Whenever my MiL asks my advice on formats I've said "get the most open one you're allowed - people who want to steal library ebooks will do it regardless of format, and people who don't just want to be able to read on their own device."

One of my favorite long-term possible benefits of e-readers is the end of "out of print". I can't tell you how long it took me to find a readable copy of "The Many-Colored Land" by Julian May back in high school. Noe, of course, I could probably find it online quite easily, but I don't love buying used books online.

Yeah, the 1984 Kindle scandal was a product purchase deal breaker for me. You`ll note that I am getting a canner and not an ereader as this year`s gift. I still want one, but I`ll let the market settle first.
 
Of course I am the wrong market for this though, as I am a 5 dollars for a bag book buyer.

All The Many Ways Amazon So Very Failed the Weekend

Heh... I thought I was going crazy when I went to buy Eye of the World for my Kindle, and it wasn't there anymore! Then I looked further and noticed all of Robert Jordan's books had been removed. But, on the bright side, a friend sent me a pdf of EotW and I learned how to convert it to a form my Kindle will read!

I do hate that publishers are going to be releasing ebooks later than the paper copies though. I'm not a patient person, so if it's a book I really want, I'm not sure what I'll do yet.

This is tangentially related (only in the sense that it's about book release dates):

If a book is released in the UK (and, consequently, available for purchase on UK Web sites), but not *yet* released in the US, though it will eventually be released in the US, can I buy it from a UK retailer?

The fourth Skulduggery Pleasant book is out on April 1, but only from UK and Australian retailers. There is not yet a US release date, though it is scheduled to be released here.

This happened with the previous book -- it was released in the UK in March or April, and not in the US until August. When I tried to order it from the UK, I got a message saying it wouldn't ship to me until August, although it was in stock.

Any earthly reason that should be so?

American publishers will only have the rights to it on a certain date, so I assume unless you went to England and physically bought the book and brought it home, an online retailer can't sell/ship to the U.S. until the U.S. pub date.

Damn it. I figured that was the case. Or something like it.

I've bought books form Amazon.com that weren't available at amazon.ca without any problems, but I don't know if there were publishing issues or just availability issues. I know people that have successfully bought books from Amazon.co.uk (to ship to Canada) specifically because they were released in the UK earlier.

Steph, did you actually place the order before you got the message?