Amazon recently announced its Kindle Owners Lending Library, with the words “borrow for free” in its advertising copy. Well, just like your own public library, the Kindle Lending Library is not free.
We often see the word “free” next to “library,” but as we all know, public libraries are not free, they are funded by taxes and donations. “Free” for public libraries means that you do not have to pay a membership fee to use the public library provided by your community’s taxes and/or library donors. Public libraries offer far more than books. They offer research assistance, access to computers and the internet, online and downloadable content (including Kindle books), classes/lectures/workshops on a variety of topics and technologies, spaces for community gatherings, programs for children, collections of local interest, and trained people who will help you navigate the increasingly complex world of information.
Amazon uses a narrow definition of “free library.” For a Kindle owner using the Kindle Owners Lending Library, “free” costs $79 per year for a Amazon Prime membership, and with it you get to borrow one free book per month from a limited list of books. Once you have read your free book on your Kindle (it won’t work on the free Kindle app for your tablet or phone), you must return it in order to borrow another.
Defining library as a collection of books that can be borrowed for free is missing the larger picture when it comes to public libraries. At your public library, those same books are shared with other people. But more than that, your public library makes all of its services, including (but far from just) books to borrow, available to the whole community, to people who have new tech devices and those who don’t.
Hear, hear! What a concise and well-written post Mary! Thank you so much.