“ Amazon’s biggest rival in the e-reader space has formed an official partnership with iFixit to provide repair kits and guides for its latest models.

[raymaccarthy@mastodon.ie]

@WanderingBeekeeper @dadbod
Also using Send to Kindle for Wirelessly copy to your Kindle or App gives Amazon a copy.
Almost no book is licenced for AI, at least by the author. A few publishers have done deals which may be illegal.
What is allowed in USA isn't a universal law.

[iris@neuromatch.social]

@dadbod I have a much older Kobo Clara 2E and I am both glad to see the direction of the company and disappointed that my ereader still declares itself capable of playing audiobooks, but only if they're bought from Kobo. It has Overdrive support and can load epubs from the library, but again, not audiobooks. Hope Kobo reassesses decisions like this for existing devices.

[j258853@toot.community]

@dadbod @HannahClover I switched from Kindle to Kobo Clara Colour and am very happy.

[raymaccarthy@mastodon.ie]

@HollieK72 @christymarx @dadbod
For most of the world the non-Amazon alternatives for reflowable novels are
Kobo (Canadian / Japanese ownes German Tolino ereaders. Owned by Rakuten who does Viber Chat)
PocketBook Ukraine/Swiss (may have taken over or merged with Chinese BigMe)
Boox (Chinese)
reMarkable is Norwegian (?), but a one trick pony more aimed at PDF/Annotation (poor compared to TCL Nxtpaper 14 for PDF/Annotation).
The large TCL Nxtpaper 14 is best for fixed layout, illustrated & PDF

[daisydaisy@mastodon.scot]

@dadbod I can borrow library books on my kobo which puts it miles ahead of a kindle already

[cian@post.lurk.org]

@dadbod
Doesn't hurt that their e-readers are very good, and pretty robust (mine is nearly 10 years old, and works fine).

Very hackable too. Sideloading is trivial, and they don't seem to have a problem with it.

[livs_ord@mastodonsweden.se]

@dadbod Glad I got a Kobo!

[cian@post.lurk.org]

@sol_hsa @dadbod

You're holding them to impossible standards here.

Repairable does not mean that you can restore it to the factory state, or that all repairs are going to be cost efficient.

[sol_hsa@mastodon.gamedev.place]

@cian @dadbod well true. For most devices these days, battery change alone seems impossible.

[contrasocial@mastodon.social]

@raymaccarthy @HollieK72 @christymarx @dadbod

Not shilling for them, but my Kobo has been inoffensive. Their store has all the books I look for, and it also doesn't fight me when I upload ebooks I find in the public domain as well using calibre or w/e.

No real fuss, at least with the model I have.

[aaron_davis@toot.cat]

@dadbod That's awesome!

[raymaccarthy@mastodon.ie]

@contrasocial @HollieK72 @christymarx @dadbod
I like the Kobo Sage and the mono Kobo Libra. Inexplicably they don't sell either now.
Kobo is best for Calibre
It can set subtitle, series, collection, publisher info/date, blurb as well as title & author. Linux / Mac / Windows. Reading status can be read /set. Annotations export via Kobo Utilities.

Libre Office Writer (copy past web or edit in odt). Extra SaveAs in docx & Calibre converts to ebook. Styles 1:1 CSS. Saved about 3000 sheets A4.

[sawaba@infosec.exchange]

@dadbod how painful is the ecosystem switch these days?

[raymaccarthy@mastodon.ie]

@dadbod
The article incorrectly claims Amazon practically invented the ereader.
1990 Sony ereader using mini CDs.
1998 Predecessor to epub2 was published and an ereader with a modem.
Palm & Win CE PDAs used to read ebooks
2005 Sony does first eink ereader
2005 Amazon buys biggest seller of ebooks for PDA & smartphones: Mobipocket (who use obsolete mobi format)
2007 Amazon launches 1st eink Kindle in USA only.
Project Gutenberg PD ebooks are since 1972!

[oszy@ieji.de]

@dadbod
I've got two Kobos, the Elipsa 2E and the Clara 2E and I love them!

[frank@fraxoweb.social]

@dadbod

Last year, I bought a PocketBook Verse e-reader.

I don't buy Kindles anymore

[burnitdown@beige.party]

@dadbod

idk which model of Kobo i have, but it's an older one. you can run NetBSD on it if you want to! i'm not sure what anyone would do with NetBSD on this thing, but it's cool that it's possible.

[mikalintu@livellosegreto.it]

@dadbod guess who bought a new Kindle Paperwhite on Christmas 2025 to substitute the older broken one? :S

[darren@c.im]

@dadbod Stop it! I'm not used to receiving good news.

[johnbrown@thecanadian.social]

@dadbod I mean we stopped being amazon customers in like 2016. You could see ALL of this coming decades ago, lol.

We went as far a hiring a lawyer to go after a bullshit online seller who hid the fact they were an amazon storefront. We would never use a kindle, and have our own source for ebooks. I hear its getting pretty wild in amazon land =P