This is a grey area for piracy since you need to own the ebook but… you also don’t really “own” anything purchased in digital distribution and this is removing DRM from that. Suffice to say, if this were Nintendo they would try to sue you so it is probably more piracy than not.

Confirmed working as of a few minutes ago since I wanted to rebuild this with KVM.

Based on https://www.reddit.com/r/Calibre/comments/1c2ryfz/ and comments thereof.

  1. Create a new virtual machine. I recently used KVM directly but also had success with Virtual Box.
  2. Install Windows 10
  3. Disable internet access for the VM.
  4. Download and install Kindle 2.4.70904 (SHA256 2e2e4e5bb9fd585947244a4a62ce5baca47818c439d0213cc9a5a96f9a692119) from https://kindleforpc.s3.amazonaws.com/70904/KindleForPC-installer-2.4.70904.exe
  5. Run the Kindle app and disable updating (Tools > Options > General > disable “Automatically install updates…”). Optionally change the save path.
  6. Run the batch script disable_k4pc_download.bat (SHA256 656fbabfa9d1bb3fd1160100391fbf3886597633178e37cffcffe747d3b66567
    ) under step 2a at https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=361503 to ACTUALLY disable automatic upgrading
  7. Re-enable networking.
  8. Download and install Calibre. 7.13.0 from https://download.calibre-ebook.com/7.13.0/. This version is known working and all efforts I found used Windows so I went with the msi (SHA256 7c1b57b6f55076cc646a30eb6394ec00df18be373c3badf80d7ee39152ccffda
    ) since this install exists solely to strip DRM before I then add them to my Calibre-Web server.
  9. Launch Calibre and install the KFX Input plugin from the built in plugin manager
  10. Separately download the 10.0.9 version of the DeDRM plugin (newer may work but, again, lazy) from https://github.com/noDRM/DeDRM_tools/releases/download/v10.0.9/DeDRM_tools_10.0.9.zip. SHA256 of d46e7ff94a46dc871eb9b7e639e6da1883823cd5a9d705d53f51bd9c251aabda
  11. Launch Kindle, login, and download whatever you want to strip DRM from. I did run into some weirdness where I had an exclamation point after logging in but restarting the k4pc app allowed me to download books.
  12. In Calibre, add all the books you downloaded by clicking and dragging the .azw file from Explorer to the Calibre window. You must do this from the downloaded directory as DeDRM is dependent on metadata in the same directory. This can be automated using a batch script pretty trivially.
  13. Then convert them to a non azw3 format (mobi if you are putting it back on a Kindle. epub otherwise).
  14. And then all the epub files in your Calibre library should have had DRM removed and be ready to import into your real Calibre library (or in a random folder on your computer)
    • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zipOPEnglish
      2·
      3 hours ago

      Yup.

      A Sanderson book will be on every tracker. But ML Wang? Maybe now that booktube love them but most smaller writers don’t get that

      And, truth be told, I like reading and want authors I like to be able to justify the time spent writing.

      • Firipu@startrek.websiteEnglish
        2·
        2 hours ago

        To be honest, books are the only form of media I don’t pirate. They deserve my money. Sucks that I have to use big shops to get them digital, but it’s so easy…

        • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zipOPEnglish
          1·
          2 hours ago

          If you find an author you like, check their website. There are decent odds they directly sell ebooks or link to their publisher’s website first. I’ve heard mixed reports on it, but some people claim buying direct from the publisher gives the writer a bigger cut (and, obviously, buying from them directly does).

          Usually resutls in a DRM free ebook without any effort.