"The Amazon kindle provides convenience, but at the cost of freedom. When you purchase a kindle, you must agree to use the Digital Restriction Management (DRM) system. Since all of the Kindle ebooks you purchase from Amazon are in their proprietary DRM format, you are also promising to not share them with friends. And, because you promise to not circumvent the DRM, there is no way to move them to another device or a computer. You are locked into the Kindle and you are locked into Amazon. If you try to move them to a new ebook reader or a computer, Amazon can end your service and remove access to the books you have already purchased..."

via http://www.defectivebydesign.org/node/1096 (instructions on tagging - Kindle Swindle )

Amazon recently released the source code of some of the components that are used in the Kindle. Contrary to the erroneous reports that are circulating the Web, Amazon is not opening its e-book reader. The code release is purely for GPL compliance while the Kindle's ebook features remain proprietary.

Inspired by Seinfeld, DefectiveByDesign is "impeaching" Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, asking him to drop DRM on the Kindle.

It was unfortunately reported yesterday by a number of sources that Amazon had released the source code for the software running on the Kindle DX.
This isn’t all of the Kindle source code. It’s a selection released in order to comply with the license requirements of the code originally written by other people (like the GNU Project) which Amazon modified for its own purposes.

The FSF and Defective By Design, which on Monday called on activists to post reviews calling attention to the Kindle Swindle's arbitrary deletion of George Orwell ebooks from hundreds of users' devices, welcomed Bezos's apology, but said more must be done to remedy the problems exposed by Amazon's actions.

San Francisco bookstore Green Apple Books has put together a series of humorous videos that point up the advantages of paper books over Amazon's Kindle e-book reader.

What was Jeff Bezos, Amazon's CEO, thinking? Amazon just signed a patent cross-licensing deal that pays Microsoft intellectual property fees for, among other things, patents that cover Amazon's Linux-based Kindle e-reader and its Linux servers.

Your editor recently "celebrated" yet another birthday; one asks "which birthday?" at the risk of making him grumpy indeed. During that celebration, a surprising present turned up, in the form of an Amazon Kindle book reader. That presents an opportunity to play with a new toy, something your editor is not known for turning down, even when the toy is as problematic as the Kindle.

The Free Software Foundation's DefectiveByDesign.org campaign, in cooperation with prominent authors, journalists, and librarians, has launched a petition against the Amazon Kindle's use of digital restrictions management (DRM).