Stupid next-gen Kindle Fire and its out-of-the-box bugs! ...Oh wait...



  • New Kindle Fire 5th Generation was released today and, as promised, the lovely people at Amazon delivered mine at lunchtime.
    Natty little piece of kit - 7" screen for £49 / $49 (aside; why do we get so ripped off in the UK?).

    I'm at work and getting a bunch of videos copied onto my new toy seems more fun than debugging a duplicate key exception in the CRM app;

    • Install VLC - check.
    • Connect to PC via USB - "Fire" portable storage - check
    • Copy videos to Fire - che... wait - what? "You do not have permission to perform this operation" - says who?

    So I get on a Chat session with the ever-helpful Amazon people and go through the usual dumb Q&A ("Have you changed the USB cable? Have you installed Windows 95 Service Pack 1?, etc.")

    This goes on for half an hour and I'm about to write it off to launch-day version 1.0 bugginess when a facepalm occurs...

    We use BitLocker! I can't write files to an unencrypted USB device!

    What a tit. On the upside, I can confirm that the new Kindle Fire is worth £49 / $49 and that the support people are very pleasant when you swear at yourself on a chat session.


  • FoxDev

    @skotl said:

    why do we get so ripped off in the UK?

    7. Higher sales taxes
    16. Exchange rates
    99. Because they get away with it



  • And Amazon don't even have to pay tax in the UK... 😢


  • FoxDev

    @skotl said:

    And Amazon don't even have to pay tax in the UK... 😢

    well..... they have to pay tax in the UK, they just manage to utilize as yet legal loopholes to reduce their tax burdeon practically to zero.

    note, i said it was legal, not that it was moral. ;-)



  • @skotl said:

    We use BitLocker! I can't write files to an unencrypted USB device!

    Is that some option that can be set? I have BitLocker on and write to unencrypted devices all the time.



  • Yes, it's a GPO/registry setting.



  • @skotl said:

    Natty little piece of kit

    Is "natty" a good thing or a bad thing? It sounds like "nasty".



  • I can't even order it here, Amazon won't let me. Stop whining...







  • Do you use Mosaic as your browser or something? :wtf:


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @accalia said:

    they just manage to utilize as yet legal loopholes to reduce their tax burdeon practically to zero

    Don't worry. London is Ground Zero for those specialist firms that assist in such creative tax burden management. :angry:





  • As for #1, I'm going to remind Europeans once again that prices in USD are before any sales taxes.



  • That doesn't help at all unless it's £1.00 = $1.10


    Filed under:


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @skotl said:

    And Amazon don't even have to pay tax in the UK... 😢

    They aren't paying tax. You are. Stop whining. Where do you think free healthcare comes from?


  • FoxDev

    @boomzilla said:

    They aren't paying tax. You are.

    And that is what the problem is. Amazon are taking the money they make out of the UK to somewhere where they only have to pay a tiny amount of tax. That's money that's not going to HMRC, which means it's not paying for our various national, civil, and social services. Yet if we normal people tried that, we'd be charged, prosecuted, and fined quicker than you can say 'Fuck, the taxman!'.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @powerlord said:

    As for #1, I'm going to remind Europeans once again that prices in USD are before any sales taxes.

    @TwelveBaud said:

    That doesn't help at all unless it's £1.00 = $1.10

    Yeah, because the sales tax is probably somewhere between 5% - 10% depending on where you are. So let's be generous and say it's $52.

    $47 ~ £31
    £47 ~ $71

    ... according to google right now. Is some of that customs? Or is that included in the shipping? I have no idea...I don't buy much stuff internationally.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @RaceProUK said:

    @boomzilla said:
    They aren't paying tax. You are.

    And that is what the problem is. Amazon are taking the money they make out of the UK to somewhere where they only have to pay a tiny amount of tax. That's money that's not going to HMRC, which means it's not paying for our various national, civil, and social services. Yet if we normal people tried that, we'd be charged, prosecuted, and fined quicker than you can say 'Fuck, the taxman!'.

    Tried what, now? If you sell something to someone in another country, do you expect to pay taxes there? Eh...I don't know what Amazon does there vs here vs wherever. Did they get some special break for locating some part of their business there?

    Your system isn't as retarded as ours, where we tax companies on their foreign income that they've already paid taxes on somewhere else. But only when they bring the money back to the states. So they all keep all that money out of the country.



  • it's a bit like nifty, but different.

    Neat comes closest, I think.

    I would offer "sucks" and / or "blows", but they have transient, highly contextual, meanings that I've never bothered to "learn".

    I have the same issue with "bite", "bite me" etc Oh! Shit, wait!...You don't read "small", so I have the same issue with "bite", "bite me" etc


  • FoxDev

    @boomzilla said:

    If you sell something to someone in another country, do you expect to pay taxes there?

    If I sold something to someone in the US, I wouldn't expect to pay US taxes, aside from maybe import/export. But then I have no business operations in the US. Amazon though has business operations in the UK (offices and warehouses), and every business that operates within the UK is subjected to the UK tax code. So yes, Amazon should be paying their taxes.


  • ♿ (Parody)

    @RaceProUK said:

    So yes, Amazon should be paying their taxes.

    Looks like they are paying taxes now. But why shouldn't they take advantage of what the law allows?


  • FoxDev

    @boomzilla said:

    But why shouldn't they take advantage of what the law allows?

    Because they arewere literally taking money they made in the UK out of the UK. Now, I'm not going to call it 'stealing'; it was within the law, so it's not the right term. But morally, it's along the same lines.


  • Banned

    @skotl said:

    Kindle Fire



  • @TwelveBaud said:

    That doesn't help at all unless it's £1.00 = $1.10


    Filed under:

    Isn't UK VAT 20%, not 10%?

    But yes, even if you subtract out the VAT, it's still more expensive in the UK. Just not as expensive as it first looks.


  • FoxDev

    @powerlord said:

    Isn't UK VAT 20%, not 10%?

    Correct



  • I was going the other way around. US sales tax varies greatly and with great frequency (on a per-locality, per-goods-vertical basis) but a reasonable average estimate for non-alcoholic, non-grocery goods is 10%.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @boomzilla said:

    If you sell something to someone in another country, do you expect to pay taxes there?

    They pay (corporation) tax where ever they're based/have a presence. It's part of the EU law. Clearly stated.

    Specifically, only having warehouses in a country (as is the case in the UK) is not considered "having a presence" for the purposed of tax. Or even more specifically Corporation Tax (tax on profits).

    Amazon, of course, do pay tax in the UK. Employers National Insurance (payroll tax), Business Rates (property tax), VAT (sales tax) where applicable.

    But everyone who whines on about this ignore the fact that

    1. the tax they whining on about is Corporation Tax, yet treat it as if it's some sort of VAT ("they pay no tax yet look at their turnover" - yeah - turnover!=profit)
    2. and totally ignore the taxes that they do pay in the UK and can't get out of.
    3. Amazon are adhering not only to the letter, but the spirit (another spurious complaint) of the law in this matter

    Same deal with Vodafone, where similar complaints are made.



  • @PJH said:

    1) the tax they whining on about is Corporation Tax, yet treat it as if it's some sort of VAT ("they pay no tax yet look at their turnover" - yeah - turnover!=profit)

    I'm not sure whether you're for or against Amazon on this? It's the "little" things like moving the money through Switzerland (or was it Luxemburg?) and having that tiny little branch office charge Amazon UK a massive "Management Fee" which artificially shrinks the profit they would have declared in the UK.

    @PJH said:

    3) Amazon are adhering not only to the letter, but the spirit (another spurious complaint) of the law in this matter

    Oh - it's perfectly legal. And the problem with our (i.e. UK) politicians shouting "I SHALL MAKE AMAZON PAY WHAT THEY OWE!" is that there probably is nothing that they can realistically do to stop this practise. It makes good headlines, though.



  • (Except in the States that have no sales tax at all. Like Oregon or Alaska.)


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @powerlord said:

    Isn't UK VAT 20%, not 10%?

    But books aren't taxed in the UK at all, or maybe are taxed at 0%. (There's a difference apparently but my wallet doesn't see it. VAT rules are confusing…)



  • Last I checked, a Kindle is an electronic device.



  • Mine runs on the power of books.

    Making the Kindle into "yet another Android tablet #3427462374" was Amazon's worst move.


  • Grade A Premium Asshole

    @RaceProUK said:

    Yet if we normal people tried that, we'd be charged, prosecuted, and fined quicker than you can say 'Fuck, the taxman!'.

    Do you have something outside of your borders that you can turn in to an expense? No? Well, that is why you can't do it.



  • @dkf said:

    maybe are taxed at 0%

    Fucks up HMRC (and Accountants) if they can't allocate a Rate in they same way that 0 and nothing messes with their minds. Whilst they did not invent double entry bookkeeping, they can't function (mentally or physically) without it.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @skotl said:

    I'm not sure whether you're for or against Amazon on this?

    Indifferent.

    However, what I am sick of is all the people :wambulance: about "they don't pay enough tax" when they clearly do, and the clear solution to what they're :wambulance: about would be the equivalent to another sales tax (hey guys, 20% VAT isn't enough, how about 100% on internet sales instead?) rather than (what they're grasping at) another tax on their (non-existent, or very low) profits.)

    Now then - about incidence of tax, i.e. who would actually be paying that 100% VAT? I'm fairly certain it wouldn't be Amazon.


  • Discourse touched me in a no-no place

    @powerlord said:

    Last I checked, a Kindle is an electronic device.

    And it would have the full 20% attached to it. As would all the ebooks on it, because ebooks are obviously not at all the same thing as books. Though the zero-rated stuff extends to newspapers and magazines too, provided they're in physical form.

    In other news, don't believe any government that promises a tax cut. They're going to hike some other tax instead. Bastards. But this is very much the same old news…



  • Most food in the UK is 0% rated, as is children's clothing. But some food is not 0-rated and adult clothing is charged at the standard rate.
    There was uproar in the UK due to the proposed "Pie tax" where the government was happy to leave all food at 0% apart from unhealthy food. There were (metaphorical) riots in the streets cos people were going to have to pay VAT on their mince pies...



  • While I'm here, can I just say Awesome Work, folks on the level of off-topicness we've achieved here :)



  • @boomzilla said:

    Yeah, because the sales tax is probably somewhere between 5% - 10% depending on where you are. So let's be generous and say it's $52.

    At the end of the 1980s, I lived in a US state whose motto (on the license plates, no less) was "Live free or die!", one that's north of Massachusetts. Their sales tax was zero. And so was their income tax.

    And that motto on the plates may have helped create a little bubble around my car when I went down to New York in it, and drove around Manhattan for a while.



  • @skotl said:

    Most food in the UK is 0% rated, as is children's clothing. But some food is not 0-rated and adult clothing is charged at the standard rate.
    There was uproar in the UK due to the proposed "Pie tax" where the government was happy to leave all food at 0% apart from unhealthy food. There were (metaphorical) riots in the streets cos people were going to have to pay VAT on their mince pies...

    No, most food in the UK is not VAT-chargeable. That's not at all the same thing as zero-rated.

    Non-chargeable items like food pay no VAT. Zero-rated items like books pay zero VAT. (Sounds the same, but if ever "zero-rated" was eliminated, books would jump in price and food would not.)



  • @Steve_The_Cynic said:

    At the end of the 1980s, I lived in a US state whose motto (on the license plates, no less) was "Live free or die!", one that's north of Massachusetts.

    I love that license plate. I love any public institution that encourages coups and/or suicides.


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