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Amazon Lets Students Rent Digital Textbooks

Posted by Soulskill on from the disrupting-the-textbook-cartels dept.

nk497 writes "Amazon has unveiled a new digital textbook rental service, allowing students to choose how long they'd like access to an eBook-version of a textbook via their Kindle or app — with the retailer claiming savings as high as 80%. Kindle Textbook Rental will let students use a text for between 30 and 360 days, adding extra days as they need to. Any notes or highlighted text will be saved via the Amazon Cloud for students to reference after the book is 'returned.' Amazon said tens of thousands of books would be available to rent for the next school year."

2 of 174 comments (clear)

  1. Bad idea by betterunixthanunix · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I routinely find myself referencing textbooks from courses that I took years ago. If students cannot afford their books, university libraries should provide copies; students should not be at the mercy of Amazon or any other company.

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    Palm trees and 8
  2. Artificial scarcity is ... by Paul+Fernhout · · Score: 4, Interesting

    ... an unfortunate business model for the 21st century and all our tools of abundance... http://www.artificialscarcity.com/

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    A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.