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Many of us have dozens of books that we lug around every time we move. Most of them we’ve already read, but there’s something about hanging onto those books just in case you want to go back and read them one more time. Just think of how many bookcases you’ve bought in your life to hold these books that you hardly ever touch. If only there was a way to keep all the books’ content within one light-weight package that’s easy to move from apartment to apartment.
A service called 1DollarScan is aiming to help you with your clutter by scanning your books and transferring them to a digital file that can be read on electronic devices like a Kindle, tablet, or even on your computer.
The idea of converting older media — like cassettes and vinyl records to digital MP3s, or slides or paper photos into digital photos — is nothing new. However, sending your old slides or VHS tapes off to have someone convert them is often a costly procedure. 1DollarScan’s niche is that it’s the cheapest way possible to digitize your books. It can also digitize things like pictures, documents, and business cards.
1DollarScan will scan 100 pages of a book, 10 business cards, 10 business documents, or 10 photos for just $1. You can barely buy a bottle of water for that price. You just have to pack and send your materials to the company, and 1DollarScan will scan your materials, check the quality of the scan, and then send it to you to download either by PDF or on a DVD. Unless you request your papers to be returned, 1DollarScan will recycle them after two weeks.
It’s important to note that you probably don’t want to send anything you want back to 1DollarScan. The company doesn’t gently scan each page for one measly dollar. It cuts off the spine and sticks it into a machine. Once you send your books they won’t be returned, so make sure you’re ready to part with them.
Bookscan, the Japanese subsidiary of 1DollarScan that launched last year, became very popular in Japan, especially after the earthquakes. People were worried their bookshelves full of books would collapse. The founder of Bookscan actually got the idea for the business because he was worried his 2,000 books would cause his shelves to collapse and hurt his two small children. There were apparently numerous reports of bookshelves falling over during the earthquakes and books fatally falling on people.
So, if you’re ready to get rid of the book but would like to have a copy to read saved on your external hard drive for those rainy days, this is the cheapest solution. However, you still do need to send the book off, and you have to pay for the shipping, so if you’re sending a box of 30 books, the shipping costs themselves may be quite costly. You’ll have to play around with the prices of shipping to see how cost effective this is for your needs.
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