Book swapping
Encyclopedia
Book swapping or book exchange is the practice of a swap
of books between one person and another. Practiced among book groups, friends and colleagues at work, it provides an inexpensive way for people to exchange books, find out about new books and obtain a new book to read without having to pay. Because swaps occur between individuals, without central distribution or warehousing, and without the copyright owner making a profit, the practice has been compared to peer-to-peer
(P2P) systems such as BitTorrent -- except that hard-copy original analog objects are exchanged.
Swap
- Finance :* Swap , a derivative in which two parties agree to exchange one stream of cash flows against another* Barter- Technology :* Swap space, related to a computer's virtual memory subsystem...
of books between one person and another. Practiced among book groups, friends and colleagues at work, it provides an inexpensive way for people to exchange books, find out about new books and obtain a new book to read without having to pay. Because swaps occur between individuals, without central distribution or warehousing, and without the copyright owner making a profit, the practice has been compared to peer-to-peer
Peer-to-peer
Peer-to-peer computing or networking is a distributed application architecture that partitions tasks or workloads among peers. Peers are equally privileged, equipotent participants in the application...
(P2P) systems such as BitTorrent -- except that hard-copy original analog objects are exchanged.
College book exchange programs
Many colleges and universities have developed online book exchange programs to help students save money on text books. Some colleges build their own systems and others use systems from third party service providers.See also
- Swaapr.com, a college specific book swapping site.
- BookMoochBookMoochBookMooch is an international, on-line book exchange community founded by John Buckman in 2006. Membership, which has grown to around 74,000 in over 90 countries, is open to anyone and is free. There is heavy community participation in its running and organisation...
, an online book swapping site - ReadItSwapItReadItSwapItReadItSwapIt is a book exchange website co-founded in 2005 by Andrew Bathgate and Neil Ferguson of London, UK. It facilitates direct swapping of books among its members in the UK.- Operation :...
, an online book swapping site - BookCrossingBookCrossingBookCrossing is defined as "the practice of leaving a book in a public place to be picked up and read by others, who then do likewise." The term is derived from bookcrossing.com, a free online book club which began in order to encourage the practice, aiming to "make the whole world a library."The...
, an online book swapping site - GoodReadsGoodreadsGoodreads is a privately run "social cataloging" website started in December 2006 by Otis Chandler, a software engineer and entrepreneur. The website permits individuals to sign up and register books to create their library catalogs and reading lists. It also allows users to create their own...
, an online book swapping site in the United States - Collaborative consumptionCollaborative consumptionThe term collaborative consumption is used to describe an economic model based on sharing, swapping, bartering, trading or renting access to products as opposed to ownership. Technology and peer communities are enabling these old market behaviours to be reinvented in ways and on a scale never...
, a trend describing similar swapping and lending organizations - Swap.com, a swap marketplace offering online and offline swapping
External Links
- xbook.co.in, India focussed site for book exchange, by meeting at common agreed place
- Bimbambim, an online book swapping site for children's books