Quote:
Originally Posted by Kumabjorn
I believe that is a distinct American phenomena, here they just store the books that nobody borrows in a central book depository. So the end result is that an e-book will be a cheaper proposition for a library since it will just reside on their server.
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That is debateable: if they have to "buy" it over and over and over to keep it available the life-cycle cost will get very high very quickly.
The bone here is the *expiration*.
A pbook that costs even US$100 (an extreme case) can circulate 52 times (or more) in two years and after that remain available for a decade or more. A less popular book can likewise remain available for occasional checkout for decades--regardless of whether the publisher keeps it in print. (The university library I studied at had a Science Fiction collection donated by the nearby Air Force Base that included original editions of the LENSMEN and FOUNDATION series from the 50's that were carefully handled and prefectly usable after decades, long after the original publisher had been merged out of existence.)
With expiration, however, the less popular titles would expire and likely *not* get replaced. And, as pointed out; even the popular ebooks would only get replaced if the publisher chooses to make them available. The clear intent here is to turn the libraries into rental outlets for Macmillan.
(For the record, what the american libraries do is buy multiple copies when the books are popular and then as time goes on they sell off the extra copies to clear shelf space for new purchases. So they still keep copies of the books on the shelves. With interlibrary loan systems they don't have to keep a copy in every single library, or a warehouse, as long as the system has a few for shared checkouts.)