book access they need.
Leave a Reply