Book swapping

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[1]—except that hard-copy original analog objects are exchanged.

Many colleges and universities have developed online book exchange programs to help students save money on textbooks.

The exchange relies on users leaving and taking books and is generally not supervised.

Some railway stations in Great Britain have informal book exchanges and one has also been set up in a phone box in Kington Magna.

[3] Such bookshelves are popular also in Baltic states, funded by local municipalities or by the governments.