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Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon.com Inc, shows a Kindle, its wireless electronic reader - Source: Reuters
Amazon.com Inc has settled for $US150,000 a lawsuit brought by a
high school student and another consumer who claimed the online
retailer illegally deleted from their Kindle devices digital copies
of George Orwell's 1984.
The settlement, filed September 25, revealed that Amazon in
September offered consumers whose books had been deleted a new free
digital copy as well as $US30.
The lawsuit was initially filed in July in US District Court in
Seattle and sought class-action status.
It claimed Amazon did not have the right to delete digital
content that had been purchased by consumers for use on their
Kindles, the electronic reading devices made by Amazon.
This summer, Amazon acknowledged it deleted certain purchased
e-books from the Kindles of some of its customers after learning
that a third party who had posted the books did not have the legal
rights to do so.
The reimbursement made it unlikely for a judge to certify a
class-action, the plaintiffs said in the settlement.
Under terms of the settlement, Amazon will not delete such works
unless the consumer agrees, unless a refund is requested or unless
the work contains some harmful embedded code that would hurt
operation of the Kindle.
Seattle-based Amazon will pay the plaintiffs' lawyers a fee of
$US150,000 to be donated to a charitable organization that promotes
literacy, children's issues, secondary or post- secondary
education, health or job placement, according to the
settlement.
