

Arch Linux Handbook for Kindle rejected by Amazon - stock_toaster
http://archlinux.me/dusty/2012/09/09/arch-linux-handbook-for-kindle/

======
da_n
"I was insulted and hurt by this message. It’s arrogant and it is
confrontational. It makes no effort to address the specifics of the e-mail."

I feel like I'm missing something here. I read the emails and their responses
seem perfectly acceptable to me, I am not picking up an arrogant or
confrontational tone and think they did their best to answer the issue. The
author asserts a copyleft license to the work and fully expects Amazon to be
100% compatible with it (one could almost say arrogantly so) and does not, in
my opinion, assert exclusive publishing rights of the work. Amazon state they
are not confident author holds the exclusive publishing rights and that this
is not acceptable on the Kindle Store, linking to the relevant policy
guideline. As someone else has pointed out, the author is also not the
customer here, they are in effect negotiating a business deal with Amazon,
Amazon do not need to tip-toe around the issue. I think the author was a
little bit over sensitive here.

If I am missing something here please fill me in.

~~~
eatitraw
> I read the emails and their responses seem perfectly acceptable to me That's
> probably because you are not the author of this book. Just try to be a
> little more empathic with this guy: he wrote the book, he did a valuable
> job(presumably, I'm not an arch linux user, and I looked through the book
> very briefly). I can see very well that response like "This type of content
> can create a poor customer experience, and is not accepted" makes him feel
> exactly the way bis post describes.

If Amazon doesn't support free licensed content, it's time to start doing so.

~~~
chrisrhoden
I'm shocked nobody has said this yet. They can't.

The ebooks distributed on the Kindle Store are distributed under a license
that Amazon has negotiated. The GNU FDL does not permit redistributing under a
different license. If the person submitting the book could assert that he was
the author, and held copyright to the content, that would be one thing. If it
is community authored, and edited by this person (as was actually asserted),
Amazon would be opening themselves to actual legal liability from all of the
other authors.

It's insane to me how many people who assert that Free Licenses are useful in
such situations. This is the same as attempting to put some GPLed software on
the App Store. It can be done, but only if everyone agrees to offer Apple an
alternate license.

~~~
domdelimar
INAL and I'm wondering, why can't Amazon redistribute it under the GPL?

Does GPL permit that anyone redistributes it or does GPL permit that Amazon
does it the way they would like to do it?

What exactly is stopping Amazon from distributing GPLed content?

~~~
chrisrhoden
Probably the bit about how they can't distribute it with DRM and must allow
people to easily copy it from that point of distribution. I don't know for
sure how free kindle e-books are distributed, but my gut tells me that it's
the same way that non-free e-books are. If there is DRM preventing me from
copying that e-book to another device, modifying that e-book, etc, then it
would be in violation.

~~~
domdelimar
But they don't choose whether a book in their store will be DRMed or not. The
authors do (see [http://www.niemanlab.org/2010/01/amazon-quietly-lets-
publish...](http://www.niemanlab.org/2010/01/amazon-quietly-lets-publishers-
remove-drm-from-kindle-ebooks/)).

So, knowing this now, is GPL still a problem for Amazon? Free Kindle books are
distributed through the same infrastructure.

~~~
chrisrhoden
The fact that it's a settling doesn't solve the problem. If they decided to
build whatever infrastructure was required to flag copyleft content and then
essentially lock this setting, they might be in a better position. It still
doesn't protect them completely. If the author fails to include the license in
the book, for instance, they're in deep water. So the important thing to
remember is that they can't get into this game lightly. It takes a bunch of
work.

The GNU licenses are _not_ designed to facilitate maximum spread of the
content. They're designed to enforce sharing. Unless Amazon wants to get
involved in that enforcement, they really can't touch this stuff.

------
ChuckMcM
I'm confused, the Amazon folks were complaining that he was trying to _sell_
otherwise free information [1], did the OP just miss that? Seems like putting
the Kindle version up for free would have removed their complaint.

[1] Amazon has had a huge problem with people who run through Google Books,
find a book from before 1923, and then re-publish it for money in the Kindle
store, only to have Amazon's customers get angry and bent out of shape when
they realize they have been 'ripped off' buying something they could have
gotten for free.

~~~
WalterBright
I've published a book for the Kindle on Amazon that was published shortly
after the Civil War. The price is nominal, but I put a lot of work into
formatting the book, proofing it, preparing the illustrations, etc.

It was a labor of love for a book I really liked, and I don't expect to make
any real money off of it, but I think a small fee is entirely justifiable. And
if one doesn't like that fee, one can go find another copy elsewhere.

~~~
ChuckMcM
That is an interesting area of Copyright Law as well. You do in fact own the
copyright on your new 'work' even through it was derived entirely from this
previous book. Good examples of this are the classics like Homer's Odessey
which is available here: <http://www.amazon.com/The-Odyssey-
Homer/dp/0140268863> the translator and their publisher put some work in
getting it from Greek to English and voila, new work.

The issue that Amazon was cracking down on was folks who went to Google Books,
found some work like *"The Inventions, Researches and Writings of Nikola
Tesla, With Special Reference to his work in Polyphase Currents and High
Potential Lighting" and then downloaded it from Google and uploaded it to the
Kindle store [2], [1]

[1]
[http://books.google.com/books?id=bhrreukJiLgC&printsec=f...](http://books.google.com/books?id=bhrreukJiLgC&printsec=frontcover&dq=tesla&source=bl&ots=OCM3DnKGKy&sig=3mnZLCHBleVP31BDcth_uNZ6sl8&hl=en&sa=X&ei=lTFNUIawH-
rViwKPm4EI&ved=0CD4Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=tesla&f=false) is the Google Books
version

[2] [http://www.amazon.com/Inventions-Researches-Reference-
ILLUST...](http://www.amazon.com/Inventions-Researches-Reference-ILLUSTRATED-
ebook/dp/B003MQMRFK/ref=tmm_kin_title_0?ie=UTF8&qid=1347236208&sr=1-4) is the
Amazon Kindle rip-off version.

~~~
antiterra
A translation is entirely different from a reformat. Translating Homer from
Greek to English is more than simply matching up words. It is a creative
venture that results in a fair amount of originality. According to the Supreme
Court of the United States, "the _sine qua non_ of copyright is
originality."[1] Effort is generally irrelevant when it comes to determining
copyrightabilty, so a reformatted version would need a certain level of
originality to be copyrightable.

[1] <http://www.law.cornell.edu/copyright/cases/499_US_340.htm> Also argued to
be 'uniqueness' by a Professor at Miami School of Law:
<http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1906047>

~~~
ChuckMcM
I invite you to argue that way against Sony among others, who have taken works
out of copyright and republished them in alternate forms establishing their
own copyright. They argue that converting the work to the new format meets the
transformation standard set by existing law.

Somehow I don't think Walter will go out and sue people if they make copies of
this e-book but I do expect that should he do so he would prevail.

So off list one of the Gutenberg folks pointed out this exception:

"Chuck they get away with this by adding a new introduction or critical essay
to be book, delete that and its back to public domain."

And notes that every republished work by various publishers that use public
domain material does add an introduction or a bit about the author to
establish that Copyright.

So I take it all back, Walter you should introduce your book with your
thoughts on how appropriate it is and then charge what ever you want :-)

~~~
WalterBright
LOL, but I don't really mind that much. Like I said, I like the book and think
everyone should enjoy it.

I also have a crapton of out-of-print books that are available nowhere, that I
would put online for free if it weren't for the dang copyright laws. Some I
have attempted to find the copyright owners, but I just find deadends.

It's really a sad state of affairs.

My personal opinion (and I make my living selling copyrighted software) is
that copyrights should be good for 20 years. After that, you can keep the
copyright going only if you're willing to send in a $1000 fee every year for
each copyright, and that fee should go up a percent a year or so.

That'll put all the abandoned works into the public domain.

------
sdfjkl
_"In other news, the Arch Linux Handbook can be downloaded in .mobi format,
free of charge, from<http://archlinux.ca/arch_linux_handbook_3.mobi> "_

Problem solved? The benefit of having it listed on Amazon is probably
negligible - it's not all that hard dragging a file to your mounted Kindle.

~~~
paulgb
Or emailing the .mobi file to <yourname>_<yourcode>@kindle.com and have it
delivered wirelessly (The email address appears in settings, charges may apply
if you use whispernet rather than WiFi)

~~~
hwatson
or use @free.kindle.com to force (free) delivery over WiFi.

------
kevinconroy
Attention all CEOs/high level folks: This is the exact reason why you need to
regularly answer questions in your customer service queue and monitor
responses (at least some of the time). Yes, sometimes things like this happen,
but if you have first hand experience helping your customers resolve problems,
you're much less likely to end up with an email chain trending on
HN/reddit/etc.

~~~
xtdx
What's the probability that Bezos would have answered this email and not some
other email?

~~~
Kliment
It's a matter of policy. If the higher ups at a company regularly service
customer requests, and there is a consistent problem affecting a number of
users, they can effect a change of policy. It won't necessarily help this
particular person this particular time, but it may help both them and everyone
else with the problem if it changes policy.

------
ig1
I don't think the author understands what "customer-centric" means. People who
publish books for the kindle aren't Amazon's customer, the people who buy
kindle books are.

Amazon applying a quality guideline that stops people republishing copyleft
content makes perfect sense from a consumer viewpoint.

~~~
naner
That may be the case but that's not what she said, she made it sound like he
did something illegal and threatened to close his account.

I have a feeling that Amazon may actually dislike people selling crowdsourced
material as assembled books, not necessarily copyleft books (such as _Dive
into Python_ ).

~~~
fastball
More books for sale means more money. Amazon likes more money.

I can think of no reason Amazon would be against selling crowdsourced books
(besides quality control). If you have ideas, please enlighten us.

~~~
naner
_I can think of no reason Amazon would be against selling crowdsourced books
(besides quality control)._

You can think of no reason besides that one reason you gave? ;)

According to the email he received, Amazon doesn't allow you you publish
material you do not own the copyright to. So this effectively kills
crowdsourced material unless you have a copyright assignment clause.

~~~
fastball
Right, but you made it sound like a problem. It seemed like you were
disagreeing with ig1, rather than rephrasing his exact thoughts.

~~~
naner
I did technically disagree. Crowdsourced and copyleft aren't the same thing. I
gave the example of _Dive into Python_ as a copyleft publication that is not
crowdsourced and where the copyright is held by one person (or publishing
company).

------
sswezey
It explicitly states on their content guidelines page they do not accept
content publicly accessible from the web. Otherwise people could just publish
Wikipedia pages.

The author should check the guidelines before going on accusatory rants.

~~~
martey
This is a misrepresentation of the Content Guidelines. See
[https://kdp.amazon.com/self-
publishing/help?topicId=A2TOZW0S...](https://kdp.amazon.com/self-
publishing/help?topicId=A2TOZW0SV7IR1U) :

 _We will not accept content that is freely available on the web unless you
are the copyright owner of that content._

Since the author is the copyright owner, there is nothing in the guidelines
that suggest the handbook is explicitly prohibited - Wikipedia pages could
possibly be accepted, if the Wikimedia Foundation submitted them.

I think "Megan B." might be confused by the facts that Mr. Phillips is the
editor of the content (as opposed to being its sole author) and by the mention
of the FDL. I also think that she is using the term "exclusive publishing
rights" to mean copyright ownership.

~~~
tzs
> Since the author is the copyright owner, there is nothing in the guidelines
> that suggest the handbook is explicitly prohibited

How is Amazon supposed to know that the author is the copyright owner? As far
as I can see, when they asked about the book being on the web and for him to
confirm that he had publishing rights, all he told them was that it was under
a free license. I suspect that Amazon is, quite reasonably, interpreting this
response as meaning that he is NOT the author, and just has the publishing
rights granted by that free license.

If he is indeed the author, his response should have been: "I am the author of
this work and the sole copyright owner. It is available on several web sites
because I have made it available under a free license".

------
surfingdino
I have a similar problem with my Vim book. Amazon blocked its sales after I
updated it and asked them to make the update available to all 25000+ people
who have downloaded it so far. They are blocking the sales, but allow negative
reviews to be posted. I released it as a separate book, you can get it while
it is still available at <http://thevimbook.com>

------
presto8
A confusing situation - do I have the facts right?

Amazon is ok with publishing public domain works. However, this is not a
public domain work so it doesn't matter.

GNU Free Doc License, just like GPL, doesn't care if you charge money or not;
only that you pass along the content when you distribute and that you don't
add restrictions on what people can do with the content.

Amazon states in their rules that they won't accept freely redistributable
content unless the submitting author is also the copyright owner.

Author does not explicitly state that he is the copyright owner in his
response to Amazon, which explains the rejection.

Author does correctly state that GNU Doc License allows redistribution even if
you are not the copyright owner. Thus he may have been trying to make a
political point that it shouldn't matter if he is the copyright owner or not
since he has the right to redistribute, for profit, from the license?

In any event, it doesn't matter since Amazon's stated policy is not to accept
works in this precise scenario. Why, I don't know; but it is their right to do
so.

------
Havoc
Given that it is essentially community created its understandable that Amazon
feels unsure about who has the "exclusive publishing rights" to it.

~~~
bediger4000
Sounds like no exclusive publishing rights exist. I mean that in a "first
principles" sense, not in a "what the twisted US copyright law says" sense.

Aren't most of the stupidest "IP" conflicts actually conflicts between what
makes sense and what "the law" says?

~~~
csense
"Making sense" is not a well-defined concept: Different, contradictory things
make sense to different people.

In fact, basing a society on "what makes sense" [to the party that has the
power] rather than a written code of laws sounds like a recipe that will
quickly turn a country into a distopian dictatorship.

~~~
bediger4000
Please pardon my momentary lack of precision. It was brought on by a lack of
legalistic thought.

Substitute "logically consistent and practically workable, along with
distinguishing between physical property and ideas" for "makes sense". By
"logically consistence" I mean derivable from a few clearly stated axioms or
assumptions, and a few primitives, like "and", "non-exclusive or", "negation"
and a rule of deduction like modus ponens.

By "practically workable" I mean things like "having a fixed term", "having a
central repository" and "clearly marked". Allowing rather extensive excerpting
also seems necessary to preserve what

The current US standard of "author's life + 70 years" leaves a lot of
uncertainty about when some material enters public domain. Having a copyright
mark on stuff, rather than the automatic assumption of copyright would help
eliminate a lot of uncertainty. Having a central registry where one could
(automatically) get confirmation of copyright would help. The automatic
presumption of fair use or fair dealing when an excerpt is used, rather than
fair use as affirmative defense, would reduce lawsuits-as-free-speech
suppression. Getting rid of the "property" part of "intellectual property"
also seems like it help reduce problems, just because the concept of
possession of an idea is false to fact, and causes people to make false
assumptions.

I freely admit that even in the face of a logically consistent, confusion
reducing copyright regime where free speech is assumed to trump copyright,
some lawsuits would still come up, and indeed, be necessary.

I think that the current arrangement in the USA guarantees the use of courts
of law to suppress opinions. The current arrangement also guarantees a
majority of illogical outcomes, by almost any standard of "logical".

Happy now?

------
armored_mammal
I refuse to use Amazon for anything because of stuff like this.

They will randomly ban your books, kill your services, and do what random
politicians or Internet mobs tell them without any sort of due process.

People love to give me flack for it at the office...

~~~
shrughes
They have a clearly explained policy about content of which you're not the
author here...

------
spaghetti
I wish the iOS reviewers were this clear and concise. Their rejection
information would be something like: Your book has been rejected because it
doesn't comply with App Store Review guideline 123.a.2: Apps that are like
something else on the internet will be rejected, apps that may contain other
things from other people may be rejected, apps that provide limited value when
they imply they provide substantial value may be rejected.

------
jmilkbal
Another day another headline of a closed repository rejecting something. In
this case, it's information for an open source project. Nevermind that these
repositories are not beholden to us, as a FLOSS proselytizer, it pains me that
my peers so readily build value for these closed repositories in much the same
way that publically-funded research papers get stashed behind paywalls. Models
exist for publishing for profit outside of the walled gardens and they do
succeed. If a potential publisher can be convinced to give it away and pray,
so be it. As a community we should really determine where our allegiances lie
and what are real priorities. It's trivial to put a book on a E-reader and
just as trivial to run a website to publish on.

------
domdelimar
It doesn't say anywhere (or I'm missing it) whether he wanted to sell the book
or give it for free.

