e-readers

[RayRay]

Bev

Thanks for the explanation.

It makes sense that eBooks, movies and television programs (and maybe music downloads) are treated differently than physical products. There are serious licensing issues. Being a former actor who still receives tiny royalties on some televisions shows and films I appeared in, I rather support getting paid for my work .

Amazon's website says you can't watch the TV or films they offer from other countries. They must have a way to enforce that, likely similar to how Netflix and other sites do it watching one's IP address.

Sounds like we will have to confine our buying of e-items to when we're in the US!

I wish that we could read Kindle books on our iPad. Amazon has a much better selection of books than iTunes .

Ray

[Bevdeforges]

I thought there was a Kindle ap for iPad! I know several people who claim to read Kindle books on their iPad... though I also know plenty of people who hack that sort of stuff, so maybe that's the answer.

But it's not just a matter of rights management. I deliberately bought an e-pub reader because there seemed to be a wider range of stores open to me (at the time I bought it a couple years ago). I used to be able to buy e-books from WH Smith's and Waterstones in the UK. Paid the posted prices, which included VAT and all. But when the publishers' got together with this "Agency Pricing" arrangement, suddenly the UK e-book stores could no longer sell to anyone located outside the UK (Amazon included).

It allegedly has something to do with the fact that the EU has declared e-books to be "computer files" and not books, so you are supposed to pay VAT depending on your country of residence, not the country where you make your purchase. Amazon, however, has no problem charging me French VAT on my purchases from the UK Amazon site - so obviously something is missing in the "official" excuse.

Kobo, which is Canadian based, seems to be able to sell to just about anyone - and while they honor the publishers' geographical restrictions (for example, from Kobo I'll usually get the UK edition of a book rather than the US edition) they seem to have no problem charging the appropriate VAT for the country I'm in.

Oh well - I seem to have little difficulty feeding my reading habit these days, even with a few "workarounds" to get titles that interest me.
Cheers,
Bev

[RayRay]

Originally Posted by Bevdeforges

I thought there was a Kindle ap for iPad! ...
Cheers,
Bev

It took me 30 seconds to look on the Apple App store and find that AMAZON offers a Kindle app for the iPad! Duh .

Thanks for the nudge to check. It didn't occur to me that they'd offer that. But they do.

Ray

[jamesOK]

Originally Posted by RayRay

Being a former actor who still receives tiny royalties on some televisions shows and films I appeared in, I rather support getting paid for my work .

I have to ask, what have you appeared in? It is one of my favourite games when watching films and TV to try and pick out actors/actresses that I have seen in other productions.

[RayRay]

Originally Posted by jamesOK

I have to ask, what have you appeared in? It is one of my favourite games when watching films and TV to try and pick out actors/actresses that I have seen in other productions.

I worked as an actor for about 30 years on stage and in television, film, and commercials in the US and Canada. I won two Clio Awards for FedEx and AMCO Transmissions commercials, I played the head of the county child care agency on a daytime courtroom TV show called Superior Court (it aired quite a while ago), and I played different roles in individual episodes of television shows and in films. None of it is newer than the early 1990s, though.

Ray

[Amandapanda]

With a Kindle, I think it's the country that the device is registered to that makes a difference. Because the terms and conditions are different, I've looked into re-registering mine in the US as you can lend books between Kindles there, but not in the UK. I could have done this without changing all my other amazon settings, so you should be able to do that!

I've travelled with the kindle, and from wherever I am in the world, I have been able to download English books and they were charged to me in pounds. Presumably, I could have paid with a credit card from anywhere! You can also get the kindle app for ipad, ipod, iphone, android etc, but reading on those is tiresome (but not too bad if you set it to white writing on a black background.)

As someone else has mentioned, you can also download books from anywhere in .pub format and put them on to a kindle, kobo etc. (presumably a nook too, we don't have them in the UK yet!)

I hope that helps!

[Bevdeforges]

Originally Posted by Amandapanda

As someone else has mentioned, you can also download books from anywhere in .pub format and put them on to a kindle, kobo etc. (presumably a nook too, we don't have them in the UK yet!)

I hope that helps!

Do you mean .epub format, or .pdf format? Most e-readers will take pdf format books. But so far I don't think Kindle will read .epub books - unless you crack the DRM (illegal in many jurisdictions, but, well, you know...) and then convert the format (which is easy to do once the DRM has been eliminated).
Cheers,
Bev

[Amandapanda]

Sorry, I meant .mobi! They don't have to come from Amazon and work the same on the Kindle, I have loads I have read that way.

[emilymathews]

I have been living in Lyon for a month and have bought several books for my Kindle and haven't noticed anything different. Maybe I haven't been paying enough attention, but when I was searching for books last night, I was looking at the same page as I do at home.

On a side note, if you want to use Netflix, Hulu, or Amazon instant downloads while in Europe, you can create a virtual private network that gives you a US-based IP address. It's very cheap per month, very easy to set up, and works great.