Quote:
Originally Posted by rogue_librarian
"His", (he goes by the name of "Horst" which makes him male), and "his" library would be the Vienna University Library, one of the leading academic libraries in Austria. Still, books can usually be repaired, re-bound, salvaged by other means; also, this could be the selling point for library ebooks (say good buy to lost and damaged books), but no. It's just stupid.
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Ah, I didn't see his name, thank you.
It is a great selling point for libraries, I agree. It may even be a big reason ebooks have been adopted in many libraries, though that has been slow. But it's exactly why HC has implemented this whether we like it or not. I'm just trying to get an idea of how reasonable the 26 loans restriction is as an analogue to the lifespan of paper books. (As you and the NYU article point out, this equation would also have to include repair costs. It also has to take into account the relative prices libraries pay for paper books vs. ebooks, which statistic seems to tip it into "unfair" territory right off the bat.) I find it curious how little real data there seems to be available about library book lifespan.