Will Amazon Offer An Ebook Subscription Service?

Amazon might be poised to throw yet another game changer into the world of ebooks. There are rumors that the largest online retailer wants to offer a Netflix-style subscription service for ebooks.

For a monthly and/or annual fee users can access Amazon’s library of ebooks and read a limited number of books. This subscription-based ebook store idea has been floated around for a while, but no one has yet to implement it in a way that has really connected with consumers.

Author Timothy Frost sent me a link to this Guardian article:

There’ve been rumblings for a while about the possibility of Amazon launching an ebook rental service – but according to a report in the Wall Street Journal (which is, in turn, “according to people familiar with the matter”), Amazon is now “talking with book publishers about launching a Netflix Inc.-like service for digital books, in which customers would pay an annual fee to access a library of content.”

There’s not a whole lot of information out there about Amazon’s plans. I looked into the matter a little more and found a few sparse details from the Washington Post:

The online retailer is reportedly thinking about making a subscription library service available to Amazon Prime members, adding book rentals to the $79 per year service that now offers online video and an unlimited deal on two-day shipping. The rental subscription, described in the report as a Netflix-like service for books, would offer older titles, and the company would limit the amount of books users could read for free every month.

I’d like to see what “older titles” would be available as part of the subscription service. I can understand new releases not being available. In other words: What does Amazon consider to be an “older title?”

Titles aside, I’m actually pretty excited about this. If I were to calculate the amount of money I spend on ebooks each year (something I’m afraid to do), I could probably save a lot of money by subscribing.

I’d be interested to know what the large publishing houses think about this idea. I’d also like to know how Amazon would pay out royalties. Would it be based on the number of people who download a certain book? The number of subscribers? I have no idea. I’ll leave those details for Amazon to figure out.

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