[Hitch]

Originally Posted by eschwartz

Yes, but I don't believe a word of it.

(Actually, I did have that in mind, and I still stand by what I said: )

If the 1-lend-only restriction was lifted, people in the US would be able to lend books out however they like, just like pbooks, to the point where the ability to do so becomes useful.

And how many freebie lends would satisfy you? 5? 10? How many times do you, realistically, lend out pbooks that you have? I have over 6K pbooks, and I can't think of ONE that I've lent to friends more than once. Not one. My friends' reading tastes apparently range in different circles, or whatever. Whether it's Harry Potter or "Why Beautiful People Have More Daughters," I seriously do not recall a single book I've lent--been asked for--more than once.

Isn't this argument a bit of a red herring? Do you seriously get asked for multiple lends of your books? How many? How often? I've always lived in heavy-reading families. My current, married-to family has a massively large reading population, and whether my birth family or my now-family, again: never been asked to lend a book more than once.

If the US-only restriction was lifted, everyone in the world can... um... lend their book once. How many people even bother to do so, when it is that limited?

I do it all the time with both. P and e. Here's a better question: why wouldn't you lend it, if asked? Why is it a "bother," to lend a digital book, just because you can only do it once? Isn't the "bother" that you can't do it MORE than once? Why on earth would it keep you from lending it?

At least if, where available, you could lend more often, it would become popular to do so and once it enters the public consciousness it might mean something. The biggest barrier as I see it, is the fact that you can't really do much with it even if you do have the ability, so no one bothers to know that you can.

Obviously, I hope all three restrictions are lifted.

What's "not do much with it?" ONLY being able to lend it once? There are already lending clubs out there, for Kindle, and I'm sure that they probably exist for other devices. Again...seems like an Aunt Sally. The limitation on lending exists for the same reason as licensing and DRM. If a book could be lent unlimitedly, the same people who crack DRM and slap unprotected books on places like Dotcomm's site would buy a book and slap it up there and let people "borrow" it, for the same reason--to deprive the publisher of income. Except then, because it was legal, you'd have even more folks doing it, just to "stick it to the man," because we ALL KNOW that "big publishers" are rich corporations, which means, automatically, THEY ARE EVIL. Because pirates think that "information should be free," and that people shouldn't have to pay for digital products. {shrug}

It's only on places like here, on MR, where people are perfectly accustomed to acquiring their books--however--and hacking the DRM, that this "gosh, it can only be lent ONCE" argument would even com up. In the real, regular Kindle-buyer world, most of those folks can't spell DRM, much less hack it, and those selfsame normal folks are borrowing and lending Kindle books all over the place.

And I'm sure, just like Amazon took time to get certain other features up and done for Europe and other countries, lending will proceed soon enough.

Oh, and P.S.: I have many friends who, like me, have STOPPED lending pbooks because the people to whom we lent them ruined them--broke the spines, marked them up, etc. We all, however, cheerfully lend ebooks, because at least we know they won't be ruined.

Hitch