Quote:
Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg
This is certainly the number one item for me.
I just now browsed the selection at my home public library, and it didn't interest me. The selection for the library of the city where I work, Philadelphia, is somewhat better, and I reserved one book (3 readers are in front of me). But their eBook selecton still is trivial compared to what's on the shelves. However, over the next few years, won't this change? I think it already is changing, with fewer hardback purchases due to recession battered library budgets.
I've ordered a Kindle 3, partly for the "experimental" no-monthly-fee internet access. I don't see myself ever buying another eReader unless it conveniently accepts encrypted library eBooks.
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Library eBook selection may actually be getting worse (I'll try to find where I read this earlier today...). Only a small fraction of patrons have ebook readers, it doesn't make sense to move quickly to ebooks, with budgets as limited as they generally are. So selection is likely to remain limited. Plus publishers and Overdrive seem to see libraries as a source of free advertising, as retail channels, all the while insisting on an anachronistic lending model (each digital copy can be read by only one patron at a time, which artificially increase scarcity and drives people to purchase what they'd otherwise read for free). Overdrive is not cheap, either - libraries may pay more than retail for their digital copies and associated lending rights. See this white paper on Overdrive's web site (PDF download):
How eBook Catalogs at Public Libraries Drive Publishers’ Book Sales and Profits
But my librarian sister tells me that they have a pilot program where her library has purchased several Kindles, loaded them up with content, and then lend them out like books (after deregistering them from the library's Amazon account of course). It seems this could indeed be cheaper and simpler than something like Overdrive - and without complexities of patrons having to futz with downloading from a website, transferring to a reading device over USB with ADE, etc. I suppose this approach could be used with any reading device but Amazon's licensing terms are attractive (up to 5 devices for simultaneous usage).
If more libraries take this up, perhaps we'll have a good cause to donate our old Kindles to when we trade up to a new one. I'm sure libraries would get the last drop of usage out of them, too. And it would increase pressure on Amazon and Overdrive to get a Kindle solution together.