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Does Amazon have better “sharing” than the Nook?
November 18, 2009 | 9:32 am
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By Paul Biba
I think it might. The Nook only allows you to share a book for two weeks and then you can only share it once. Further, and I haven’t seen this mentioned elsewhere, when you share the book you can no longer read it on your device until the sharing period is over. This is pretty useless, in my opinion.
However, Dear Author points out, in another context, that Amazon allows up to 6 Kindle devices to be registered to a single account. These devices can all read the same books. There is no limitation on how long the books can be used and they can all read the same book at the same time.
I suspect that Amazon hasn’t highlighted this because it doesn’t want to make the publishers antsy, but it is potentially a far better sharing scheme than what BN offers.
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Comments:
You are comparing two different things – B&N’s (very) limited loan scheme and Amazon’s DRM limits.
If you compare Amazon’s DRM limits with B&N’s DRM limits instead, you find that B&N’s are much better – any number of devices, and no need to re-download when moving to a new device.
And if you compare Amazon’s load scheme to B&N’s – well, there is no Amazon loan scheme.
I have read on various postings that B & N allows similar sharing with the nook, so you may want to check that.
Sounds like the Kindle would be great for a small reading club. Register the Kindles together, and one copy would suffice for each six members. Doing the math, that’s $9.99/6 or $1.67 per reader for a book that might retail in hardback for $24.95.
No wonder Amazon seems so reticent to promote this feature.
In either case, if your only sharing choices are “another Kindle device,” or “another Nook,” you’re still being severely limited to their hardware… which I don’t consider much of a feature at all.
I’d settle for sharing a Kindle book on my MobiPocket-reading PDA…
The admins over on the B&N forums have stated that you can link multiple nooks to the same account. See, for example, a post by Kristine_S here: http://bookclubs.barnesandnoble.com/t5/eBooks-Help-Board/Multiple-Licensing/m-p/402418#M961
“Thanks for the compliments, and the answer is yes, you can access one B&N account from multiple nooks and multiple eReader supported devices (iPhone, iPod Touch, BlackBerry, PC, and Mac). Enjoy!”
So, at least with B&N, you’re not limited to having a nook — you can share with anyone using the B&N software. I don’t know if the same applies to Amazon with their PC software.
Last time I checked, you couldn’t transfer a DRM’d B&N book from the B&N reader to my HP PDA (which has eReader installed on it). Same result for me: Until I can register my PDA, or whatever device I may want to read on, with Amazon or B&N, “sharing” is an empty offer. I’m not rushing out and buying new devices for their services.
Yeah, I just read that same board that JimM quoted before I found this article. So looks to me that Amazon does not have better sharing than nook.
I am apparently incorrect above: I just bought a B&N e-book that I was able to transfer to my HP iPaq. This automatically makes B&N books more sharable, as far as I’m concerned, than Kindle.
(I notice the file has “From the library of Steven Jordan” embedded in it… after I put in my name and CC# to unlock it.)
I would like to see Kindle impliment the same kind of “book sharing” as the Nook. As far as I’m concerned linking several devices to the same account isn’t sharing on the same level for two reasons.
1) doing it requires sharing so completely that you give your friend, instead of one book, every book you own plus your credit card for buying new books. That makes sharing nearly impossible because you can only “share” with people you trust so much you don’t mind handing over your bank account. Loaning a new acquaintance your copy of “Your Inner Fish” is pretty much out of the question.
2) a Kindle can only be linked to one account. So sharing a book with a friend requires that she give up access to her own books plus the ability to buy new ones (given that she doesn’t want to cheat you) until the sharing period is over.
Sorry–that’s not sharing as I understand the word.
The B&N sharing is not there yet. I do not have a problem with not having access to the book while it’s loaned out–that’s only fair–but you should be able to loan a book more than once, and you should be able to set the time period yourself.
But it seems to me that the B&N model comes closer to the ideal.
Recently, I saw the Thriller novel Third Party Candidate, just released a month ago, is on both Kindle and nook! It must have been done at the very same time…I am amazed how fast these novels are being processed! I paid 19.95 instead of $7.16!
I own both, but I like kindle better.
http://books.barnesandnoble.com/search/results.aspx?store=EBOOK&WRD=Third+Party+Candidate