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Norway’s Consumer Council is threatening to sue Amazon over the user agreement for its popular Kindle e-reader.  The council insists that the terms of the agreement are in violation of basic consumer rights.  Those terms include Amazon’s right to remove books from the Kindle if the terms are violated, their right to change the terms at anytime, and the fact that Kindle books can not be read on any other device.

That last issue is something the council has taken issue with in the past with other companies.  They threatened legal action against Apple in 2006 because at the time items bought from the iTunes store were only playable on iPods.  The complaints were dropped after Apple removed the DRM restriction and allowed songs bought there to be compatible with all mp3 players.

Amazon hasn’t had any comment yet but this bears keeping an eye on.  Many Kindle users share the council’s complaints about books bought on Amazon not being compatible with other ebook readers.  Amazon has slowly been opening up their platform though, first with a Kindle app for the iPhone and iPod Touch and soon will release one for PCs.  With Sony, Barnes & Noble and other companies now offering their own e-readers for sale, Amazon will have it’s work cut out for it if it want to stay on top of the pile.

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