Jeff Bezos

The on-screen message draws the line: previously downloaded books still open, but the device can no longer pull new purchases from the Kindle store. So he built a workaround, buy on Amazon, torrent a DRM-free copy, sideload over USB, and admits the purchase step now delivers no benefit whatsoever.

Not everyone sees malice. One reader whose own older Kindle still sideloads says the block only hits the store on end-of-life devices, whose ancient built-in browser was never going to last.

The story: internal memes deriding Amazon's AI coding tools, set against Bezos-era promises of 'unprecedented productivity gains.'

Then a current employee said the quiet part: staff have unlimited free Claude Code and Codex, plus the new Mythos, and abandoned Amazon's own Kiro the moment they could.

The deeper read isn't 'AI bad' — it's org chaos: too many short-lived internal tools and token dashboards eating their own tail.