I found this super helpful… github.com/WeLackDiscipline/…/end-all-guide.md
Amazon’s killing a feature that let you download and backup Kindle books
Submitted 1 year ago by misk@sopuli.xyz to technology@lemmy.world
https://www.theverge.com/news/612898/amazon-removing-kindle-book-download-transfer-usb
Comments
bluetardis@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
ouch@lemmy.world 1 year ago
github.com/Jedi425/BulkKindleUSBDownloader
Quick script to download all your Kindle ebooks.
If you know any other tools, please reply.
Reposting as a top level comment for visibility. Thanks gitamar.
bluetardis@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
I am getting prompts from the script for “Your Amazon Oath”
Any idea where I can actually find/download this ?
kava@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Get an old Kindle. The news ones make it hard for you to connect to your computer. But even just a couple of years back you could plug in your Kindle to your computer through a USB and just drag and drop files. It only reads the proprietary .mobi format but Calibre, an excellent piece of software, will automatically convert .epub files to .mobi for you and it has a great algorithm.
Then all you gotta do is look up whatever you want on libgen and for the price of one kindle you can have a virtually infinite library of books.
I’ve actually had my first generation Kindle for about ~14 years now and my newer one for about ~3 years. I won’t ever buy a new one, but the ones from ~3 years ago are excellent pieces of hardware.
You just have to disconnect it from the internet and never turn on the wifi. If you do, Amazon will fuck with your settings and make your life difficult.
the16bitgamer@programming.dev 1 year ago
Good news is that there are alternative ways to download these books from Amazon for backup purposes. It’s not as straightforward but it’s doable.
That said I will be refusing to buy from any storefront that doesn’t offer a way to download my books. Even adobe digital editions is a viable alternative.
umbraroze@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Previously, you could just download the books on the Kindle for PC, use a random decoder software or install a plugin for Calibre, and boop, decoded books, readable in Calibre, can be converted to EPUB.
For ssssssome reasonnns I’ve been looking at how to do the same thing again, but apparently you need an old version of KfPC because the new one uses new encryption/file format that hasn’t been sussed out yet. Weirdly enough, even with the newer app, I’ve still been able to download a bunch of books that didn’t have DRM to begin with, but of course Amazon doesn’t exactly advertise if a book is DRM-free anywhere on the store page.
Also weirdly enough this quest of mine actually started last year when one Finnish ebook store was closed down, but that was less of a problem. I just downloaded all of my purchases as unencrypted EPUBs. Guess the local publishers are less dickish, worst thing they asked for was watermarking.
hsakaa@lemm.ee 1 year ago
Just pirate them at this point instead of giving your money to predatory companies lol
Teknikal@eviltoast.org 1 year ago
I’m actually suprised Google never went and made an reader they already have the store and software. Kobo does the job for me anyway though.
grahamja@reddthat.com 1 year ago
I have no need for my Kindle services anymore. I bought books there for how easy it was to put on my electronic devices, and to easily make back up copies for later. If I can’t downloaf and reformat the e-book to easily make a physical copy I don’t want it.
JOMusic@lemmy.ml 1 year ago
Definitely switch to alternatives from Amazon. They treat their authors abhorrently too. I’ve personally been super happy with libro.fm for Audiobooks (essentially Audible, but you can download the audiobooks DRM-free)
underfreyja@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Do yourself a favour, switch to Kobo or a third party ereader… Especially if you’re not in the US.
fatalicus@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Why “especially if you’re not i the US”?
I’m not in the US, and switched to kobo a couple of years ago, but i’ve had to keep buying books from amazon, sine the kobo store is just realy bad (missing a lot of books, even popular once), and there are few others who offer ebooks here.
The quality of the devices seem not the greatest either.
Bought a kobo libra first and it lasted just long enough for the warranty to expire before it just fully died. Replaced it with a kobo libra colour, and had to replace it three times before I got one that didn’t have pin holes on the screen where light shone through.
Meanwhile my 9 year old kindle oasis works just fine, it has just gotten slow and the battery is worse, which is why I replaced it with kobo.
underfreyja@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Because supporting the US economy from outside of it right now is ludicrous and Amazon is a union busting mega corporation that destroy local economies…
Now, I’m not a Kobo corporate shill, I don’t care which device you get, I did say there are other ereaders you can get, pick whatever you want. You don’t care about thr trade wars, you can get a Nook or Remarkable. You care but don’t like Kobo? You can buy an Onyx or another Chinese brand. You can use your phone, an old tablet whatever you want.
Personally, I’ve never not found a book on kobo but if it happened and it wasn’t at my library, I’d find alternative to buying on amazon, I’d get it physical or find other ways to get it.
You want to continue using amazon products and contribute to the success of Bezos and his billionaire friends, that’s your prerogative but a lot of us are not ready to do that for the sole sake of minor convenience.
wide_eyed_stupid@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Yup, I’ve had my Kobo for quite a while now and I still love it. The push buttons are great, as pointed out by another poster, but also… I’ve just never had any issues with it. None whatsoever. I’m hoping this one will just never brick.
About a month after I got mine, I bought the exact same one for my husband and he says his is still working like a charm as well! Now to be fair, I had never owned any other e-readers so I can’t really compare it to anything, but quality-wise I’d say they’re really good.
sunbytes@lemmy.world 1 year ago
A whole new generation of the Kobo readers just came out too!
I’ve got one of the previous Gen and I was so happy to find they have models with the clicky buttons to turn the page.
underfreyja@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Yeah I got the libra colour and it’s really great for the buttons. Didn’t really care about the colour part but the regular one was out of stock when I got it so I just went with it and I’m finding I enjoy it a lot. Especially when I read picture books for mt kid’s bedtime
guywithoutaname@lemm.ee 1 year ago
I get my books for my used Kindle off Libby because I have no expectation of ownership and I don’t want to give Amazon the satisfaction of my money.
rouroborous@lemm.ee 1 year ago
Iquit on Kindle a few years ago. The publicationsI read, like Asimov’s Sci Fi, no longer publish via Kindle. I use Book Funnel, Kobo, Pocket Book and store books on my desktop’s drive.
Guidy@lemmy.world 1 year ago
That’s why I don’t download or purchase ebooks from Amazon, but only get them from places I can download a non-DRM’d copy. I’m not looking to break any laws, but if I pay for it, I want to be able to have it whenever I want even when the Internet is down. Recently a buddy gave me his old blu-ray juke box, and now I’m doing the same thing with my favorite movies as well. And building a home lab. It’s finally time I decreased (not completely ended) my reliance on the cloud, given the shit show my nation collectively voted for.
IphtashuFitz@lemmy.world 1 year ago
My wife borrows a lot of ebooks from our library, which are delivered to a kindle through Amazon. I’ve used this USB download option to remove the DRM from some of those borrowed books. Guess I’ll have to figure out a new approach now…
dnick@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
I think it’s worth noting that the bigger issue here might not be the drm, but the access Amazon has into your device. Regardless if you can download ‘another’ version of the book or not (that is something you can find out for yourself relatively quickly) there is no reason it should be considered ok for the company to insist that it can connect to a device you own and modify the contents of it. Even with ownership of the books being a topic, certainly there should be little questions of whether you own the device, and along with that being able to control access to it.
Surely there is something in the user agreement that states accessing the download functionality also grants Amazon permission to go in and claw back things they’ve uploaded to the device, but i think that should be at least half the argument. Restrict whatever they want up front, I’ve downloaded it to my device and they consider that a fair exchange for my money, but to then say they screwed up on their end so they’re taking it back (assumedly without giving up the money they made as part of the agreement) is where things should be breaking.
keyez@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Where do you usually go to find the DRM free books? Sometimes for new books I am unable to purchase a copy without any sort of DRM
Fungah@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I pirate everything. Because fuck you that’s why.
Entertainmeonly@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 year ago
Holy cow i just looked up a blue ray “jukebox” used the sony 400 disc one is like $900. That’s fucking crazy.
uraniumcovid@lemm.ee 1 year ago
did that a couple of days ago thankfully. goodbye amazon, you were never loved.
ilinamorato@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Thanks for the heads-up. I’m downloading all of mine and finally making a Calibre library.
tamal3@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Can I root my 10 year old Kindle Paperwhite?
Sturgist@lemmy.ca 1 year ago
kindlemodding.org/jailbreaking/WinterBreak/
Jailbreak now available for all kindles
Entertainmeonly@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 year ago
My 4th gen doesnt need it. I’ve got two D01100 models. I can literally plug them into my phone and copy paste books onto them. I google the book i want, download to my phone and just paste it into my kindke.
Just don’t attach an account to it and keep it on airplane mode. They can’t stop anything. I’ve even got manga on it but that took a converter program on my laptop to make the manga into an epub file.
Teppichbrand@feddit.org 1 year ago
Probably no, as its firmware auto-updates and they closed the jailbreak a year or two ago. But who knows, put it in airplane mode and check it.
Sturgist@lemmy.ca 1 year ago
Check the firmware version.
wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Prefix_Index
Above is a fair amount of documentation.epubor.com/how-to-jailbreak-kindle-paperwhite.htm…
Jailbreak instructions for Paperwhites.ilinamorato@lemmy.world 1 year ago
That’s what I’m looking into, too. I’m finding info about a Branch Delay, a WinterBreak, and a LanguageBreak. I don’t know which one to try.
ohshittheyknow@lemmynsfw.com 1 year ago
Surprised Pikachu face
IDKWhatUsernametoPutHereLolol@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 year ago
I wonder how long before this US administration makes “copyright infringement” a felony…
🤔
SubtitledMustard@lemmy.world 1 year ago
And then copyrights all pending legislation…
Anegro_Montoya@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
Makes it harder to pirate or share, so more profit with the benefit of censorship. They could make updates to material on the fly if they wanted. Assuming you need an Internet connection, no privacy and limits where you can read. It’s hard because you can’t avoid things like AWS but you can stop paying them directly. Sadly, even now, it’s hard to convince people to give up on Amazon and similar corps.
Hyphlosion@lemm.ee 1 year ago
I’m sad that the Kindle Oasis doesn’t get a new model. Mine has served me well for the past few years, but it’s starting to show its age.
BeardedGingerWonder@feddit.uk 1 year ago
I felt the same about my Voyage, but I’ve resolved to move to kobo once it bites the dust.
TheRealKuni@midwest.social 1 year ago
I jumped from the Voyage to the Paperwhite when they switched to USB-C and added a warmth slider for the screen. It’s really nice, especially with an origami case (even if that case isn’t as nice as the origami case for the Voyage).
thingAmaBob@lemmy.world 1 year ago
This won’t stop users from removing DRM. There will always be a way to own your e-books.
ThirdConsul@lemmy.ml 1 year ago
The article literally says you will still be able to push books via Calibre etc, but won’t be able to download books into Kindle from PC.
Example: If you don’t have a WiFi at home, there is an option to connect Kindle via USB to your ethernet connected PC and download books from Amazon that way.
And this option is going away, as most people have WiFi.
Anywho, fuck Amazon (for other things, but not this one).
ackables@lemm.ee 1 year ago
Yeah it seems more like they decided that maintaining that specific feature isn’t worth it because not enough users are using it. It sucks, but that’s just how it goes with closed hardware and software ecosystems.
werefreeatlast@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I literally just installed caliber recently. Are they following my every move or something? Trying desperately to prevent other “near techky” people from leaving the market place?
ilinamorato@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Calibre is open-source: github.com/kovidgoyal/calibre
So if it had telemetry, we would have heard about it.
werefreeatlast@lemmy.world 1 year ago
No I mean, now that I got caliber they block book downloads.
Siegfried@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I read somwhere how to solve this
1 - factory reset 2 - deactivate wifi for life 3 - upload books with calibre
This will wipe out any content you have, as i understand
Xatolos@reddthat.com 1 year ago
[deleted]Siegfried@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I’m planing on doing this but i fear 2 things out of pure ignorance: killing my kindle and battery usage
heavydust@sh.itjust.works 1 year ago
I upload books with Calibre and never had to reset anything. It’s great.
menemen@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I have a kindle, nut i never buy my books at Amazon. I just but them elsewhere, de-DRM then on calibration and copy them in the kindle. Not as comfortable, but okay for.me.
amos@mander.xyz 1 year ago
resist.
Stop buying whatever it is that Amazon/Meta/Google/Etc sell. They will not stand for you. They will not respect you.
At some points, it may seem like they changed and that they are now good. They are not. They will never be. Resist them.
Yppm@lemy.lol 1 year ago
I bought a Kindle so I can pirate all my books. Am I resisting?
PM_Your_Nudes_Please@lemmy.world 1 year ago
At least install KoReader before they find a way to firmware-lock the device.
amos@mander.xyz 1 year ago
You could have made a better choice, I suppose. And some authors/editors do deserve the money.
Pirating is not necessarily resisting. Are you taking money from authors who really really need it? Or are you taking money from rich CEOs who are worsening the environment, future generations, etc?
Throwaway131447@lemmynsfw.com 1 year ago
This is why I almost never get any Digital Book. The only digital books I have are books that were free either originally or through a giveaway, or that were severely discounted and I already owned physically. That’s also why I don’t buy movies or TV series digitally. You’re just renting these things, and you’re only renting them when you have an internet connection.
EngineerGaming@feddit.nl 1 year ago
Physical vs. DRMed digital is not a dichotomy. Personally for books, I do prefer paper ones - and mostly read in my language on paper. However, pretty much all non-fiction I read is in English, and getting it in paper would cost a fortune (English books are not sold here that much as we’re not an English-speaking country, and shipping would likely cost more than the book itself).
As for movies and music - it’s all digital DRMless as well, unlike books, there isn’t even a functional difference between a file from a tracker vs. a file from a DVD, except that you wouldn’t have to throw out a perfectly good disk after ripping.
FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 1 year ago
You can download and keep countless ebooks from annas-archive.org
🏴☠️
fatalicus@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Well fuck… Guess i’ll need too look at what is available for ebook downloads i my arr stack to get books for my kobo.
The kobo store is mostly useless, and there are limited options available for buying ebooks here, so amazon has been the best option for likely finding what i was looking for.
phx@lemmy.ca 1 year ago
Yeah I looked into the Kobo store and a LOT of the books I have - which are not exactly small titles - aren’t available there.
In some cases they’ve got the first couple books or audiobooks out of a series that currently has 10
Korhaka@sopuli.xyz 1 year ago
You know I am starting to think going to the library is a better idea than buying their products. You can literally just walk in.
Rozz@lemmy.sdf.org 1 year ago
You can also get ebooks from the library
PM_Your_Nudes_Please@lemmy.world 1 year ago
My library only offers ebooks via CloudLibrary, which doesn’t support e-readers. You have to read everything in their mobile app which scrolls instead of turning pages. It’s like someone custom built an app to be horrible for reading books in bed.
friend_of_satan@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Some libraries offer large sections of the O’reilly Safari Bookshelf, a collection of educational tech books.
tomkatt@lemmy.world 1 year ago
I rarely use my Paperwhite Signature since I like my Boox Nova 2 more. The Kindle is mostly just for the serial note to strip DRM now via Calibre.
My wife recently joked that it’s my “Kindle Paperweight.” With this announcement I doubt I’ll buy anymore books from Amazon.
Michal@programming.dev 1 year ago
Hi, what do you like about boox nova? I have the Paperwhite (2022) and wondering if there’s a better alternative that isn’t Amazon. I do enjoy the page turn animation, does boox have it too?
tomkatt@lemmy.world 1 year ago
No book turn animations in Neo Reader, but other apps might, like Moon+ Reader. I prefer the Boox interface and warm light, and it’s much more customizable. Also, being android based means access to alternative reading apps, and even manga.
Not sure if you can still buy the Nova line, I’ve had it since 2020. I bought the Paperwhite Signature as an “upgrade” but the Boox screen is larger, the warm light is nicer (warm orange/tan, the Kindle warm light is pee yellow).
ouch@lemmy.world 1 year ago
Another tool for bulk downloading, with 811 stars for the record:
github.com/…/amazon-kindle-bulk-downloader