Quote:
Originally Posted by DuckieTigger
Publishers tried complete ebook embargo before, and they changed their minds after a while. The library cannot financially lose, as it is operating as non-profit. They can still buy paper at a much cheaper price per borrow for the publisher and without limits.
Why do think it is a bad decision for the library?
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Can you provide a source on that embargo? All I've been able to find, removing Macmillan from the search to get rid of as many articles about this specific incident, are either for Academic publishers which isn't the concern here since Macmillan may have academic imprints, but are much more vast. A mention of eAudiobooks from Blackstone which was further limited to a selection of popular authors not their entire frontlist. And Tor (who are an imprint of Macmillan for those unaware) setting a 4 month embargo a little over a year ago. Tor officials citing that they were looking in to library loans affecting sales.
Source for Tor embargo:
https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/...t-of-test.html
Though in my searching I also found a blog of a librarian who stated bluntly that libraries frequently break release dates for physical books. Yes anecdotal evidence, however there's plenty of cases where store break release dates it stands to reason libraries would as well. So perhaps some turn about is fair play with publishers now restricting formats they can assert more control over. If you've ever worked in a bookstore, a store which happens to sell books, or a library you're very aware books come in ahead of release dates, especially popular books, because of the logistics of shipping.
Circling back to Tors embargo, as an imprint of Macmillan I'm sure they shared any information from that experiment (they call it such themselves) with their larger company. It follows that Macmillan is using the information from that to set this policy.
Now to get to your question of why I think this is a bad move for the library. Fiscally it's not, as you mentioned they are a non-profit. Not buying something is certainly a good way to save money for other things.
However a library exists to serve the public, removing access to an affordable means to read news books runs counter to one of their chief purposes. Right now it's Macmillan, but what if other publishers want to follow Macmillan, will the library then cease buying ebooks from those publishers? And if so, how is that not damaging for the public good, since the library is now removing a form of affordable reading from the public?
While it's not apples to apples, Amazon caught flack from the public over their decision to not sell books from Hachette not too long ago, over of all things pricing. As I said it's not apples to apples, Amazon is a for profit mega corp, the libraries aren't. But I doubt we'll get an apples to apples situation that doesn't concern the same two parties (publishers and libraries). The point of this is public perception, and I'll grant libraries are otherwise doing a good job of getting good press on the Macmillan issue for their view. But when you start essentially banning books when the other side is not banning them the view starts to shift. Maybe not for everyone, and apparently not for everyone on MR, though given the general atmosphere of 'publishers are evil money grubbers' that seems to invade this forum I probably shouldn't be surprised.
Libraries are already a quarrelsome part of taxes, many people not understanding the full scope of the good they do. A fight libraries should be very much aware of. So when you go around and tell patrons "well we could have given this to you, but they wanted to limit for a time the number of copies we could lend so we decided zero was better' it's not going to sit well. One is still greater than 0, and if the members posting here about being willing to wait are indeed willing then 1 copy to go around 20 people is a night and day difference to zero copies.
All this leads to the public being less loving of libraries, they don't even need to shift into being openly hostile. They just need to go from viewing them as a cause to fight over to being ambivalent. Politicians see this shift and start cutting taxes for libraries. Now those libraries have less coming in than before, maybe not as much less as they're saving not buying ebook licenses, but still less. Which generally leads to stresses within the staff and the services offered.
Now, how is a library removing access to books a good thing?