textbook rentals

Amazon's got game (and textbook rentals)

Tuesday's top tech stories are out to disrupt your world:

Oh Amazon, what don't you do? Well cross off game development, as it just launched its own studio to make Facebook games and compete with Zynga. It also joined the textbook rental service to face off with eBay's Half.com and BookRenter.

YouTube will no longer be a pre-loaded default app on Apple devices. Apple is dropping the YouTube app for iOS 6, and Google will create a separate app you can download. It's all part of Apple's mission to distance itself from Google.

If … Read more

Rosensweig named chief of Chegg

Dan Rosensweig, a high-profile technology executive, is the new president and chief executive of the online textbook rental company Chegg.

The appointment, announced by Chegg co-founder Osman Rashid on Tuesday, becomes effective immediately. Rosensweig finds himself in a crowded business segment, with Chegg squaring off against its chief rival, BookRenter.com, as well as megasize book retailers such as Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com and smaller local booksellers.

But helped by penny-pinching concerns born of a bracing recession, students increasingly view textbook rental as an attractive alternative to purchasing their books outright. The service operates on a time clock. … Read more

Avoid campus bookstore prices with BookRenter

When I was a college student living on a lowly work-study salary, few things angered me more than shelling out dough for a required course book, only to have the professor assign a single chapter for reading. (It's been 10 years since I took the class, but I still remember fuming as I paid $30 for 30 pages in From Max Weber.) And don't get me started on science textbooks that cost hundreds of dollars but only net you a few bucks once the class is over.

Online textbook rental service BookRenter wants to ease at least this … Read more