The company is announcing the Kindle Owner's Lending Library, which will feature thousands of books that Kindle owners with an Amazon Prime membership can download. This comes in addition to the Prime library of more than 13,000 movies and TV shows.

According to Amazon's release, the company is paying a fixed fee in some cases, and in other cases paying on a per-checkout basis for each Kindle title that's in the library. That means that any way you slice it, Amazon is paying to let its customers check out books.

Why? Amazon says this is "a no-risk trial to demonstrate to publishers the incremental growth and revenue opportunity that this new service presents."

Don't Get Too Excited

Unlike Amazon Video Streaming for Prime, there's a limit to Amazon's largess here: Users get access to one book a month with no due dates. So if you have dreams of burning your library card and tapping the Kindle library for all your reading needs, guess again.

The company says the library will have "thousands" of titles, including more than 100 current and former New York Times bestsellers. Right out of the gate, Amazon is offering Moneyball: The Art of Winning an Unfair Game by Michael Lewis, Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond, and The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.

Note that this only seems to be available to owners of Kindle hardware. If you're using the Kindle app for iPhone or iPad, you're going to be out of luck. If you do have a Kindle, it should show up in the Kindle Store when you click "See all categories" and you'll be presented with the option to buy for free.

This is a nice little feature, though I'm not sure it would sway most users from a different e-reader to a Kindle. When I'm in a reading mood, I often tear through as much as a book every day (though more often every two or three days). So the lending library isn't going to keep avid readers full up on reading material. But, every little bit counts. A free book is better than none. What say you, readers? Would this convince you to buy a Kindle, or pony up for Amazon's Prime membership?

But there are restrictions, of course.

But some of the restrictions are particular to the eBooks and are likely to frustrate book-lovers and would-be-eBook-sharers:

• Some books will not be available to lend. This will be up to the publisher or the person who holds the rights to the book.
• You can only lend the book once.

Want to pass around your well-worn, well-loved and highly recommended copy of The Illuminatus! Trilogy? (Sorry, that's just what comes to mind. Probably because someone borrowed my copy and didn't give it back.) You'd better select that one person who you are certain will actually read it. (I guess you won't have to worry about them running off with it, though. Hooray.)

These restrictions don't only apply to the Kindle. The Nook operates with the same set of guidelines. And while Amazon's Jeff Bezos criticized these limitations in the Nook in a New York Times interview last year, it remains to be seen if the new Kindle lending policies are any more liberal.

No word yet on any eBookseller working on a used eBookstore. But we'll keep you posted.

This is a technology blog. However, in order to highlight how far eBooks have to go until they seriously challenge for the hearts and minds of book lovers, we present here a list of reasons why paper books are still better than eBooks. We'll also speculate about how eBooks might match each feature that paper books currently have over them.

1. Feel

Paper books just feel good in your hands - even the best designed eReader is a cold, lifeless steely contraption by comparison. Paper books are also seen as "more personal," which was a comment that a number of people made on the previous post. You can become attached to a copy of your favorite novel, or a well thumbed book of poetry. I own a worn copy of the novel 'Catch-22,' which I have read a number of times since my University days - and no eBook could ever replace the memories it evokes whenever I pick that book up.

How can eBooks match this in the future? They may never do, but perhaps we will find that the features I listed in my previous post assume greater nostalgic significance instead: highlighted text, notes that you made back in your University days, and the ability to search and find all of this very easily.

2. Packaging

I bought a poetry book for Kindle on iPad last week, but it turned out that the eBook was missing half of the image of an obscure painting that adorned the front and back covers of the paper edition. The eBook just had the front cover art, not the back cover art. This is one small example of how paper books can have a more beautiful package than eBooks.

We could similarly point to book binding and typeface, both often carefully selected by publishing companies for their paper editions. It can make a big difference to one's reading experience.

If eBooks are to challenge this feature, it will need to be with something unique and native to the electronic format. For inspiration, we can look to what Arcade Fire did with the electronic release of its latest album. As a way to try and match the album art and booklet available on CD, Arcade Fire came up with an artistic package it called "synchronised artwork." This enabled listeners to access imagery, lyrics and links on their iPod or iPhone while listening to the album. Some might say that it still isn't as good as a CD package, but this is the challenge for electronic mediums - to come up with alternatives that offer something equally compelling, perhaps even more so.

Skip Knox summed it up well in a comment: "We need a new generation of authors and publishers who will create new art forms around the technology. We're still at the point analogous to the early years of movies, when all they could think to do was essentially film a stage play."

3. Sharing

I noted in the last post that receiving marked up books from a friend is something that can't be duplicated by eBooks - yet. Also, you can't lend a copy of an eBook to someone else. DRM (Digital Rights Management) or incompatible eBook formats prevent that.

However, I have to think that both of those features - personal notes and sharing eBooks - will get figured out by eReader manufacturers sooner or later. There is no technological reason it can't be done, it's more a matter of navigating the always murky DRM waters and people getting used to new kinds of 'reading' functionality. Just as we DM people on Twitter or send email, sending messages or notes to another person via an eBook is a feature that would be useful and eventually well used.

4. Keeping

On the topics of DRM and eBook formats, not only is this an issue for sharing - but for your own future accessibility of books. As Adrian Lafond eloquently noted, "If I "buy" an e-book, read it, put it in storage, and try to re-read it in 10 years (since I "own" it) it's anybody's guess whether there will exist a platform or device on which that will be possible for that particular e-book format and DRM scheme."

Gwyn Headley added, a little cynically, that eBooks are great for books "you know you will never want to read again."

To be frank, I think the same risks apply to paper books too. I have misplaced favorite books over the years or lent them to people and not had them returned. However, eBook and eReader manufacturers certainly need to address this issue before consumers are truly comfortable buying them over paper books.

5. Second-hand books

A few people noted that eBooks are still too expensive and that you can't get cheap second-hand copies. Or for that matter, expensive first edition copies.

Similar to previous points, eBooks won't necessarily be able to match this 'feature' of paper books. However, the price of eBooks will likely drop over time and become more flexible. Indeed, I picked up a copy of the full works of Emerson and Thoreau this week for a few dollars - cheaper (and much lighter) than I could've gotten anywhere else for a paper copy. We'll see more of this type of pricing as the eBook market ramps up.

In summary, there are pros and cons for both paper books and eBooks. The eBook market is ripe for innovation and breakthroughs in how we read, so eBooks will only improve over the coming years.

In the final analysis though, the real value of any book - whether read via paper or electronically - is in the words.

Image credits: cindiann, Ben+Sam, practicalowl, jbonnain, ulle.b

I should note that I wasn't a hold-out on eBooks for moral reasons. I simply couldn't access them until recently. Amazon's Kindle, Sony's Reader and Barnes & Noble's Nook have all been either unavailable to people outside the US, or the eBook stores to populate them have been inaccessible. However with the Kindle for iPad, I've finally been able to enjoy the forbidden fruit of eBooks.

Being able to highlight quotes and passages and easily find them again is a key feature that eBooks have over paper books. This activity can also be social - Audrey Watters pointed me to an Amazon Kindle page featuring the most highlighted passages of all time.

I must add that one thing I miss about paper books is the personal touch, for example receiving a book from a friend with their marked up highlights. By contrast, there's something a bit impersonal about electronic highlighting. But perhaps eBooks will evolve to enable more personal sharing of highlights, perhaps even mimicing your hand writing style.

2. Notes

The ability to create and then easily display archived notes is a big plus for eBooks. Instead of scribbling in small writing in the margins of a paper book, you can type a clear note in your eReader.

3. Look-up of words

I recently bought a few books of poetry in the Kindle Store. Readers of poetry will know that modern poets like to use big and esoteric words. So one feature I have really enjoyed over the past week is tapping a word and having the definition displayed below. Very helpful and something that made me thankful I had the eBook version of the poetry.

4. Ability to Tweet & Facebook quotes

@Tooq commented via Twitter that he/she likes the ability to tweet or send to Facebook quotes from books, on the Kindle. This feature was introduced to Kindle 2.5 at the end of April.

5. Search

You can search for topics or keywords inside your eBook, or out on the Web. Similar to the word look-up feature, this is something that augments the reading experience.

Most of these features are just the tip of the iceberg of what eBooks are capable of. As ReadWriteWeb's Curt Hopkins opined yesterday, "the e-book format has inherent multimedia possibilities: trailers, background and reference materials, interviews, actors reciting the poems the book contains."

Those multimedia features probably need to come from publishers, rather than eReader manufacturers.

In the meantime, let us know in the comments what your current favorite eBook features are. Or are you still a paper book hold-out?

In an extensive guest post on TorrentFreak, a well known BitTorrent blog, Dan Morrill told his experience with offering his latest eBook, 'Selling Books On Amazon, Tips and Secrets' on popular BitTorrent tracker Mininova. Dan explains that his initial reason for releasing his eBook using BitTorrent was not for marketing purposes, but "to control the release and gather good stats on the process." We don't think he could've picked a better service. Within the first 24 hours, Morrill's eBook had been downloaded close to 700 times.

Based on the stats he received from Mininova, Morrill was also able to pinpoint the countries in which the eBook was being downloaded the most. Africa ranked high on the list, which is understandable because of the relatively large amount of e-commerce businesses that are set-up in Africa. Morrill was surprised to see India contributing to 5.2% of the overall downloads.

Operation BitTorrent a Success

Morrill rated his overall experience as highly satisfying and recommends using BitTorrent as a great content distribution channel for those that don't mind. The expansion of the BitTorrent network will only increase in the next few years. In doing so, we think this may be a tool that publishers will eventually start taking a lot more seriously than they do now. It's undeniable that BitTorrent can prove to be an effective marketing tool for a cheap price when used correctly. Nine Inch Nails concluded the same in March of this year when they uploaded part 1 of their 4 part album Ghosts I-IV to numerous BitTorrent sites. It became the #1 most downloaded album on The Pirate Bay, which helped to increase their sales tremendously for the rest of the album.

We can only wonder when others will catch on to the effectiveness of using BitTorrent sites to market and distribute content. You can download Dan Morrill's eBook 'Selling Books On Amazon, Tips and Secrets' here.

"Here Ends the Beginning is much more than a conventional e-book," wrote Furlong to us in an emailed press release. "The text is punctuated throughout with video clips and photographs of actors recreating the characters and scenes. Music and sound effects further enhance this novel experience."

The first 5 chapters of the 43-chapter-long book are available for free, with the full book available for $12.95 CDN. But is this really the future of the novel?

We've seen a lot of experimentation with the traditional book publishing format over the past year. From an author using Amazon's Kindle ebook reader to beta test his book to one using blog comments to peer review another. From books being written and released on cell phones to novels being serialized and released over LiveJournal, Twitter, and Google Maps. Unfortunately, none of these experiences have so far been able to match the enjoyable, intimate feeling of curling up with an real, printed book -- at least for me.

Writing about Penguin's Google Maps-based novel mashup in April, Booklist's Keir Graff wrote, "It's an odd sensation, really: simple words can evoke a world in our imaginations, but as soon as the words are married to real-world images, they lose much of their power." The same thing can be said of Furlong's Quillr concept. While videos and images flowed well as far as where and how they were inserted into the text, they seemed to detract from my reading experience by breaking up the continuity of the "inner movie" I develop whenever I read a piece of fiction. Also, constantly having to scroll and click while reading a long piece of writing can be frustrating -- it's just not as natural or satisfying as turning pages in a book.

But perhaps that's due to my advanced age of 24 years old (ha!). Maybe multimedia-enhanced, web-delivered books will resonate better with a younger set of readers. Give Furlong's book a chance and then come back here and leave a comment letting us know what you thought. Is this an enjoyable way to read a book? Or are publishers barking up the wrong tree with experiments in web publishing that mash books with web technology?

It is no surprise that book publishers are trying to find new ways to appeal to readers. We noted in March that offline reading of books is on the decline. Though new forms of book consumption have begun to appear -- such as Amazon's wildly popular Kindle eBook reader -- "free" is an enticing way to get people acclimated to them and a way for publishers to make readers aware of a specific author, title, series, or genre.

Del Ray is taking a page from the music industry by promoting its new Star Wars book via an online giveaway. We wrote a couple of months ago that here is a huge value in awareness for artists and publishers, which is what Del Ray is attempting to build in the Star Wars book brand. The music doppelganger to this marketing ploy is R.E.M. and Pennywise -- both of whom made their new albums available to fans for free a couple of weeks prior to launch, and both of whom saw those albums crack the top 15 on the sales charts. However, like those bands, Star Wars also already has brand recognition, so it will be tough to gauge how many sales actually translate from the online promotion.

"This giveaway is a great way to introduce the legions of Star Wars fans to our books," said Deputy Director of Marketing at the Random House Publishing Group, Christine Cabello in a press release. "We also expect that it will build awareness and excitement for the on-sale date of the final book in the series, Invincible."

Will other book publishers follow suit? Will we ever see a "pay-what-you-want" distribution scheme for books?