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Originally Posted by rcentros
Those darn libraries... so "20th century."
As for Amazon and it's not selling its own published books to libraries... for the most part they're not worth reading anyhow. I've quit looking at their free book of the month lists anymore. When I did download them it was a chore to read them. I guess there might be a few exceptions.
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Amazon imprints (Thomas & Mercer, Amazon Crossing, the article mentions Lake Union but I could find nothing for that publisher), include titles by popular or well regarded authors. The are subject to review by Amazon’s editors, and in the case of Amazon Crossing, Amazon commissions a translation (I wish they would also publish it in the original language, but apparently they do not acquire rights to do so). These comprise a few thousand titles (or at least 2000), all of them are available in print, so if a library wants to make them available, all they have to do is purchase copies from Amazon. I understand some people prefer print books.
Kindle Direct Publishing is a different story, though there books worth reading there as well. KDP authors can choose to have print editions, which again could be purchased and lent out by libraries.
All authors share the problem of ‘discovery’. To the extent that having their ebooks available in public libraries helps with that, they should be given the option to make their ebooks available for borrowing there. It seems Amazon is doing some negotiations that will allow this but I don’t expect to know the details until they’re finalized. In particular, there is no evidence that ePub would not be part of this, or that Overdrive wouldn’t be.
Personally I rarely open the Libby app with the idea that I’m going to discover anything new to read: I only use it to look for specific books that I’d like to borrow. And for years, it is hit or miss as to any given new or recent book will be available (guessing roughly 50%). So the benefit to authors is not obvious to me. However I do sometimes purchase a book I’ve borrowed when the price is right, so there’s that.