Charity bookselling

Thu 26 Aug 2021, 17:47

Malcolm, What Andrew says about licensing ebooks also applies to most other types of ebooks. What a reader is "buying" is not the ebook, but a licence to read the book issued by the publisher or the platform, and that licence can be shared with a small number of other pre-registered machines, but not transferred between users. 

There are various ways around this -- the legalities of which are disputed. But I doubt it  something that a Charity Bookshop would want to be seen as supporting -- except where the author had wanted her or his book to be free of DRM (Digital Rights Management) and had an appropriate contract. 

Interestingly, it's not possible to borrow Kindle books from UK public libraries (unlike US public libraries) as Amazon has not signed up to the agreement about DRM and public lending rights. 

And, following up Felicity Brookes post about ALCS, for those authors wanting to benefit from the next ALCS distribution of lending and copying fees (and now also 2nd-hand book sales), 9 September is a key date for adding your details. 

Thu 26 Aug 2021, 07:36

Malcolm, I'm afraid (in the case of Kindle books) Amazon's terms of service expressly state 'Kindle Content is licensed, not sold, to you by the Content Provider.' (See here.) So alas you do not have rights to transfer Kindle books elsewhere. (From a technical point of view it's perfectly possible to circumvent the DRM, and thus share the content elsewhere, but of course there's no legal right to do so.) 

Wed 25 Aug 2021, 11:20

Not a direct response, but authors in Charlbury (and elsewhere) may be interested to learn that they can now receive royalties from some of the sales of their books sold second-hand, but will need to register their titles with ALCS (Authors Licensing and Collecting Society). You can nominate a charity for your ALCS distributions too.

https://societyofauthors.org/News/News/2021/June/AuthorSHARE-launch

Wed 18 Aug 2021, 20:09

What an excellent idea!  It would save me a hernia, and perhaps a divorce  .. hard to know which I shall get first from my current book sorting.

I'm embarrassingly technophobic .. but surely there's someone out there who can help this happen?

Wed 18 Aug 2021, 20:05

Digital ebook licence transfers. Just a thought.

I'm not sure how the digital rights for ebooks work, for such as Kindle and Kobo readers (and tablets and general purpose computational devices as ISTR Prof. Alan Turing put it in his short paper "inventing" computers).

I think that it is possible to transfer licences for digital copies in the US, provided the original iteration on the first machine is relinquished and it is erased.

I was thinking about some convenient "centre" for exchange where offers from current licence holders can be catalogued in one place for convenience of searching and acquiring. A sort of non-fungible but actually sort of fungible transactionn,,,

Also facilities for actual loading of files onto a person's device. Any old computer able to load a basic GUI (graphic user interface) with some usb cables or a wireless dongle if not modern enough to have wireless chipset in it. Even a £35 quid Raspberry Pi credit-card size computer with a few memory sticks or sd cards, any old monitor and a usb/bluetooth keyboard and mouse would be overkill.

There will be people for whom getting to grips with file transfers could be a problem needing help to step through.

I've got a few legit ebooks I'm never going to read again (and some which I never got into them and they are cluttering up my limited Kindle storage space) for starters.

So what is possible?

Wed 18 Aug 2021, 10:35 (last edited on Wed 18 Aug 2021, 20:10)

As usual I write with little knowledge and no authority .. but a number of people are asking, and so let me explain what I think is going on.

The original Corner House bookshop (Neil P-W's domain, upstairs) is now open again, selling books as usual for 50p, with all proceeds to the Corner House & Memorial Hall [CHMH].  There's a wider, and will soon be a larger, selection of books than before, including more older out-of-print hardbacks etc.  From September the shop will usually be open all day, but during August it's (I think) open only in the mornings.  Neil is however no longer selling children's books ...

... which instead are being sold downstairs in the back room of CornerStone [CS], for a suggested donation to CS of 20p each (three for 50p).  CS are also still selling adults' books (suggested £1 each, three for £2);  but these are gradually being moved to ...

... the Anne Downer room (on the left, downstairs);  also at £1 each, three for £2 (the proceeds being shared 4:1 between CHMH & CS).  Please pay for them in CornerStone.

Meanwhile I'm taking over the CRAG stock of secondhand books from Clive G-L.  Many will be sold on the internet, with all profits of course to CRAG;  but some will find their way to the Corner House & CornerStone, and a few also no doubt to ..

.. the Street Fair, where there will be a bookstall (mostly of books not sold in Charlbury before, ie fresh stock for the occasion), with all proceeds to CHMH.

Donations continue to be welcome, at the Corner House (leave them in the box in the hallway) or larger quantities collected by me:  07555 608780; john@pjohnp.me.uk.  I am also happy to sell better-quality books online for you or for your chosen charity:  just ask.  ['Books' above refers to books, CDs, DVDs and maps.]