Amazon sued over damaged Kindles

Amazon is facing legal pressure after at least one Kindle e-book owner filed a lawsuit against the company, saying the Kindle’s cover unexpectedly broke the screen to his e-book reader.

Amazon has agreed to replace the broken Kindles — and fix the problem — but the lawsuit will likely continue.  The class-action lawsuit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington, which is where Amazon is located.

The leather cover, which is sold separately, puts too much pressure on the Kindle’s hinges, leading it to damage and possibly crack the screen.

“I think it’s a much bigger problem, given the number of posts going up every day,” Beth Terrell, Geise’s lawyer said in a statement.  “These are just the tip of the iceberg.”

I’ve read some Twitter messages and Internet forum postings where other Kindle and Kindle DX owners voiced their complaints about the add-on cover.  The device itself doesn’t have a flaw, so simply not using the cover is sufficient to prevent damage to the device until Amazon fixes the problem with the cover.

Anyone with a problem should return the cover, Amazon says, and a replacement will be sent out.

“We encourage anyone who has an issue with the cover attachment mechanism to return the cover and device for a free replacement so we can investigate further,” Amazon said in a statement.

I believe Amazon will simply pay off the plaintiff, Mathew Geise, to simply make this case go away, if possible.  Fixing the covers and ending this legal case should help potential customers forget about any issues — remember, it wasn’t long ago when Amazon faced lawsuits over several patent issues with the Kindle.

In addition to a possible major legal issue, Amazon also must deal with a growing number of e-book readers being released by competitors.  The company recently cut the price of the Kindle 2 by $60 to better compete with these rival products, and an e-book reader war may be in the works.