Amazon’s Kindle Library - Netflix For Books

Amazon unveiled a long-speculated “Netflix-for-books” digital library on Wednesday. It’s another perk that Amazon Prime members get to take advantage of. Prime members that also own Kindles can borrow at most one book per month from around 5,000 available books. Once you borrow the book, you can keep it for as long as you wish – there is no due date on which DRM will disable the file.

The title of the program is the “Kindle Owners’ Lending Library.” It’s akin to the Amazon Prime Instant Video service, which offers free streaming movies and television shows to customers that cough up $79 a year for two-day shipping at no extra cost for most of Amazon’s products. The library is another attraction to draw in potential Prime members, which will lead to many more sales on Amazon.

Also, the borrowed books can only be accessed if you have a Kindle. So not only is this new promotion designed to convince people that Amazon Prime is amazing, it’s also incentivizing the purchase of a Kindle. And every generation of Kindle device has access to the library.

The service is drastically different from public libraries’ e-book lending, which got to the Kindles back in September. The books are licensed directly between Amazon and publishers, not through a library. Users can check out the same copy an unlimited amount of times if they wanted, and there’s no due date for the return.

Another Prime Perk

But it’s probably not a good idea to sign up for Amazon Prime just for the books. $79 a year comes out to around $6.50 per month, which is more than the cost of a lot of the books on the library list.If you’re just looking for an extra perk about Prime, then this is certainly a good deal. Plus, it lets publishers make some extra cash from backlist titles, directly through the program and indirectly, since their books will reach a wider audience. Amazon’s Russell Grandinetti told the Wall Street Journal that most publishers were compensated with a flat fee for allowing the service to use their books, while some are receiving the same fee that Amazon would have to pay them if a consumer actually bought the title, and this fee is paid every time the book is rented.

Program Could Take Off

The program is more about establishing a baseline in the e-book rental market and improving Amazon’s visibility than it is about money. Some of the biggest publishers didn’t want to participate in the Amazon program yet, but if this first round is a success then they could jump on board.

If the model actually works, then the program could grow exponentially. And the program certainly has potential, in kind of the same way as Apple’s iTunes. Low-key authors could gain wider exposure and make some money, popular authors will probably enroll in the commission aspect, and Amazon could make a killing arranging a tier subscription model where each level costs more and enables you to rent more books. It looks like everybody wins.

Photo by : Amazon