Amazon Reinstates Kindle-Lending Startup Lendle

Business Insider:: "After a bit of press and consumer outrage, Amazon's team got in touch with them [Lendle] and they're back. They had to remove their book sync feature to get into the terms of service. It's hard to know whether Amazon's crackdown was just a fluke or was pushed on them by publishers or what. In any case it's impressive how fast they responded."

Amazon stymies Lendle e-book lending service

In the long run, Amazon is doing Lendle, eBook Fling and BookLending a favor, because they had shit business models anyway. That being said, I think it may be a strategic mistake for Amazon to look like it is trying to stifle lending. Carnoy, CNET: "It may be game, set, and match for Lendle. No, not Ivan Lendl, the former tennis great. Lendle, the newly hatched e-book lending service. Lendle first reported the news via Twitter: 'Amazon has revoked Lendle's API access. This is why the site is down. It's sad and unfortunate that Amazon is shutting down lending sites...According to Amazon, Lendle does not 'serve the principal purpose of driving sales of products and services on the Amazon site.''"

Good Summary of the Current State of Business re: eBook Lending

Stu Woo, WSJ: "BookLending and Lendle opened in the past two months, while eBook Fling plans to start Monday. The sites' creators said they decided to launch the services after Amazon, following Barnes & Noble's lead, introduced the ability to lend Kindle e-books in late December. Analysts estimate that Kindle has about two-thirds of the U.S. market for e-books." BookLending and Lendle are just for Kindle users. The new eBook Fling provides service to both Kindle and Nook users.