
Apple forces users to pay full price to redownload already bought ebooks - stuff4ben
http://www.baekdal.com/publishing/apple-pay-full-price-for-an-ebook-you-already-bought/
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leviathant
As much as I'd love to give Apple a hard time over this, I'm going to put it
out there that this is likely just capitulation to publishing companies. You
have to pay to re-download MP3s and eBooks, but not apps from the app store. I
may not like Apple's philosophy regarding a lot of things, but they're
generous by comparison to record labels and publishing companies.

~~~
ghshephard
If that's the case why is it that the kindle will sync all my books to my k1,
k2, iPhone 3G/3GS and iPad with zero fuss and no repurchases required?

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ugh
Amazon is better at negotiating with publishers or has more bargaining chips?

I don’t really know whether Apple’s heart is in all this book stuff (Steve
Jobs famously said that Americans don’t read anymore), they might not care all
that much at the moment. iBooks might just be a fallback solution in case
Amazon tries funny stuff (or some other competitor emerges which doesn’t want
to play ball with Apple).

~~~
nkassis
I was under the impression that he said that because he didn't have a book
reading application yet and was downplaying the kindle until the iPad was out.
Similar to how he downplayed the netbooks until the iPad came out. (Yes iPad
and the netbooks are different but they are in the same field. I think it's
harder to reinvent books compared to small portable computers. Hence why iBook
is pretty much the same as all the ebook software).

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WilliamLP
I think looking at something (netbooks), then turning around and selling 3
million units of a vastly more expensive and higher margin product in a few
months, shows that he was right to downplay it and that the iPad does actually
offer something fundamentally different that consumers really want.

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faboo
> [T]he iPad does actually offer something fundamentally different that
> consumers really want.

Prestige?

"Your laptop's so small! How do you type on that keyboard?"

"Woah, dude! The screen on your iPod's enormous! That must've cost a mint!"

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adolph
If I remember correctly, music on the iTunes store works similarly. They
charge you at download and you had better back up your files. The operational
concept is that the user downloads the content once and then syncs that
content among devices (iPhone, iPad, whatever) using their desktop computer.

From <http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4059>:

"Can I copy my books onto other computers or devices?

Books downloaded from the iBookstore can be placed on up to five computers you
own that you’ve authorized with your iTunes Store account. You can sync your
books to all iPads, iPhones, and iPod touches you own.1 Audiobooks, PDF files,
and ePub files you've added to iTunes will appear in Books under Library. To
sync Books to your device, connect it to your computer using the cable it came
with. In iTunes, select your device then click the Books tab. Choose the books
you would like to read on your device then press Sync. Books will sync to
iPad, iPhone, and iPod touch even if iBooks is not installed; to read synced
books, download iBooks from the App Store."

"1Requires iPhone and iPod touch with iOS 4 or later. iBooks is not compatible
with original iPhone or iPod touch (1st generation)."

~~~
jackowayed
But why? What's the difference to them between redownloading it on your new
phone and syncing with your computer to get your books? The bandwidth costs?

And it works fine for apps. I can buy an app over the air, delete it, and
redownload it for free, all without my computer ever being involved.

~~~
bobbyi
I think they are trying to make it hard for 100 people to share one iTunes
account and "redownload" the purchased content onto their respective iPods.

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nkassis
except they have limitations on the amount of devices which can be authorized.
And this is the rip mix burn company who didn't care in the past. Why would
they care now, most users will just make a cd out of the music anyway to pass
it to friends.

~~~
Maktab
Contracts with publishers.

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bonaldi
Just tested. Downloaded a book on the phone that I'd bought on the iPad, and
it gave me the "you have already purchased this book; press to downloaded it
again" message you get from the App Store. If you go into the "purchases" tab
it offers to redownload any books you've purchased elsewhere.

What the OP is seeing has to be a bug; after all iBooks does syncing between
iPad and iPhone -- they can't expect you to repurchase each time.

~~~
DeusExMachina
The message says:

"You have already purchased this but _it isn't available for redownload._ To
purchase it _again at full price_ , tap OK"

Given the exact phrasing of the parts I highlighted, I don't think it is a
bug. I cannot see in the picture what book it is, but since this does not
happen to you for your books, it could be something related to
copyright/distribution.

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yardie
Personally, I'd never buy an eBook, ePub, or whatever. I either invest in a
dead tree, get a unDRMed PDF, the web copy, or just check it out from the
library.

There are far too many options available today for me to buy into a format
that can do less than what I was able to do 5 years ago.

~~~
sliverstorm
I really hope you change your mind eventually. Dead-tree books are probably on
the decline, and if nobody is willing to pay for electronic books because of
the prevailing attitude (electronic things are free!) that's going to mess
things up.

Don't get me wrong, dead-tree books have their place. In addition to ebooks, I
own something like 200lbs of reference books. I'm not blind to the pros of
paper. (though you can bet I'll be excited when a real textbook replacement
comes along, and I don't have to lug 200lbs around)

~~~
abstractbill
What does "mess things up" really mean though? Do you think people would stop
writing books if it was harder to make money from them? I don't.

~~~
sliverstorm
Not entirely; books would still be written, that's for certain. Except, the
books that are written with no expectation of money whatsoever or as a
personal project are either statements for political reasons, or often not
worth reading. Most of the popular books and series are written by career
authors. Would anyone be a career author if it didn't pay? I don't think
anyone tries to be an author for riches, but if it can't pay for food you can
hardly do that for a living.

It seems like you presume all the authors will simply continue to write out of
passion for writing. Some will, but I feel that's an incredibly narrow-minded
and self-interested view.

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fjabre
The main point I took away from this:

Syncing to iTunes sucks. It's been broken for a long time and it's becoming
more apparent with the release of the iPad.

It's easily the most frustrating experience I've had managing my iDevices
mainly because it's archaic to have to constantly sync to your desktop in
2010.

Google was right: "We discovered something really cool...it's called the
Internet."

Real opportunity for Google here to improve on this with Android/Chrome OS
devices.

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CoryMathews
Yet another reason for people to wake up and see how closed and restricted
apple is and always will be. I'm actually getting tired of reading about apple
screwing people over the same way again and again.

~~~
pyre
While I hate a lot of the restrictions that Apple places on things, you have
to entertain the possibility that the content industries
(music,movies,books,etc) heavily push these types of these things when
negotiating distribution deals with Apple. As others have mentioned, the
things that Apple does control (e.g. Apps) don't have the 'rebuy to
redownload' restriction.

~~~
borism
but nothing except profits prohibits Apple to stand up for the interests of
it's users the way Amazon and Google do, yet Apple seems to always choose it's
own short-term interest ahead of it's users' long-term interest.

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cabalamat
I wonder how long before everyone gets the message: Just say no to DRM.

~~~
glhaynes
What does this have to do with DRM?

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joblessjunkie
This sounds more like a series of first-release bugs than an evil policy.

~~~
bitmover
Sounds like a bug to me. I redownloaded eBooks I had purchased on my iPad just
fine.

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commieneko
The solution is called Stanza (owned by Amazon now I believe) and ePub books.
I agree that the legitimate selection possilby isn't as good, but I see no
advantage to buying books, _books_ for chrissakes, that have DRM.

I actually use Apple's book software a bit here and there, it works fairly
nicely, and when they add PDF support I'll probably use it a bit more. But I'm
not buying a page from Apple's book store until the DRM situation has changed.

I waited them out on DRMed music, never bought a note before they offered DRM
free files. Now I spend money there regularly, among other non-DRMed places.
Its a shame the "powers" have to learn this lesson over and over and over and
over...

~~~
joubert
I think iBooks is a better app than Stanza (notes, bookmarks, PDF capability)
and you can get your EPUBs in there via iTunes (even ones bought from other
stores such as the one my startup runs, fifobooks.com).

~~~
commieneko
Both readers have their strengths and weaknesses, which is why I'm still
playing with both. iBooks is certainly the younger of the two and I expect it
to pass ahead, especially since the Stanza folks seem to be under the sway of
Amazon, which has a vested interest in the fight. PDF capability will
certainly be a big plus for iBooks when it comes to the iPad. I'm running the
new version on my iPod Touch, but PDFs on such a small screen aren't that
useful, at least to me.

Frankly, all the readers I've used fall short when it comes to library
management. I want something like iTunes (only better!) both to manage my
library and create and manage reading lists. Right now everything just goes
into one big pile that takes _forever_ to scroll through (I've around 800
titles in iBooks and several hundred in Stanza). iBook on iPad actually has
crashed (!) a couple of times as I've gone scrolling from the top of the
alphabet to the bottom. I'll admit I'm pushing iBooks harder, but that's
because I expect so much more from Apple ;)

The best desktop solution I've found for PDFs (and cbr/cbz comic files) is a
comic book reading program called Comicbook Lover. I use it for PDF management
(okay, I manage my digital comic book collection with it too...) It works very
much like itunes. If they would add ePub support to it, and change the name,
they could rule the world, at least for a while. Unfortunately their iPad and
iPhone/iPod Touch app is woefully lacking in the very features that make it
work so well on the desktop.

Edit: And I do a slow burn every time I go to add documents to my iPod Touch
or iPad. Syncing through iTunes is just _stupid_. I understand this is a
problem with _many_ apps on the iOS platform, and that there are political and
commercials issues involved, but I don't care. Apple needs to work this out,
post-haste...

~~~
joubert
"I've around 800 titles in iBooks and several hundred in Stanza"

Are these mostly for reference, or are they on your to-read list?

~~~
commieneko
A lot of Gutenberg books, a lot of science fiction from Feedbooks. I've also
been playing with ePub convert software and have been making ePub "books" from
various plain text sources. I also went on a late 19th and early 20th century
math and geometry book binge a while ago and downloaded a _ton_ of titles from
Google books. A lot of them were available in both ePub and PDF format.

Most of the reference titles I have are in PDF format, though. I've been using
a couple of different PDF readers on the iPad, none of which do everything
that I would like. When the new iBooks comes out for the iPad, I'll give it a
go as a PDF reader as well.

The amazing thing is that _all_ the books on the iPad, all 1000+ spread across
several programs, take up less than a Gig.

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crad
This must be publisher specific. I purchased a book on my first iPad and when
I bought a second (with 3g), I re-downloaded it without having to pay for it.

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tzs
Plug iPhone into computer. Select the iPhone in the sidebar on iTunes. Click
the books tab. Check the box to sync books. Sync.

Your purchased books are then on your iPhone.

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gte910h
Yet another reason amazon has won the eBook battle....

~~~
rbanffy
Yet another reason to avoid DRM...

Try to get your DRM'ed Kindle books to any non-Kindle platform.

~~~
mtrichardson
I can read my Kindle books on my iPhone, iPad, BlackBerry, Mac, and Windows
computer (and soon Android). It's still Amazon's software (which, for the
desktop computers, sucks), and it's still DRM'd, but you don't have to have a
Kindle to enjoy the Kindle library.

~~~
joubert
Amazon has the power, and have used it, to _remove_ books from your home that
you have already bought. That's insane!

~~~
gte910h
And they learned that's a very very bad idea and aren't going to do it again.

~~~
rbanffy
And we should trust them completely.

