Tech Report: Amazon Introduces Textbook Rental Service

SAN FRANCISCO (KCBS)— Amazon's new textbook rental service could save college students money, but is likely to be a temporary solution for an all-digital future.

Where were they when I was in college? Even buying them and selling them used, you still ended up paying a lot. But in this case they will be renting physical, printed textbooks. They're already in the business of renting Kindle books, so this adds physical books to their rental library.

They claim it will cost customers 70 percent less than buying them. Business-wise Amazon can continually rent the book out, until it becomes outdated, but the problem is the shipping which can put a killing on some of the cost savings.

KCBS Tech Report:

It is a surprising move considering I thought the future of textbooks would be all digital. I've heard that there are medical schools that do just digital textbooks and Amazon does seem to be committed to Kindle.

I think it's going to be a temporary situation. Digital makes sense especially if you remember lugging around a 40 pound backpack.

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