Amazon Kindle discussion
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Multiple Kindles per account?
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I have three physical kindles (four with the Fire), the cloud reader, three copies of for PC, one for Android, and I may have forgotten to deregister my old crackberry ...I've heard that you can do what you propose, but it's a PITA. And she may end up having to re-download books when she reregisters to her own account. If you want to share books on a regular basis, AND if you can trust her to pay you for charges to your account, you might as well just register her Kindle to your account.
Or, at only $80, get her a Kindle touch registered to your account, if she has a lot of content on her own. I think you can have it ask for the password rather than set up one-click for purchase.
Then, it could be the family pass-around Kindle, all hooked to your library.
I do it all the time with about 5 friends, it is not a PITA at all and you don't have to redownload any books when you register. I have been doing it for years with my friends and I often check on a weekly if not daily basis.This is how my friends and I do it -- step by step below. We each have our own account where we buy books. But we log on to each other's accounts to share books.
1. Get the sign in and password.
2. Deregister your Kindle from your account (from the settings page on your kindle -- or from Manage Your Acount page on Amazon).
3. Register your kindle to friend's accont (from the settings page on your kindle).
4. Immediately, all your folders dissapear, but everything 1) not in a folder and 2) hard loaded from your computer (not downloaded) stays on the kindle.
5. Go to archives on your Kindle (it will now be friend's archives) OR go to friend's Manage Your Kindle Content on amazon.com (you need to sign in as friend) and send/download the books you want to your Kindle (which is now registered to friend's account). I prefer browsing online once my kindle is registered to their account. But both options are available.
6. Once you have the books you want, deregister from friend's account (same as above.)
7. Register back into your account (same as above).
8. Your folders/collections will re-apear, all the books you downloaded from your friend's accounts are STILL (yippee!) on your kindle and also all the books you have hard loaded onto your kindle are there. So basically -- everything is there.
Easy peasy, takes literally minutes. :)
To answer your question on limits, it doesn't really matter unless all of your friends are registered at the same moment. I am guessing what will happen is people will register and derigster once they get the book they want. The book STAYS on their kindle and they don't have to stay registered in to read it. The only time they would have to stay registered in are if they are reading from an App and not on a kindle. Once your friend deregisters from your account, the license number for the number of books allowed to be read at the same time on any given device -- returns to the original number. I have called and talked to Amazon about this and they have confirmed all this for me -- years ago before I started doing it.
I hope this helps.
It's fascinating that there's no limit, compared to all sorts of things that limit sharing accounts. eg, some online systems lock off shared accounts and it can happen if you're logging in from different computers at different places. You'd think if one account has a lot of devices coming and going it'd raise flags.The simplicity of it almost makes me wonder why Amazon won't allow basic lending with more flexibility.
It isn't that Amazon won't allow basic lending, it is the publishers that won't allow it, according to my understanding. But I could be wrong.I have reviewed the FAQs on account sharing and the user agreement, this is not a violation of it. Unless I have missed a provision and someone else would like to point it out. :)
The Nook has something similiar but there are more controls (or at least there were when I tried it). On the Nook you need to enter the credit card information once you have registered to an account. And then when you deregister the Nook from the account the book does not stay on the Nook.
There are some limitations to the Amazon method. For example, if you save the book and upload it to your computer -- if you get another Kindle, you cannot transfer the book from your friend's account to another kindle, it won't work. The book can only be read on the kindle that was at one time registered to the friend's account.
I had suspected that the DRM was device-specific since they ask which device you want when you choose to download and copy by USB. Nice to have confirmation of that. Amazon must be creating a new copy of the book with DRM every time you request it on a new device.It's interesting. The licensing you buy (no quibbling here - you're *not* buying actual books, but licenses to access their content) is keyed to an Amazon account, but the download is keyed to a device.
Why?
Could Amazon be paying out royalties per "copy" based on device, even though we only pay per account? I doubt it's data mining - there's enough in the EULA to allow them to know what Amazon-DRM content you loaded onto another device even if you went through your own computer instead of direct from their site.
Maybe it's something about it being more difficult to clone a whole device than to create a jailbreak code that mimics attachment to a certain account? Such as the device ID including the MAC address or some other bit of hardware ID that's difficult to spoof.
It's just funny when you think about the concerns that both Amazon and the publishers have over "sharing" of different types. Seems quite silly how much they care.
Amazon has said they take a 30% cut on sales of most ebooks. They are not paying publishers per device. I think if it were soley up to Amazon they would sell the books drm free like they do on their music side for mp3 files. I think it is the publishers who are insisting on DRM and limiting the number of devices linked to an account at one time.
The publishers are afraid of a napster or where a book club would by 1 copy of the book and register dozens of kindles to a single account instead of each member buying their own copy.
Amazon probably isn't too worried about that because it requires giving someone else your username and password and how many people are you going to do that with? I don't think I have any friends I'd give my password to. I'd be willing to share it with family but I'm not going to share with the world.
But a book club could set up a stand alone account and fund it with a gift card in the exact amount of their monthly book purchase. They don't even have ever to give out their amazon user name and password. The owner would just ask for everyone's kindle device I'd and register them on the website. The only time someone needs the password is to login on the web or to register a kindle through the kindle settings menu.
Actually, as I understand it Amazon has at times advertised that benefit to book clubs. I don't give my password out to the world, but there is a limitation to what someone can do with it anyway. Sure, they could order something I don't want. But I get the email notifying me - -and then I call amazon and get it refunded and I change my password. There are not huge ramifications to it. But, still it is a sensitive ownership issue and I only give it to someone who I know and trust and who reciprocates -- like my mom, dad, a neighbor, and two other friends.
I was unaware that I had two accounts, and tried to register my iPad to an account - was then instructed to to de-register the device from another account. When I did so, all archived books were deleted, and I could not access them in the registered account. Amazon should have a policy which permits transfer of archives; otherwise, one cannot share books with another user on the same account. Every new account starts from scratch, no matter how many books you might have purchased earlier.
I had a neighbor that was able to combine 4 accounts. Maybe call again?
As a teacher, is it possible to set up an account for 30 Kindles?
I think that Amazon and many publishers only allow 6 Kindle or Kindle apps per book or account. But you could check with Amazon!
Bev wrote: "As a teacher, is it possible to set up an account for 30 Kindles?"If you did so, would you be teaching your students how to infringe copyright?
For example, if my sister was to get her own Kindle and wanted to read something that I've already purchased, it seems it would be possible to have her de-register the device from her account, register it onto mine, and sync a book that I had purchased. (No different than me loaning her a paper book - before anyone starts to fuss over royalties. :)
Does the system really work that easily to move devices around? Is there a limit of how many devices can attach to my account, or how many times one device can move? What am I perhaps missing here?