Whatever you might think of Amazon, you certainly have to admit that it’s are clever. For some time the company had an option called Amazon Upgrade which lets you read the p-books you have bought from them on line. If you pay the extra fee, which varies based on the book, you can:
* Start reading the book online while you wait for your physical copy to arrive
* Add highlights, bookmarks, notes, or tags to any page or section of text
* Print pages, and even copy and paste text from the book
* Read your book from any Internet-connected computer, meaning your book is always with you
This could be quite a useful feature for those who have to lug p-books around for one reason or another. Right now the program seems pretty limited. Of the many books I have bought from Amazon only 3 qualify. Here they are with the Upgrade price:
Microsoft Windows XP Inside Out $8.99
Microsoft XP Professional Administrator’s Pocket Consultant $5.99
Faster Smarter Digital Video $3.99
Thanks to the Amazon Kindle Review for the heads up.
By the way, what’s the relevance of the picture? It’s an Amazon Tree Frog, of course.
They’ve actually had this feature for years, but last time I used it the DRM was so onerous that it was unusable if you so much as opened it on another computer on the same network.
I love the idea in principle…. and if they extended it to Kindle copies I’d be buying like mad, but.. eh.
[Moderator’s note: Great idea re the Kindle! And yes, Amazon has had this useful feature for at least a year or two—I remember blogging it, and I’ve changed the post. Let’s hope that the option will be available for all Amazon books. Of course, as I see it, the best approach would be free e-books bundled in with the paper ones. – D.R.]
I think I’ll stick with O’Reilly Safari.