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Montgomery County, MD completed a new expanded library in a new shopping district just in time for electronic books to become prelevant in the area. Now they have had a sever drop off in visitors to the library as residents have simply stated that it costs too much to get to the library. It costs $0 to borrow the books, but the costs are in the fuel to get you there and back and therefore needs to be figgured into the cost of the books.
IMHO what counties across the country need to think about is how to remove the barriers to electronic books. Let's face it the readers are not free unless you have a smart phone, such as the one my office gives me which is free to me. In my county PC's are in 95% of all of the homes so library books can be provided via Overdrive. although readers are in 5% of the homes in the county so the challenge is to get the readers into the home. Since smart phones are in 90% of the homes and books can be borrowed with them, smart phones are a simple answer to how to get readers into the community. The challege here is telling the community how to get to the books via overdrive.
What ideas has your ocunties come up with the get electronic library books into the community? My county is talking to the community about smart phones and reading books on them. They will setup any smart phone that is presented to them for reading the counties electronic books from the county's libraries.
Other than that I say "It's about time a county out there gets with the 21st century". Libraries have become a rellic of the past.
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