Create a web site where people can register their books, which they own and are willing to rent them to others. People would have to be members of the site, and pay membership fee. A member can list books given by the zip code where the books are located. The potential rentors located near the owner of the books can come and pick up the books from his place, or can get it delivered through mail, and send the book back, once the book is read. There will be rental periods, based on the book owner's requirements.The liability issues will be handled by the rental website company, with maximum loss compensation calculated according to the number of times the book has been rented, decreasing with more book rentals and a maximum of the new book price available cheapest on the web.
I agree
No opinion
I disagree
Add your comment
This fine idea immediately suggests expanding: why not allow people to rent out their power tools, kitchen appliances, garden implements (lawnmowers, snow-blowers, etc) electronic gadgets like video cameras, or even their cars? The issue of insuring against damage or loss would need to be addressed, perhaps by requiring people to leave a deposit with the lender.
You might want to take a look at BorrowMe. It hasn't quite launched yet, but it has real promise.
Check out the Distributed Library Project (http://www.communitybooks.org/), the OpenDB (http://sourceforge.net/projects/opendb), and MediaChest (http://www.mediachest.com/)
As owner of a book rental company, I have to admit that the proven model for a peer-to-peer distribution for books has to be in the "book swap" industry. My personal favorite, <a href="http://www.bookmooch.com>Bookmooch, lets you list your books and when another user requests one, you send it fronting the shipping cost, but receive a point which is good towards the request of someone else's book. It's tough to find new releases on here because people are not willing to give them up so readily, so if book rental is what you're looking for, try BookSwim Book Rental Online Library Club - www.bookswim.com. With all the new releases and no need to worry about the flakiness of others and you don't have to part with your current book collection just to get new reading material.