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By Paul Biba

That’s the question in this Library Journal article.  Evidently there is some confusion, even within Amazon, about what Amazon’s policies really are. Here’s a short excerpt.

  • Amazon rep tells library OK
  • Amazon official tells LJ no
  • Librarian says Kindle well-received

Noname As a few more libraries begin lending the Kindle, the ebook reading device from Amazon, the company continues to offer ambiguous messages regarding its policies. Asked by the Howe Library, Hanover, NH, if it was OK to lend a Kindle, an Amazon support staffer said yes—and the library has proceeded to do so, with much positive response.

However, another support staffer told blogger Rochelle Hartman that the Amazon Terms of Service bar lending of Kindles. Amazon spokesman Drew Herdener confirmed to LJ—as he did last year—that the policy bars library lending, but “we don’t talk about our enforcement actions.”

In practice, that apparently means that Amazon doesn’t pursue enforcement, given the negative public relations impact from going after libraries, coupled with the potential ambiguity of the Terms of Service, which bar a user who wishes to "sell, rent, lease, distribute, broadcast, sublicense or otherwise assign any rights to the Digital Content or any portion of it to any third party."

 
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