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gracie, geographic restrictions refers to the publishing rights on books, and how ebooks and paper books are treated differently with regards to point of sale. In short, if a book is published in one geographic market but not another (eg USA vs Australia) then it is available for sale in USA but not Australia. With paper books, the point of sale is considered to be the location of the seller. So I, in Australia, can happily import US-published books if I buy them from a US seller. With ebooks, the point of sale is considered to be the location of the buyer. Which means that I, in Australia, cannot buy an ebook published only in USA, even if it is not, and has no prospect of being published in Australia.
THis is obviously very simplified and doesn't take into account wholesale imports, parallel import (and restrictions thereof), ways to get around geo-restrictions, etc.
What you are talking about is a library choosing who has patronage rights. Usually libraries are funded from local taxes, so residents are in fact subsidising those non-residents who are using the library's resources. With physical resources, you pretty much have to be physically in the area to use them, which naturally limits who uses them. With purely digital resources, you can be anywhere in the world and in theory you could have 7 billion potential users of a library supported by a few thousand local residents. While I am *grateful* that certain libraries (thank you Singapore) allow non-residents access, I don't *expect* it, and should that privilege be taken away tomorrow, I would understand that decision and be happy that I had that access at all for a short time.
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