Device limited Kindle Books

Amazon has said all along that Kindle books are limited to six devices, not necessarily simultaneously, but in total. This limit isn't actually in the Terms of Service (I can't even find those for actual Kindle books, only for the Kindle device), but has been in the marketing materials and on the FAQ page under Kindle Support.

Most books and other non-subscription items you purchase from the Kindle store may be simultaneously accessed for your personal use on to up to six Kindles (or Kindle compatible devices) registered to your Amazon.com account.

If you reach the device limit and wish to replace one of your current devices with a new one, you must first deregister and delete the content from the device you wish to replace before you can access the content in question from your new device. Please see the "Registering Your Kindle" section of our Managing Your Kindle Settings Help page to learn how to register/deregister your Kindle. There is no limit on the number of times a title can be downloaded to a registered device.

It turns out that removing a license isn't all that simple and may not be possible at all for a device that you are simply no longer using, although they can be removed for devices that have been replaced. If you have a device break and are at the limit, you have to get Customer Service to remove the license from each book in your library, a process that is apparently done by hand, one book at a time. (Have these people never heard of computers, search engines and automated programs? There is no reason this could not be done by the end customer or at least in a more automated and faster fashion by Customer Support.)

Also implied in this paragraph is that some books won't allow six devices. In fact, each publisher may limit book purchases to fewer than six devices. In the past, you had to guess as to which books were limited, by simply trying to add six devices and hitting the limit, whatever it might be. This week, though, I started noticing this new disclaimer on many books:

• Simultaneous Device Usage: Up to 5 simultaneous devices, per publisher limits

It has been applied to a number of titles and a wide variety of publishers have apparently started entering limits. You would think that with four readers here, it wouldn't be a big deal - but we have six devices (four Kindles, plus a DX and one iPhone App). With the encouragement from Amazon to use the iPhone app and sync back and forth (which really only works well for an account with either a single reader or readers who never read the same book at the same time), plus hints of releasing a Kindle App for other devices (I want it on my Sprint Mogul, for example), I can easily see people hitting the device limits with only 3 active readers (and for whatever odd reason, I know of at least one Kindle reader who has three actual Kindle devices, reading different material on each one or multiple at a time - not unreasonable for research or studying purposes, really, or for a professional editor).

I've spot checked the books in my library and have found this limitation on a surprising number of them -- mostly independent authors using DTP and some that are using Amazon's CreateSpace as the publisher (I suspect they must actually use the Amazon DTP services to get their books on Kindle, however). But other independent authors do not have such limits set, which leads me to believe that these authors are intentionally limiting the use of their books - which begs the question, why are they picking five versus the default of six? Is there some (perhaps new) setting in the DTP system that is misleading authors into thinking that they are being the least restrictive by picking "five" as the device limit (perhaps leaving that selection as blank yields the six-device limit). I suspect (hope) a misunderstanding of the process has lead to all these books being limited to five devices, as only one single book that I checked had any other number as the limit (Gluten-Free Girl: How I Found the Food That Loves Me Back...And How You Can Too, which I purchased many months ago, has a 4 device limit; so did all the other Kindle books from the same publisher, Wiley).

Here's a quick summary of just the books I've bought this month (which mainly shows, I think, that I buy too many books; in my defense, many of them were free), by limitation and "publisher." There is only one obvious DTP publisher in the default limitations list (and that one appears to be listed from mobipocket.com), while almost all those with limits appear to be self-published (one of which is Chris Anderson's FREE: The Future of a Radical Price). The number in parenthesis is the count of books purchased from that publisher, if greater than one.

No/default device limitations

Mike Darretta (DTP; mobipocket.com)
Samhain Publishing, Ltd (2)
Scribner Ebooks
Aspect
St. Martin's Press
Harlequin
Aladdin
Tor Books
Good News Publishers/Crossway Books
Public Domain Books (3)
Harvard Business School
Ballantine Books
Delacorte Press

Limited to Five Devices

Penguin/Putnam/NAL (3)
Hyperion e-books
AuthorHouse
CreateSpace

However, I don't think that in many cases it is the actual publisher who is setting the limitation, but the author (and one who is using Amazon DTP). Lee Golderg's latest book, My Gun Has Bullets, for example has the five device limit and claims to be from St. Martin's Press (but is priced as an indie/DTP book), yet a book I purchased earlier in the month with the same publisher does not have the limit (sorry Lee, your book just happened to get used in this example!). The three from Penguin/Putnam/NAL all all one author, who has stated on another board that he owns the digital rights, so I suspect that he is the actual publisher. Chris Anderson's book is from Hyperion and the last two are obvious DTP published independent authors.

The other possibility is that Amazon themselves has (hopefully, mistakenly) added this limitation. I've spot checked books going back several months and found this 5-device limit on nearly every DTP/indie authored book that I checked (the earliest of which I purchased last August).

So, if you are an indie author using DTP, let me know: Did you set this limit on purpose? Or is Amazon unfairly limiting books published independently? Are you going to let Amazon know you are unhappy about this?

If you are a reader: What do you think of the new limits? Is it fair to be applied retroactively? Are you going to let Amazon know you are unhappy about this (please, no boycotts - just vote with your purchases)?