Can you only loan a book once and once only?

[BooksOnTheKnob]

Actually, lending an ebook is a tried and true concept. It's used by libraries all over the country.

Rather than focusing on how restrictive the B&N license is, just use the library and read the epub (or PDF, but with a much poorer experience/format) version on your nook and skip buying it from BN at all.  All your friends can do the same, so you can all read it at the same time for the book club.

If your libary doesn't have compatible books, there are those like the NYC library that will let you join for a fee ($100 a year or less, usually) and check out their books from anywhere in the world. 

Of course, you can let anyone read your books, for as long as they want, so long as you activate the book on their nook (since I assume you would not trust them with your CC# and purchasing name).

[noumena12]

I agree that the ability to lend books is a SIGNIFICANT feature. At this point, that option doesn't exist with any other ereader. I understand the time limit. Some people may not want their books to disappear forever. Is 14 days long enough? I think it is reasonable. Could it be longer? Sure. Am I disappointed that a lend is limited to one time only. Sure. But I'm confident that will change over time. And I believe that other ebook providers will follow suit.

At this point, I'm wishing that I had a nook. I like my (less than a year old) Kindle2 but I've always been unhappy that Amazon didn't jump at creating the book sharing community. I've always been a B&N fan and am glad to see nook take the lead.

[Therinia]

I think being able to loan an ebook even once is very generous; no other ebook company does it at all.  And as hesitant as publishers are to embrace ebooks this is a step in the right direction!  If sales increase as a result, perhaps they will raise the limit...fingers crossed!  I am excited to see where this goes!

[SerenityCat]

I will not be purchasing the Nook as I have a K2 and am quite happy with it but I do want to add my two cents in here about the lending feature:

I think some people are being a bit hard on B&N about this.  As a few have pointed out, no other ereader has this option.  This is a very small step in the right direction.  There are a lot of battles between Publishers and ereader/ebook companies; Text to Speech, prices, ebook release dates, sharing, title availability, etc.

Not all of these are going to be exactly what we want at this time.  As ereaders increase in popularity, I believe these features will change, more to our, the customers, advantage.

The very fact that B&N was even able to work out a 14 day, one time only lend feature on some books is quite a victory.  I'd say don't be so harsh on them.  They've accomplished something that many readers want and that other ereaders cannot or will not do at this point.

Give it time.  While there is an ultimate goal, most things are reached with baby steps or one step at a time.  This is a big step, if you ask me.  Sure, of course it's disappointing that we can only lend a book one time for 14 days but it IS a step forward.

Finally, I'm not so sure that B&N ever misrepresented itself with the Nook and the lending feature.  The answer is actually quite clear in the FAQ.  They never said one can lend a book an unlimited number of times.  They stated they had a lending feature.  The FAQ states the book can be loaned one time for 14 days.  The Nook isn't even out yet so I do not view this as misrepresentation at all.

Because of the step that B&N has taken in the lending feature department, I think that in time, we will see this lending feature change to be more like we want it to be.  I think they got something right, straight away:  You may lend the book but not be able to read it at the same time as the other.  I also believe they got it right with putting a time limit on that lend.  How many times have we loaned a book out and got it back a year later or never got it back?  A 14 day feature takes care of that future problem.

What will hopefully change in the future is that we will be able to loan that book out as many times as we want, to whomever we want and all books will have this option, not just a select few.  This isn't going to happen overnight but it CAN happen because B&N took the step in that direction.

Look on this as a good thing.  And if you truly were interested in the Nook, why not still get it?  If the lend feature ever does change in our favor, it's probably just a matter of a software update.  If you have the Nook, you can get that update.

Like I said, I have a K2, I won't be buying the Nook because I just got my K2, but I applaud B&N for this feature.  Yes, it's limited, right now...but because of it, our future with ebooks may open up considerably. 

[DavidGC]

Restricting the number of  lends at the borrowers ereader is brilliant. I hope someone in the publishing world is listening.

To those of you who are all upset about this "one lend" rule, be sure you are aiming your displeasure at the right parties.  I'm sure B&N would love to let you lend out the books more than once (as a retailer, they know that it will end up in additional sales, not less).  You should be aiming your wrath at the publishers. It is they who have made this stipulation.

DCM

[Sharon_R]

As a bookseller, this thread has me confused. According to one of my managers who attended the regional conference on Thursday regarding nook, a book can be lent once per lendee. I had asked him because I had read the general internet news on how disappointed people were in this feature. He assured me that the speaker had been very clear that you can lend it once to as many different people as you want, one at a time.

[GoodOldNeon]

For the record, up to six Kindles can be registered to a single Amazon account, so, in that sense, books can be freely shared without restrictions, time or otherwise, between users. This is especially beneficial and cost effective for families that own more than one Kindle. Whether this is possible on the Nook, I do not know.

[JimM]

From what the admins has said so far, it is possible to have multiple nooks registered on a single account, so that is possible with the nook also.

[JimM]

Publishers (not B&N) are the reason LendMe is limited: see article.  As the author of the article noted, their reasoning is flawed:

"Books are viral by nature, and the loaning of books is one of the main ways that the book virus spreads. We’ve all had friends push a favorite book on us. Sometimes it’s annoying, sometimes it’s a life changing. Frequently we end up buying other books by the same author as a result of the initial loan. In that respect, loaned books are like a gateway drug. It’s in the publishing industry’s best interest to ensure that the loaning of books continues in the digital era."

Also, as the article points out, in the end, consumers will eventually get what they want:

"One way or another, consumers will work out ebook sharing. Either through a supported feature like LendMe, or by cracking DRM and sharing the unrestricted books with their friends and family. In the digital era consumer always get what they want. In this case what consumers want is also good for the publishing industry."

[hazydave]

It's a shame.. when I read the original description of the Nook, I thought to myself, "wow, nearly there". But lending once?

The general slow growth of eBook readers so far is largely tied to the fact that no one wants to simply create an electronic book -- something that behaves in every possible way as a physical book would. That means it should work on any reader (I can read a physical book, no matter where I bought it), I should be able to lone to a friend (and absolultely lose access to it until that loan is over), and I should be able to resell the book.. again, just one copy, of course -- exactly like any physical book.

But rather than that, there's this big scramble to lock you into a specific reader (eBooks for the Nook are in ePub format, but are they readable on any other ePub reader?) and reign in the rights conveyed in the physical form.

Are we all willing to trade those rights, and perhaps the lack of a possibility of competition on price (I can shop a title at Amazon, B&N, the local Atlantic Books discount shop, the local used bookstore, etc.), just to have the "right now" purchases and my library always with me. That last one IS the big point of these experiments, but unless the format is fully open, it's of questionable permanence. I can play a CD or DVD or Blu-Ray on any player, thus, these have been fairly safe media investments. Same goes with the MP3s I might buy on Amazon (which I'm willing to buy at the right price... they are a lower quality form, so they should sell for significantly less than the CD or I'll just buy the CD).. they will play anywhere. If B&N gets into trouble, if the Nook failes, what happens to the purchased books... where can I read them in 10 years?

[pipersline]

I really hope BN is listening.  We want to be able to lend it multiple times!!!  How about lend it up to 10 times?  A comprimise?

[ScottEllsworth]

Lending is a quite innovative feature, and one of the primary reasons I was considering a Nook, having rejected a Kindle for not having a decent loan feature.

Unfortunately, being able to loan them out only once really limits the utility of the feature for me.  I am a parent - with all good intentions, 14 days may not be enough time, and being able to just ask for a relend cuts back on the pressure.  Having to pick which friend gets to read the book is less fun.

Don't get me wrong - the nook is still a cool device, and I may get one anyway, but I would be vastly more likely to get one were the lending to be more like a physical book (but better)  - I have no problem with not being able to read it while my friend is reading it, and 14 days is a fine amount of time for a loan.

Express to the publishers that this is a good feature, and even the once-only lend has value, but loosening the restrictions would be a substantial competitive advantage, and would result in more ebooks being sold.  The same friend that I loaned the first few Jim Butcher books to has since started to buy the series.  Loan books 1-3 of a series three times, and you sell copies of books 4-10, plus books 1-4 of his other series.  He was not the first person I loaned the books to, and it took him over a month to read that first book.

Scott

[Trebuchet]

The one-time 14-day lend is indeed a significant step.  The possibility of lending books is what made me interested in buying a Nook, when I never had the slightest interest in a Kindle.  

However, if it is limited to some books, and only one lending per book, that is too restrictive for my needs, and I'll continue to buy and lend paper.  

An e-book, for me, needs to be as close to a paper book as possible.  Paper books afford reading in bed or on airplanes, flipping back and forth between pages, and lending freely.  Without these features, to me, it isn't a real book.

An e-book does obviously afford other things, such as searching or resizing the text.  Nice, but not nice enough to offset such a serious limitation on lending.  

As Baen Publishing has learned, letting people see content without paying does not lead to lower sales, but to higher ones.  Check out the Baen Free Library, which has been a great success.  I have bought many books after reading them in their entirety there, because I wanted them, or wanted to give them as gifts.  

Many times, after borrowing a paper book from a friend, I did buy it, and I expect the same will happen with the Nook.  But if I didn't get to finish the book, because some emergency came up, I'd probably be so annoyed I would not be interested in reading it anymore.  

[RickNY]

Simply put, the limit of only one loan will kill the Nook and not allow the eBook industry to succeed. Any limit on the number of loans will be a killer. I have pre-ordered the Nook and will consider returning it if this is not resolved by the time I receive it.

A limit of only one user account having access at at time is perfectly reasonable. After all, a book can exist in only one home at a time.

[Flechette]

I simply wanted to thank you for the kind words about my idea for restricting how many lends an account could receive ;-}

I'm going to make it an official feedback/request, not that I expect much to happen anytime soon lol!

Hubby going Nook, while I (somewhat regretfully) am going Kindle ~  Should be interesting!

[rossifer]

So, it's a marketing gimmick and not intended to be a useful feature.  Very disappointing.

Well, I will be buying a nook, but it is extremely unlikely that I'll ever put DRM'd content on it.  Especially if this is the sharing "feature".  I am very eagerly waiting for Google's gigantic library to become available for ebook reading.  I am also hoping that the Android developer community will come up with a few hacks to open up the wi-fi and sideloading unofficial content (wikipedia browser anyone?)

[ScottEllsworth]

---

RickNY wrote:

Simply put, the limit of only one loan will kill the Nook and not allow the eBook industry to succeed. Any limit on the number of loans will be a killer. I have pre-ordered the Nook and will consider returning it if this is not resolved by the time I receive it.

---

I doubt it will kill the nook, but it will certainly cut down on the sales that the lending feature will give them.  Our family was planning on buying two, and now we are waiting until someone offers a better version.

I am not annoyed with them - this is just a statement of the value of lending, and the value of e-books.  I travel a fair amount, and a nook looked like a pretty good way to handle my gaming supplements, the odd technical book, and my airplane reading, but without lending, it is not quite valuable enough to justify the cost and lock in.

If they change that, I will most certainly look again.  I like the idea of having textbooks easily available.