Paperspine – Rent books online just like Netflix
Posted on January 3, 2008 at 8:01 am
Make sure to read other posts from the Rent Books Online series!
- Paperspine – Rent books online just like Netflix
- Rent an unlimited number of books online using BookSwim
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about an interesting Netflix-type service for books called BookSwim, whereby for a monthly charge you could rent books online. Online renting of books does not have a large market considering that only 12% of Americans read a book each month, but for avid readers, it’s absolutely great! Just try to imagine life without Netflix!
One of the issues that I had with BookSwim was that it was simply too expensive. For 2 books out at a time, the cost was 14.99! I can go and buy two paperbacks for that much! So the only way it was beneficial was if you were to read a minimum of three books a month. That’s just not going to happen with most people!
Paperspine is another online book rental service, but it has some better prices that make it more attractive to the casual reader. For the same two books out at a time, Paperspine only charges 12.95 (9.99 for the monthly fee and 3.00 for shipping two books). It’s not a huge savings, but it’s still better. After that, the plans are pretty much the same between both companies.
Paperspine works the same way your Netflix account works: log in, add a bunch of books to your queue, your book is sent to you, read the book, then mail it back in a prepaid mailing envelope and get your next book. Easy.
They currently offer over 150,000 book titles that you can choose from, which is slightly lower than BookSwim, which offers about 180,000. The only thing that I don’t like about these online book renting services is that they ship your books via Media Mail, which is the slowest form of shipping from the USPS. You can except your books to arrive after 3 to 7 days!
For a monthly service, I would except that the books would come in faster! If two weeks out of my month are wasted waiting for my books, then why am I paying that much! Maybe that’s something they will change soon.
If you really like a book and simply want to keep it, you can actually email the Paperspine folks and they’ll bill it to your account. They are actually building a feature whereby the process will be automated and you can buy the books after you have received them.
Overall, these services are worth it for avid readers, but if you’re a casual reader, stick with Netflix! If I had to choose between the two, I would probably end up going with Paperspine for my book renting needs! Enjoy!
[tags]rent books, book rental, online book rental, rent books online, bookswim, rental books, online book renting[/tags]
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What do your numbers mean?!?! This makes no “cents”.
“One of the issues that I had with BookSwim was that it was simply too expensive. For 2 books out at a time, the cost was .99
(99 cents a month for two books sounds pretty great to me)!
I can go and buy two paperbacks for that much! So the only way it was beneficial was if you were to read a minimum of three books a month. That’s just not going to happen with most people!
Paperspine is another online book rental service, but it has some better prices that make it more attractive to the casual reader. For the same two books out at a time, Paperspine only charges .95 (.99 for the monthly fee and .00 for shipping two books).
Zero dollars and cents for shipping. Sign me up!
It’s not a huge savings, but it’s still better. After that, the plans are pretty much the same between both companies.
Klein, I’m not sure what happened to my numbers, but those are certainly not what I typed in!!! I’ll be fixing this immediately! Thanks!
Whoa that’s weird! Apparently the dollar sign ($) is causing the problem! It’s being replaced by blank characters! I had to remove the dollar sign symbol in order for the numbers to show up correctly…anyone else have this problem!? I’m running WordPress 2.3.2.
Of course, this also only makes sense for new releases as most books older than a few years can be found in one’s local library or at books.google.com for free…
I notice that 2 of the book clubs are mentioned but booksfree is not. They have free shipping no matter what level you get and have plans up to 15 out at a time. I use the 6 at a time which is currently 23.99 a month. You send them back to at a time. I just thought I would throw that out there. I have been with them for 1 1/2 yrs and have never had any issues. They also give you a discount on the first month….