[blindlaw] Kindle E-Reader: A Trojan Horse for Free Thought

Tue Mar 31 21:58:40 UTC 2009

I read another blog post from writer Corry Doctorow today indicating this
same problem: we do not own what we think we own. Doctorow in effect asked
his readers to put themselves in the position of the purchaser of a Kindle
2. When the purchaser bought the device, it was advertised as having the
ability to read e-books aloud. But when Amazon makes the technical changes
that allow authors and publishers to disable their books, the Kindle 2 will
not work as advertised at least some of the time. Amazon will probably
coerce the purchaser into accepting this change by requiring that he or she
download the firmware making this modification in order to be permitted to
purchase more e-books. Nowadays the devices we purchase can turn on us,
without warning and with no input from us, simply because the device
manufacturer, under pressure from some faction or other, makes a firmware
modification that causes an advertised feature to disappear or become
severely restricted. Authors, Doctorow suggested, should be the last people
to make themselves party to such a reading device--a device that controls
how the reader can use content at the whim of third parties.

I'll forward the original post to this list if I can find it, since Doctorow
expressed the problem better than me and also made some very coherent
arguments about why the Authors Guild is wrong about text-to-speech.

Chris

-----Original Message-----
From: blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org] On
Behalf Of craig.borne at dot.gov
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2009 2:10 PM
To: blindlaw at nfbnet.org
Subject: Re: [blindlaw] Kindle E-Reader: A Trojan Horse for Free Thought

Hi Craig,

One major difference I see is that a library book is never owned by the
patron.  It is merely borrowed.

On the other hand, the patron who purchases the electronic book on the
Kindle is purchasing the same privileages as one who purchases a hard
copy of the book, yet that purchase, though promising ownership of the
book, is severely limited as to the portability of that book, which is
not the case with a hard bound book. 

My impression of the article's focus was that we are indeed heading into
a great technological age, but we also seem to be giving up certain
privileages along the way.  ITunes is another great example: I can
purchase an entire albumn of music, but I am limited in how I want to
listen to that music.  I am also limited in allowing my neighbor to
borrow the albumn to decide whether or not he is interested in
purchasing it for himself (I am not suggesting any copying of the albumn
in this example).  

Craig

Craig Borne
NHTSA/DOT
(202) 493-0627 
craig.borne at dot.gov

-----Original Message-----
From: blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org [mailto:blindlaw-bounces at nfbnet.org]
On Behalf Of Craig R. Anderson
Sent: Tuesday, March 31, 2009 1:05 PM
To: NFBnet Blind Law Mailing List
Subject: Re: [blindlaw] Kindle E-Reader: A Trojan Horse for Free Thought

Dave,

     Heady thoughts indeed.  But isn't Ms. Walsh a little too alarmist?
How, after all, is a digitalized book on a Kindle Reader significantly
different in this respect from a borrowed library book?  Thanks in any
event for posting the essay.  Regards.

Craig
----- David B Andrews <David.B.Andrews at state.mn.us> wrote:
> With all the discussion about the Kindle, and what it permits, and 
> doesn't permit, I thought this might be of interest to some.
> 
> David Andrews
> 
> 
> Kindle E-Reader: A Trojan Horse for Free Thought
> 
> By Emily Walshe
> The Christian Science Monitor
> from the March 18, 2009 edition
>
<<http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0318/p09s01>http://www.csmonitor.com/200
9/0318/p09s01-coop.html>
> 
> Brookville, N.Y. - All you really need to know about
> the dangers of digital commodification you learned in
> kindergarten.
> 
> Think back. Remember swapping your baloney sandwich for
> Jell-o pudding? Now, imagine handing over your sandwich
> and getting just a spoon.
> 
> That's one trade you'd never make again.
> 
> Yet that's just what millions of Americans are doing
> every day when they read "books" on Kindle, Amazon's e-
> reading device. In our rush to adopt new technologies,
> we have too readily surrendered ownership in favor of
> its twisted sister, access.
> 
> Web 2.0 and its culture of collaboration supposedly
> unleashed a sharing society. But we can share only what
> we own. And as more and more content gets digitized,
> commercialized, and monopolized, our cultural integrity
> is threatened. The free and balanced flow of
> information that gives shape to democratic society is
> jeopardized.
> 
> For now, though, Kindle is on fire in the marketplace.
> Who could resist reading "what you want, when you want
> it?" Access to more than 240,000 books is just seconds
> away. And its "revolutionary electronic-paper display
> ... looks and reads like real paper."
> 
> But it comes with restrictions: You can't resell or
> share your books - because you don't own them. You can
> download only from Amazon's store, making it difficult
> to read anything that is not routed through Amazon
> first. You're not buying a book; you're buying access
> to a book. No, it's not like borrowing a book from a
> library, because there is no public investment. It's
> like taking an interest-only mortgage out on
> intellectual property.
> 
> If our flailing economy is to teach us anything, it
> might be that an on-demand world of universal access
> (with words like lease, licensure, and liquidity) gets
> us into trouble. Amazon and other e-media aggregators
> know that digital text is the irrational exuberance of
> the day, and so are seizing the opportunity to codify,
> commodify, and control access for tomorrow. But access
> doesn't "look and read" like printed paper at all -
> just ask any forlorn investor. Access is useless
> currency.
> 
> Why is this important? Because Kindle is the kind of
> technology that challenges media freedom and restricts
> media pluralism. It exacerbates what historian William
> Leach calls "the landscape of the temporary": a hyper
> mobile and rootless society that prefers access to
> ownership. Such a society is vulnerable to the dangers
> of selective censorship and control.
> 
> Digital rights management (DRM), which Kindle uses to
> lock in its library, raises critical questions about
> the nature of property and identity in digital culture.
> Culture plays a large role - in some ways, larger than
> government - in shaping who we are as individuals in a
> society. The First Amendment protects our right to
> participate in the production of that culture. The
> widespread commodification of access is shaping nearly
> every aspect of modern citizenship. There are benefits,
> to be sure, but this transformation also poses a big-
> time threat to free expression and assembly.
> 
> When Facebook, for example, proposed revisions to its
> terms of service last month - claiming ownership of
> user profiles and personal data - the successful
> backlash it spawned caused complex (even existential)
> ideas about property, identity, and capitulation to
> bubble up: Is my Facebook profile the essence of who I
> am? If so, who owns me?
> 
> The hallmark of a constitutionally governed society,
> after all, is the acknowledgment that we are the
> authors of our own experience. In an Internet age, this
> is manifest not only in published works, but also an
> ever-evolving host of user-generated content (Twitter,
> Blogger, Facebook, YouTube, etc.). If service providers
> lay claim to digital content now, how will it all end?
> 
> Print may be dying, but the idea of print would be the
> more critical demise: the idea that there needs to be a
> record - an artifact of permanence, residence, and
> posterity - that is independent of some well-appointed
> thingamajig in order to be seen, touched, understood,
> or wholly possessed.
> 
> "You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture,"
> Ray Bradbury once said. "Just get people to stop
> reading them."
> 
> Access equals control. In this case, it is control over
> what is read and what is not; what is referenced and
> what is overlooked; what is retained and what is
> deleted; what is and what seems to be.
> 
> To kindle, we must remember, is to set fire to. The
> combustible power of this device (and others like it)
> lies in their quiet but constant claim to intangible,
> algorithmic capital. What the Kindle should be igniting
> is serious debate on the fundamental, inalienable right
> to property in a digital age - and clarifying what's
> yours, mine, and ours.
> 
> It should strike a match against the winner-take-all
> casino economies that this kind of technology
> engenders; revitalize American libraries and other
> social institutions in their quest to preserve the
> doctrines of fair use and first sale (which allow for
> free and lawful sharing); and finally, spark Americans
> to consider the extent to which they are handing over
> their baloney sandwich for a plastic spoon.
> 
> Like a lot of people, I'm a sucker for a good book. But
> not at the expense of freedom, or foreclosure of
> thought.
> 
> 
> Emily Walshe is a librarian and professor at Long
> Island University in New York.
> 
> 
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