Electronic book rentals

• US 9,129,322 B2
• Filed: 12/29/2010
• Issued: 09/08/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 12/29/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Inventors: Rausch, Daniel B., Fardeen, Mohamed Aakhil, Limp, David A.
• Primary Examiner(s): Nigh, James D
• Application Number:
  US12/981,056
• Publication Number:
  US 20120173353A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,714 Days
• Field of Search: 705/26.1, 705/50, 705/51, 705/59
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 21/105 Arrangements for software license management or administration, e.g. for managing licenses at corporate level
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/1235 with control of digital rights management [DRM]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/00 Commerce
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0601 Electronic shopping [e-shopping]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0645 Rental transactions; Leasing transactions

Abstract

Architectures and techniques are described to rent electronic books. In particular, a content provider can rent electronic books to individuals for a specified rental term. The individuals may have the option to modify the rental term for an electronic book. The rental term for a particular electronic book may be modified by extending the rental term of the particular electronic book or decreasing the rental term of the particular electronic book. Individuals may also convert the rental of an electronic book to a purchase and a purchase of an electronic book to a rental. In order to rent the electronic books to individuals, the content provider may acquire permission from the publishers of the electronic books. In some cases, the content provider may acquire a pool of time-bound rentable licenses from the publishers to allocate to individuals renting electronic books from the content provider.

Claims

1. A computer-implemented method, comprising:

under control of one or more computing systems of a content provider, the one or more computing systems configured with specific executable instructions,

acquiring, from a publisher of an electronic book, permission to rent the electronic book to individuals, wherein the acquiring comprises acquiring a plurality of licenses to access content of the electronic book and agreeing to provide a first payment to the publisher for an initial rental of the electronic book and a second, lesser amount to the publisher for a subsequent rental of the electronic book;

receiving a rental request from a client device of an individual to rent an electronic book, the rental request specifying a period of time for the individual to rent the electronic book;

providing, by the one or more computer systems, a single license from the plurality of licenses to the client device for the individual to access the electronic book for the period of time specified by the rental request, wherein providing the single license decreases the plurality of licenses available to the content provider by one;

when the period of time for the individual to rent the electronic book ends, receiving the single license from the client device, wherein the individual is no longer able to access the electronic book when the single license is not present on the client device; and

responsive to receiving the single license from the client device, increasing the plurality of licenses available to the content provider by one.

2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising sending a notification to the client device that the period of time specified in the rental request will expire within a particular period of time, the notification including at least one option selectable to modify the period of time for the individual to rent the electronic book.

3. The computer-implemented method of claim 2, wherein a rental term modification request is received, at least partly, in response to selection of the at least one option.

4. The computer-implemented method of claim 3, wherein the rental term modification request indicates a request to extend the period of time for the individual to rent the electronic book.

5. The computer-implemented method of claim 3, wherein the rental term modification request indicates a request to purchase the electronic book.

6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising causing at least a portion of the electronic book to be removed from memory of the client device after the period of time for the individual to rent the electronic book has expired.

7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a content access request from the client device to access content of the electronic book after expiration of the period of time; and

denying the client device access to the electronic book at least in partly in response to receiving the content access request.

8. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a request from the client device to purchase an additional electronic book; and

receiving a request from the client device to convert the purchase of the additional electronic book to a rental of the additional electronic book for a certain period of time.

9. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the single license may be allocated to rent the electronic book for a respective period of time that is different from the period of time specified by the rental request received from the client device.

10. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a rental term modification request from the client device to change the period of time for the individual to rent the electronic book; and

providing permission to the client device for the individual to access the electronic book for an additional period of time based, at least partly, on the rental term modification request.

11. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving a rental term modification request from the client device to increase the period of time for the individual to rent the electronic book beyond a maximum period of time for the individual to rent the electronic book; and

sending a notification to the client device offering to;

(i) extend the rental term to the maximum period of time, the maximum period of time being a rental term for which a payment amount for the rental is equivalent to a purchase price of the electronic book, or (ii) convert the rental to a purchase.

12. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising causing a royalty payment to be provided to the publisher at least partly in response to allocating the single license to an additional client device.

13. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein an amount of payment to the publisher for subsequent rentals of the electronic book decreases until a minimum payment amount is reached.

14. An electronic reader device comprising:

a processor; and

memory accessible by the processor, the memory storing;

an electronic book rental module that is executable by the processor to;

send a request to a content provider to rent an electronic book for a period of time;

receive metadata to access the electronic book for the period of time;

receive at least a portion of the electronic book;

send a request to the content provider to modify the period of time to access the electronic book; and

modify the metadata of the electronic book when the period of time to access the electronic book is modified;

an electronic book rendering module executable by the processor to render the at least a portion of the electronic book after receiving the metadata to access the electronic book; and

a search module executable by the processor to search the at least a portion of the content of the electronic book, wherein the metadata indicates that the search module has permission to search the electronic book and the metadata prohibits rendering of the electronic book on the electronic reader device.

15. The electronic reader device of claim 14, wherein the electronic book rendering module is executable by the processor to retrieve the at least a portion of the electronic book from a local memory storage device of the electronic reader device.

16. The electronic reader device of claim 14, wherein the electronic book rendering module is executable by the processor to retrieve the at least a portion of the electronic book by sending a request to the content provider for the at least a portion of the electronic book.

17. The electronic reader device of claim 14, wherein the memory further stores a digital rights management module executable by the processor to compare an indicator of time stored by a local memory storage device of the electronic reader device with particular metadata of the electronic book indicating when the period of time to rent the electronic book expires.

18. The electronic reader device of claim 14, wherein the metadata of the electronic book includes one or more vouchers, one or more keys, one or more certificates, one or more tokens, or combinations thereof.

19. The electronic reader device of claim 14, wherein the electronic book rendering module is executable by the processor to deny requests by a user of the electronic reader device to render content of the electronic book after expiration of the period of time to access the electronic book.

20. The electronic reader device of claim 14, wherein the electronic book rendering module is executable by the processor to remove at least a portion of the electronic book from a local memory storage device of the electronic reader device after expiration of the period of time to access the electronic book.

21. The electronic reader device of claim 14, wherein the memory further stores a digital rights management module executable by the processor to compare an indicator of time that is independent of an internal clock of the electronic reader device with particular metadata of the electronic book indicating when the period of time to rent the electronic book expires.

22. The electronic reader device of claim 14, wherein the memory further stores an annotations module executable by the processor to access annotations made by the individual that are associated with the electronic book rented from the content provider.

23. The electronic reader device of claim 22, wherein the annotations are accessible after the period of time to rent the electronic book expires.

24. The electronic reader device of claim 14, wherein the electronic book rendering module is further executable by the processor to determine if a portion of the electronic book that is to be rendered is stored locally on the electronic reader device and, if not, retrieve the portion of the electronic book that is to be rendered.

25. Computer readable storage memory having instructions stored thereon that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform acts comprising:

acquiring, from a publisher of a digital content item, permission to rent the digital content item to individuals, acquiring a plurality of licenses to access content of the digital content item, and agreeing to provide a first payment to the publisher for an initial rental of the digital content item and a second, lesser amount to the publisher for a subsequent rental of the digital content item;

receiving a rental request from a client device of an individual to rent the digital content item, the rental request specifying a period of time for the individual to rent the digital content item;

providing, by the one or more computer systems, a single license from the plurality of licenses to the client device for the individual to access the digital content item for the period of time specified by the rental request, wherein providing the single license decreases the plurality of licenses available to the content provider by one;

receiving the single license from the client device after the period of time for the individual to rent the digital content item ends, wherein the individual is no longer able to access the digital content item when the single license is not present on the client device; and

increasing the plurality of licenses available to the content provider by one.

26. The computer readable storage memory of claim 25, wherein the instructions cause the one or more processors to perform further acts comprising:

sending a notification to the client device that the period of time specified in the rental request will expire within a particular period of time, the notification including at least one option selectable to modify the period of time for the individual to rent the digital content item.

27. The computer readable storage memory of claim 25, wherein the instructions cause the one or more processors to perform further acts comprising:

receiving a request from the client device to purchase an additional digital content item; and

receiving a request from the client device to convert the purchase of the additional digital content item to a rental of the additional digital content item for a certain period of time.

28. The computer readable storage memory of claim 25, wherein the instructions cause the one or more processors to perform further acts comprising:

receiving a rental term modification request from the client device to change the period of time for the individual to rent the digital content item; and

providing permission to the client device for the individual to access the digital content item for an additional period of time based, at least partly, on the rental term modification request.

29. The computer readable storage memory of claim 25, wherein the instructions cause the one or more processors to perform further acts comprising:

receiving a rental term modification request from the client device to increase the period of time for the individual to rent the digital content item beyond a maximum period of time for the individual to rent the digital content item; and

sending a notification to the client device offering to at least one of;

(i) extend the rental term to the maximum period of time, the maximum period of time being a rental term for which a payment amount for the rental is equivalent to a purchase price of the digital content item, or (ii) convert the rental to a purchase.