Scribd acquires Librify

[AnemicOak]

Scribd, the subscription e-book service, has acquired Librify, a subscription e-book and social reading platform launched in 2014 that also offers e-book retailing.

Librify launched with a partnership with mass market retailer Target. For $6.99 a month, Librify subscribers received free access to one e-book each month recommended by Target, and could purchase the rest of Librify’s inventory of about 1 million e-books at a discount of 10% to 20% off list price. An early version of the subscription e-book model, Librify combined Target-recommended, discounted e-books with a social reading platform that enabled users to meet online and discuss, list and share the books they were reading.

http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/b...s-librify.html

Also...
http://www.digitalbookworld.com/2015...ial-e-reading/
http://www.thebookseller.com/news/sc...librify-304953

[Turtle91]

6.99 per month for one book of their choosing.... yeah... not for me. The "social reading" aspects I just never could get into, and certainly wouldn't pay for.

Not sure what this is going to mean for scribd? A bigger source of ebooks to choose from? Or is Scribd just buying out the competition??

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by Turtle91

Not sure what this is going to mean for scribd? A bigger source of ebooks to choose from? Or is Scribd just buying out the competition??

Don't know. Perhaps it gets them in with Target in some way and will be beneficial? Sounds like the social stuff was one of the things they wanted.

[rem736]

honestly, i don't understand why we need to incorporate "social" into everything nowadays. besides reviews and spoilers, why would anyone feel the need to have discussions over a novel?

[Turtle91]

I agree - with regards to the online thing - but I do get into some pretty good discussions with people about novels. My son and I discuss the political/cultural implications of the Dune series, I discussed religious overtones of the Narnia series with the whole family, my daughter and I discuss aerodynamic/astronomic realities in the Pern series....and, of course, EVERYONE has something to say about sparkly vampires!

But all that discussion is face to face, quality people bonding time. I guess you can get some of that by discussion online...it just never appealed to me.

[ApK]

I'll note that Target also tried to do the streaming video thing, like Vudo or CinemaNow, but quickly bailed out of that space.
We'll see how they do with ebooks.
Not as many of Target's experiments stick as, say, Amazon's....

I'm with you on the social stuff. I find all that stuff...antisocial.

Here's hoping this is good for Scribd, so they can invest in their app development and fix the remaining annoying bugs.

[AnemicOak]

This is nothing like Target running their own streaming store (which was a disaster for many reasons), just a marketing partnership they had with Librify and from looking at the Librify site that partnership is over or on hold since they've ceased to sell anything and talk about refunds for GC's and credits.