How I purchase e-books How not to use Amazon or Kobo

I have a Kindle e-reader myself, but don’t like a single monopolist like Amazon to control the market. So I try, whenever possible, to skip their market place. And that is perfectly possible. But say goodbye to one-click shopping.

(same argument probably also applies to the Kobo store, another popular eReader-manufacturer, but perhaps less evil for not being Amazon and supporting ‘local’ shops, e.g. Bol.com in the Netherlands… which is basically the Amazon of the Netherlands, oh well…)

The alternative

Many books these days come without DRM(!) … they’re still watermarked, but that doesn’t stop you from converting books.

So, it takes some dedication but my approach is:

1. To search for the book’s publisher, check their website for a purchase link and purchase it there.
   • Or use libris (Dutch independent booksellers collaboration), which allows you to pick a local Libris connected bookshop, and purchase an e-book from them.
   • And try your local bookstores; one of the bookstores near by my home actually sells eBooks as well on their website.
2. Copy the download to my Calibre e-book manager
3. Send it to my device (I set up sending to my kindle.com email adress for wireless syncing)

Calibre is horrendous looking, but when you have it configured correctly it works.

Not ideal.

Of course there are plenty of disadvantages:

• You might end up with multiple accounts at multiple publishers and have to walk through quite a few different ways to obtain it.
  • Hence: downloading it with just your e-reader is a nogo
  • Hence: one click download doesn’t work
• Calibre is not a really pleasant app to use
• You are responsible for backups => but as I recently learned, you should always make sure you have your own backups

I welcome suggestions for better approaches.