We had reported earlier that Amazon was working on Kindle lending system where Kindle books can be checked out from libraries. Well this has finally happened! Amazon kicked off its Kindle lending library which allows Kindle and Kindle app users to borrow Amazon’s e-books from thousands of libraries across the US. Users will be able to find the Kindle books in their libraries that participate in the program through Amazon. The books will be sent directly to the devices using Whispersync.
The ability to make notes and highlights are also added which can help users add notes. However users will have return the e-books after a certain period of time just like any other book. The books will be encrypted so users cannot hack into them and copy them. The e-books will carry a 14 day lending period just like regular books. Seven to 14 days isn’t a lot of time to read an entire book for some people, but it’s hard to argue with free, borrowed books.
Amazon already has a list of 11,000 participating libraries where users can actually go and borrow e-books! This is awesome move by Amazon but how happy are publishers is still yet to be known.
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