AmazonTERMS OF USE, PRIVACY NOTICE &LICENSE AGREEMENT

Online Policy PrimerNET 303

What was the world’s biggest bookstore has now become the world’s biggest everything store (Hoovers, 2011).

Amazon.com

Selling anything from books, CDs, Blurays and MP3s tocameras, clothing, toys,

sports equipment and lots more.

Photo credit: ‘Kindle 2.0 in a box’ (2009) by shadowstorm

They even have their own range of credit cards

(Amazon, 2011c).

Photo credit: ‘amazon.co.jp Credit Card’ (2008) by MJ/TR (´ ･ω ･ )

But have you read their

Terms of Use, Privacy Policy or

License Agreement?

Because by even visiting the website, you are accepting the practices outlined in the Privacy Policy (Amazon, 2008),

which states that Amazon can collect and store a

comprehensive dossier of your personal details and other information including:

your nameaddress

phone numbercredit card information

email addressesyour friends’ details

your photographfinancial information

and social security and driver’s license numbers

(Amazon, 2008).

Photo credit: ‘Self Portrait’ (2009) by t6mdm

where your personal information is compiled, stored and used as they see fit but recently governments have

attempted to gain access to customer data compiled by Amazon, interested in what people are buying including titles like…

This kind of data mining has been called by Rotenburg as

“a ticking privacy time bomb” (Barbaro & Zeller, 2006),

“Lolita” “Brokeback Mountain”

and “Fahrenheit 9/11” (Cohen, 2010).

Generally speaking, Terms of Use and privacy policies are rarely read by users but

“they are the binding forces thatdetermine what a company can do

with your personal information and private data” (White, 2011).

Another way Amazon gets your information is through the use of Flash cookies, which are more persistent and are harder to avoid relative to normal browser cookies (Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, 2011).

Photo credit: ‘”chocolate chip cookies’ (2009) by seriousbri

Also, although the Privacy Notice states that Amazon does not sell products to children, there is no way it can verify that is can’t happen.

Photo credit: ‘"his" computer’ (2011) by Paul Mayne

And of course… “Amazon reserves the right to refuse service, terminate accounts, remove or edit content, or cancel orders in their sole discretion” (Amazon, 2011b).

Now what about th

at Kindle

ebook reader y

ou own?

Photo credit: ‘Kindle Birdies’ (2010) by sarowen

As a Kindle owner, you are subject to the Kindle License Agreement and Terms of Use which states

“Digital Content is licensed, not sold, to you by the Content Provider”

(Amazon, 2011a).

This means that you don’t own books in a traditional sense,rather just the unlimited rights to read them (Buchanan, 2008). You can’t resell or loan your digital copy.

Now that's a whole new interpretation of

“ownership”.

Photo credit: Adapted from ‘Book Sale’ (2010) by clemsonunivlibrary

Amazon also have to rights to

remove purchased content from your Kindle.

In 2009, Amazon deleted digital copies of books from customers’ devices,

without consent or notice, due to insufficient rights to sell the books (Stone, 2009).

Ironically, among the books removed were George Orwell’s

‘1984’and

‘Animal Farm’.

Photo credit: ‘Pig’ (2010) by Travis S.

Kindle owners were angry. This case highlights the “gap in understanding about rights in the digital world and the real world” (Claburn, 2009).

People expect digital world rights to be the same as real world right.

The Kindle License Agreement has been

changed and amended many hundreds of times over the last few years (TOSBack, 2011),

constantly protecting Amazon’s best interests.

Photo credit: ‘Day 54/365’ (2010) by Roxanne Cooke

But if you were notified every time it changes,

which you’re not, would you re-read the agreement?

So if you think that digital copy of ‘1984’ is the same as the one on your bookshelf, think again.

Photo credit: ‘Big Brother Congestion’ (2006) by jeroen020

So let’s recap, Amazon is a company that knows who you are,

where you live,

your bank and credit card details,

your phone number and email address,

what you like,

what you buy and

who your friends are.

Plus they have access to your purchased digital content,

which they have the power to remove.

Would you trust them?

Creative Commons LicenseThis work is licensed under a

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License.

References

Amazon (2011a). Amazon.com Kindle License Agreement and Terms of Use. Retrieved from http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html/ref=hp_left_sib?ie=UTF8&nodeId=200506200 Amazon (2011b). Conditions of Use. Retrieved from http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?ie=UTF8&nodeId=508088 Amazon (2011c). Amazon.com Credit Offerings. Retrieved from http://www.amazon.com/Credit-Cards/b?ie=UTF8&node=1266766011 Amazon (2008). Amazon.com Privacy Notice. Retrieved from http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?ie=UTF8&nodeId=468496 amazon.co.jp Credit Card (2008). [Image]. Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/photos/mujitra/2527994700/ Barbaro, M. & Zeller, T. (2006). A Face Is Exposed for AOL Searcher No. 4417749. Retrieved from http://w2.eff.org/Privacy/AOL/exhibit_d.pdf Big Brother Congestion (2006). [Image]. Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/photos/jeroen020/349034095/ Book Sale (2010). [Image]. Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/photos/clemsonunivlibrary/5017091407/ Buchanan, C. (2008). Amazon Kindle and Sony Reader Locked Up: Why Your Books Are No Longer Yours. Retrieved from http://gizmodo.com/369235/amazon-kindle-and-sony-reader-locked-up-why-your-books-are-no-longer-yours

Claburn, T. (2009). Amazon Says It Will Stop Deleting Kindle Books. Retrieved from http://www.informationweek.com/news/personal-tech/digital-content/218501227 Cohen, N. (2010). In a State’s Search for Sales Tax, Amazon Raises Privacy Concerns. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/03/business/media/03link.html?src=busln Day 54/365 (2010). [Image]. Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/photos/yakoshka/4383282187/ Hoovers (2011). Amazon.com, Inc. [Fact Sheet] Retrieved from http://www.hoovers.com/company/Amazoncom_Inc/hrcsyi-1.html “his” computer (2011). [Image]. Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulm/5574119017/ Kindle 2.0 in a box (2009). [Image]. Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/photos/shadowstorm/3312576649/ Kindle Birdies (2010). [Image]. Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/photos/sarowen/4411436839/ Pig (2011). [Image]. Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/photos/baggis/6115219043/ Privacy Rights Clearinghouse (2011). Fact Sheet 18: Online Privacy: Using the Internet Safely [Fact Sheet]. Retrieved from https://www.privacyrights.org/fs/fs18-cyb.htm Self Portrait (2009). [Image]. Retrieved from http://www.flickr.com/photos/t6mdm/3362295860/ Stone, B. (2009). Amazon Erases Orwell Books From Kindle. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/18/technology/companies/18amazon.html TOSBack: The Terms of Service Tracker (2011). Amazon Kindle License Agreement and Terms of Use. Retrieved from http://www.tosback.org/policy.php?pid=35 White, C. (2011). Analyzing the Terms of Service (or “Not Every Company is Evil”) [Editorial]. Retrieved from http://www.neowin.net/news/analyzing-the-terms-of-service-or-not-every-company-is-evil