Just wanted to get this out to let everyone know of something cool from Amazon overnight – as if Carly’s note about Amazon and Fancy Widget wasn’t cool enough!
Bottom line – Amazon has unveiled the ‘lending library’ that was rumored before the Kindle Fire launch. Basically, if you own a Kindle, and are a member of Amazon Prime, you have access to a reasonable size library of works you can borrow one at a time.
Here is the description:
Today we’re announcing a new benefit for Kindle owners with an Amazon Prime membership: the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library.
Kindle owners can now choose from thousands of books to borrow for free, including over 100 current and former New York Times Bestsellers — as frequently as a book a month, with no due dates. No other e-reader or ebook store offers such a service.
The Kindle Owners’ Lending Library features a wide array of popular titles, including Water for Elephants, Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game, and Fast Food Nation – plus award-winning novels such as The Finkler Question, motivational books like The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, biographies and memoirs including Kitchen Confidential, and Pulitzer Prize-winning books like Guns, Germs, and Steel.
We’re adding the Kindle Owners’ Lending Library to Prime membership at no extra cost — Amazon Prime remains just $79 a year, which gives you free two-day shipping on millions of products, plus unlimited instant streaming of almost 13,000 movies and TV shows.
If you’re a Kindle owner with Prime, you can start borrowing books today. If you don’t yet have a Kindle, our all-new Kindle family is available from just $79.
We’re working hard to continuously drive even more value for Kindle owners. We hope you enjoy the new library — happy borrowing.
The other restriction noted is “one book per month”, which is definitely a limitation – especially for voracious readers like my kids – but it is still enough that there is a clear benefit. What do you think?
Head to Amazon and check out more details and get started!
Well, this got my attention. The main issue blocking me from purchasing a Kindle in the past has been the relatively high cost of the downloads. I can typically buy used books for half the price of a Kindle version.
On John Grisham’s _The Confession_, for example, the Kindle version is $9.99, a brand new mass paper is the same price, a new hardcover is about $15, and a gently used hardcover goes for $4. What’s more frustrating is that they “never” budge on the Kindle price even after the new has long worn off of a title. I put “never” in quotes, because I expect they do run some specials at times, but by and large, it’s $9.99 for a major writer’s novels. John Grisham’s very first novel, _A Time To Kill_, a bestseller that peaked after the movie was released fifteen years ago, is still $9.99 on Kindle. If I was a reader who had just discovered Grisham, I’d be an idiot to go back and purchase his entire works on Kindle at $9.99 per pop when I could get the hardcovers for $4.
I already have a
Prime membership that I use regularly for Amazon purchases, free movies and TV shows. Now that I can get one free book per month, I’ll most likely buy a Kindle.
Not sure about Grisham but bear in mind that many mainstream author titles are still controlled by the publishers. So even after the higher agency pricing wears down they are artificially boosting ebook prices.
Typically the titles that go on sale are outside agency control or so backlist that they don’t mind dropping the price. As more and more authors take control of their backlist though we probably will see Amazon cutting those prices or offering them through this new prime program.
What I like most about this isn’t the lending system in specific but the fact that Amazon seems committed to adding more and more value to prime and its overall offerings. In an era of being nickel and dime it’s nice to see the companies that actually is adding some features even as they are working to make a boatload of money.
Written with Siri
I completely agree – which is why I call it ‘Cartel Pricing’. You are pretty much paying ~$1 less for a Kindle/Nook/iBook/gBook/Kobo/SonyReader version of *anything* new than for the Hardcover. Like ‘Steve Jobs’, which they *call* a $35 book, yet is <$18 hardcover most places, and *exactly* $16.99 everywhere based on price fixing.
But like Dan said, this is more about the ever-expanding Amazon Prime ecosystem. Remember when Prime Videos launched with a decent but anemic list? Now look where we are – full series of The Next Generation, X-Files, solid movie selection, and more.
Or … for $79 a year you have a video service than Netflix, which costs $96 (assuming $8 a month). AND you have free expedited shipping, no minimums, and now a book lending system. Awesome-sauce!
Dan,
Exactly. Amazon is providing incentives on multiple fronts through Prime, and that’s especially good for someone who would naturally take advantage of all of those incentives anyway.
Some people were already buying the annual Prime membership just for the free two-day shipping. I did. Now, by adding movies and free books (with the requirement that a physical Kindle be purchased), consumers who may not care about the quicker shipping may buy a membership…and the added value locks in those who were already members. If two-day shipping was enough to get me to try Prime for the first year, I’m sure not going to give it up next year with these new features. Plus, it’s drawing consumers like me who had held off on buying a Kindle up until now to finally buy one.