Faith Life Study Bible App - ESV not free? But available free on Faithlife.com
I was testing FaithLife App on Android with Proclaim. I had previously tested FaithLife.com and found it will be incredibly useful as a church. The problem we have is this. Users can signup for a FaithLife.com account and gain access to a number of key books and bible versions including ESV Bible. We have discovered however that when they login to the Faith Life Study Bible App they can no longer access ESV and we also found that there is a $10 (£6.50) license fee per users to use ESV. As a church we use the ESV and so obviously would like to use that within the App. The problem we face is this inconsistency and also the fact that the congregation can download the ESV for free outside of the App. As you will appreciate the church congregation will be wondering why they need to pay £6.50 ($10) for it.
Is there any way around this issue? What is the "license" fee for? If a fee has to be paid is there any way we can organise a bulk price? I know it doesn't seem much but we have 60% of our congregation under the age of 30 and only 30% of the congregation are in paid work. Being based in Hackney, London which is the most deprived borough in the UK we have to make every penny work and avoid cost where we can. Any thing you can do to help us therefore would be greatly appreciated. Of course if the cost truly cannot be avoided can you explain the full benefits gained by the payment?
Thank you for your consideration of this and I look forward to understanding better the reasons behind this and even hopeful for a low cost way to roll out the ESV for our congregation using the Faith Life App.
Hi Stephen.
in general, Logos provide access to "free resources" when people create an account. most of these resources are only available when online (i.e, when accessed over the Internet) due to licensing restrictions.
to download them to a device requires a purchase which, as you say, is $10 in the case of the ESV.
So I would have expected your congregation to see the ESV from within the Faithlife app but that they would need to pay if they wanted to download it.
is this consistent with what you are seeing?
Logos would need to comment on any bulk options, but the general licensing model is on a per-individual basis. For any variation on this I suggest you contact Logos sales directly.
Graham
Graham
Are you viewing the use of ESV on the Faith Life App as a downloaded version? The ESV in this scenario cannot be used outside of the App so does not seem to be a download to me.
I can go and download the ESV to my phone free of charge outside of the Logos.com system but then I cannot use the proclaim links to open my mobile for me nor can I use it alongside my Faith Life study bible.
It just seems very odd and inconsistant for what is principally a free digital bible.
I will email someone in the Sales team at Logos.com but I found on some issues the forum has derived answers that the sales team could not on other issues. I will try them on this one.
Hi Stephen
It depends - you should be able to access it "online" but if you try and download it (which is a function in the app) then a purchase will be needed.
I'm afraid I can't check (I access the resource through an account where I have purchased it) but can you check whether you see the ESV in the Library window in the app? If so, then it should be readable from within the app - just not downloadable to the device
Understood
As above, I think it should be free to access - not to download.
For technical questions the forums are great. For variations on pricing you need to talk with Sales.
Graham
In addution to what Graham said:
The ESV is not a free digital bible in the sense some other translations are - and while a publisher may choose not to ask for a fee on a certain platform or for some time (I think there was a free ESV offer for Faithlife once, and a free NIV offer as well, IIRC), this does not mean the bible is free everywhere and in every different edition.
Logos produced the Lexham English Bible (LEB) which comes for free and is part of the Faithlife package, thus I would recommend checking it out, since it's the least hassle for people who simply want to use Faithlife without much ado.
That said, there is a standing offer to obtain the ESV plus additional material for free, provided some conditions are met, see http://wiki.logos.com/free_logos_books Crossway section.
Hope this helps a bit,
Mick
Have joy in the Lord!
I may have worded my self poorly. If you pick up any phone and go to the app store you will find you can download the ESV free of charge. To this extent everyone we speak to saying "hey you can use this FaithLife app to follow the service but it will cost you $10 to add the ESV", the reply returns "but I've got a free ESV bible on my phone already why do I need to pay $10?" or "I just signed up for FaithLife.com why does FaithLife App not use the same facilities?"
I think these are justified questions from the average person in the pew.