Amazon's lending library


The other day, Amazon started a new "library" feature as part of a plan to (supposedly) push sales of its Kindles.

The only problem is, authors aren't being paid for the books. (Publishers are, but that's a really strange arrangement as well - in some cases, Amazon is actually buying single copies each time a book is loaned out. Most major publishers are pretty much up in arms over the whole enterprise, which has the potential to hurt them in any number of ways. But we'll let them speak for themselves.)

So once again, the people who actually created the work are after-thoughts, while others make money on them.

From Publisher's Lunch:

 The Association of Authors' Representatives has issued a statement on the new initiative:

"The agent and author community have not been consulted about this new sort of use of authors' copyrighted material, and are unaware of how publishers plan on compensating authors for this sort of use of their books, which is unprecedented. But we think free lending of authors' work as an incentive to purchase a device and/or participation in a program is not covered nor was anticipated in most contracts between authors and publishers—nor do most contracts have any stipulation for how an author would be compensated for such a use. Without a clear contractual understanding with their authors, it is unclear to us how publishers can participate in this program. We take very seriously our role to protect the interests of our clients, and at this stage it is difficult to see how this program is in the best interests of our clients."