Online petition over library ebook embargo

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

What is laughable that you use the same argument against the library when you fully support it when it comes to the embargo imposed by Macmillan. You cannot have it both ways. Macmillan should jump up and down with joy, if their argument about cannibalized sales due to frictionless library ebook lending is true.

Except I’ve said library lending does help sales, which Macmillan seems to acknowledge as well since they only restrict multiple licenses for 90 days.

And you’ve yet to provide any reason why this would be good for the library to do. You’ve stated libraries are supposed to provide books to the masses regardless of income etc. and yet you defend them when they are ceasing to do so for forthcoming ebooks.

Again one is better than none and one for 90 days is better by far than none until the end of days. And save the pedantry I’m obviously talking about new ebooks.

If Macmillan were to cease providing ebooks to libraries flat out, I’d cast them in similar light.

[JSWolf]

@MGlitch, if it is censorship, it's censorship on McMillan's side of things. They are censoring their own eBooks.

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

@MGlitch, if it is censorship, it's censorship on McMillan's side of things. They are censoring their own eBooks.

You’ll have to explain how providing the same content in every format requested is censorship. And if then explain how the library refusing to carry a widely used format isn’t censorship.

[Tomk2]

Originally Posted by MGlitch

Except I’ve said library lending does help sales, which Macmillan seems to acknowledge as well since they only restrict multiple licenses for 90 days.



And you’ve yet to provide any reason why this would be good for the library to do..

Libraries are expensive, inefficient, government mandated and taxpayer supported entities. 11% of the budget goes to the library collection, 89% goes to the staff salaries, and overhead, which includes providing meeting spaces for the public and computers. If a library can only provide less popular and older works, some of those taxpayers might get to thinking that all that library tax money is not well spent. So the libraries will defend themselves against a publisher who runs the risk of marginalizing libraries, in case taxpayers take notice that the libraries are expensive and inefficient providers of (now older) content.

Is that too harsh? I like and use my library for ebooks, but I do not think I am inaccurate in what I have said.

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Loo

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by Tomk2

Libraries are expensive, inefficient, government mandated and taxpayer supported entities. 11% of the budget goes to the library collection, 89% goes to the staff salaries, and overhead, which includes providing meeting spaces for the public and computers. If a library can only provide less popular and older works, some of those taxpayers might get to thinking that all that library tax money is not well spent. So the libraries will defend themselves against a publisher who runs the risk of marginalizing libraries, in case taxpayers take notice that the libraries are expensive and inefficient providers of (now older) content.

Is that too harsh? I like and use my library for ebooks, but I do not think I am inaccurate in what I have said.

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Loo

Ok so lets review

Macmillan restricts the purchase of *multiple* ebook licenses from libraries for the first 90 days of release. They can still purchase a license for those 90 and however many licenses they wish after the 90.

This does not limit the kinds of books the library has, old vs new, popular vs unpopular. It simply limits within a relatively small timeframe, the number of copies of new releases.

The library in question decides 'nah we wont buy any new ebooks from you'

Using your example, those taxpayers are going to get a whole lot madder with the library's decision than the publishers decision.

Sure the library has the right to try and get the better deal out of the publisher. But the figures which others have quoted show that the libraries need the publishers more than the publishers seem to need the libraries. So making power plays by not buying books is a rather questionable move.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by MGlitch

Except I’ve said library lending does help sales, which Macmillan seems to acknowledge as well since they only restrict multiple licenses for 90 days.

Riiiight. Now name me one single coherent reason why the library shall bow to the demands of the publisher without getting anything out of the deal themselves.

If Macmillan offers a one sided deal, they shouldn't be surprised if some libraries refuse to have any part in it.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by MGlitch

Ok so lets review

Macmillan restricts the purchase of *multiple* ebook licenses from libraries for the first 90 days of release. They can still purchase a license for those 90 and however many licenses they wish after the 90.

This does not limit the kinds of books the library has, old vs new, popular vs unpopular. It simply limits within a relatively small timeframe, the number of copies of new releases.

The library in question decides 'nah we wont buy any new ebooks from you'

Using your example, those taxpayers are going to get a whole lot madder with the library's decision than the publishers decision.

Sure the library has the right to try and get the better deal out of the publisher. But the figures which others have quoted show that the libraries need the publishers more than the publishers seem to need the libraries. So making power plays by not buying books is a rather questionable move.

Sometimes it comes down to who can sell their narrative the best. Certainly, there is the any stick to beat a publisher with crowd who are cheering on the library.

Looking at the Atlanta-Fulton County library budget, the over all budget is some $27 M with $2 M of that for book acquisition. Apparently, a fairly new thing is to lease new books, i.e. rather than buy a bunch of books, the libraries lease most of their copies of the latest buzz book and once the buzz dies down send most of those copies back to the leasing company and only keep a few copies for the permanent collection. This is for hard copy books.

I do wonder given that libraries are only 1.2 percent of the publishers business, how many ebooks we are talking about. I suspect we aren't talking large numbers. It could very well be that we are talking about very small numbers of ebooks and patrons.

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

Riiiight. Now name me one single coherent reason why the library shall bow to the demands of the publisher without getting anything out of the deal themselves.

If Macmillan offers a one sided deal, they shouldn't be surprised if some libraries refuse to have any part in it.

Tell you what when you bother to answer my question about why this particular tactic is a good move I’ll answer this. All you’ve done so far is say the library has a right to try and get the best deal it can.

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by pwalker8

Sometimes it comes down to who can sell their narrative the best. Certainly, there is the any stick to beat a publisher with crowd who are cheering on the library.

Looking at the Atlanta-Fulton County library budget, the over all budget is some $27 M with $2 M of that for book acquisition. Apparently, a fairly new thing is to lease new books, i.e. rather than buy a bunch of books, the libraries lease most of their copies of the latest buzz book and once the buzz dies down send most of those copies back to the leasing company and only keep a few copies for the permanent collection. This is for hard copy books.

I do wonder given that libraries are only 1.2 percent of the publishers business, how many ebooks we are talking about. I suspect we aren't talking large numbers. It could very well be that we are talking about very small numbers of ebooks and patrons.

Yes I’d agree public perception is very important. Of course so is what is lost in the battle. With libraries being such a small part of publishers sales, that boycotts generally tend to break down in numbers over time, and that a certain percentage of library patrons were never going to buy the book vs knowing libraries aid in discovery it might be more advantageous to publishers to cut the cost of some of an authors backlist or the first in a series (which is already an in use practice) to try and make up for the lost discovery.

I’ve said it before it’s pretty readily apparent that in the large scale libraries need publishers more than publishers need libraries. And just to be sure I’m not trying to vilify libraries or say I feel they’re useless. I’m speaking just in terms of the business transactions between them and publishers.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by MGlitch

You’ll have to explain how providing the same content in every format requested is censorship. And if then explain how the library refusing to carry a widely used format isn’t censorship.

McMillan is not allowing the library to buy as many eBooks as they need. What the library is doing by not buying McMillan eBooks is a protest.

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

McMillan is not allowing the library to buy as many eBooks as they need. What the library is doing by not buying McMillan eBooks is a protest.

The one isn't censorship, the library still has access to the material just in limited quantity. Further, the library does not "need" multiple copies, they want multiple copies. They are perfectly capable of lending out a single copy, as is evidenced by the fact they've done it with physical books for ages.

It can be a protest, it's still censorship. The two are not mutually exclusive concepts.

[murraypaul]

Originally Posted by MGlitch

The one isn't censorship, the library still has access to the material just in limited quantity.

Is censorship purely absolute, or is there a functional level?
My library system has around 280k active users (defined by them as having been 'seen' in the last two years).
Is providing a single copy of a book to 280k people functionally different than proving no copies? In either case the vast majority of the people will not be able to read the book.
If libraries didn't show the number of copies they had, just a simple flag of whether the book was currently available to read or not, there would be no effective difference between having 0 and 1 copies available, as far as the vast majority of users could tell.
With two week load periods, 6 or 7 people would be able to read the book, or 0.0023% of the library membership. Even if everyone read it in a single day and returned it, it would still be unavailable to 99.97% of the library membership.

If <insert restrictive society of your choice here> didn't ban reading <contentious book of your choice, eg. the Bible> absolutely in their country, but instead allowed only a single copy to exist, and prevented any method of duplicating it, would than not be censorship of any form?

Further, the library does not "need" multiple copies, they want multiple copies. They are perfectly capable of lending out a single copy, as is evidenced by the fact they've done it with physical books for ages.

That seems an ... odd argument, seeing as libraries can buy as many physical copies as they wish. They can only lend out one physical copy at a time, as they can only lend out one eBook licence at a time. But they can have many physical copies, but are only allowed to have one eBook licence.

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

Is censorship purely absolute, or is there a functional level?
My library system has around 280k active users (defined by them as having been 'seen' in the last two years).
Is providing a single copy of a book to 280k people functionally different than proving no copies? In either case the vast majority of the people will not be able to read the book.
If libraries didn't show the number of copies they had, just a simple flag of whether the book was currently available to read or not, there would be no effective difference between having 0 and 1 copies available, as far as the vast majority of users could tell.

If <insert restrictive society of your choice here> didn't ban reading <contentious book of your choice, eg. the Bible> absolutely in their country, but instead allowed only a single copy to exist, and prevented any method of copying it, would than not be censorship of any form?

This would hold water if 1) all those 280k people wanted to read the book which is doubtful at best 2) they only had 90 days to read it which is again doubtful at best.

Your example with a library not displaying how many copies would also mean they don't allow you to place holds, and enter in ebooks to their database that they do not have. Since they do allow holds, and don't enter books they don't have displaying copies is irrelevant to the end user anyway, and only serves to ease things on the libraries end. To further clarify, lets say a library has 4 licenses, the minimum wait time is 1 week remaining, that's all they need to display to inform the patron when the book will become available, the rest are superfluous. Likewise if they had only 1 they'd simply display the wait time for that. Finally if they were so wasteful with their time to enter books they had no copies of the wait time would be infinite.

But again, that's not how they display information. And it's in their own interest to keep displaying information in the way they do. So postulating them changing it is irrelevant.

Your final example is also flawed since the limitation on copies is itself limited. And limited in such a way that given the vast time after it it's an insignificant amount.

Yes the publisher is restricting the number of copies the library can have, the same way Apple restricts the number of iPhones you can buy on the day they release (or at least they have in the past), and then relax as time goes on and demand eases up. I'll grant not an apples to apples situation since we're dealing with digital goods vs physical, but Apple is hardly censoring the iPhone. Nor is the publisher censoring their ebook.

However the publisher also makes their ebook available to everyone and you can buy as many copies as you wish.

[MGlitch]

Originally Posted by murraypaul

That seems an ... odd argument, seeing as libraries can buy as many physical copies as they wish. They can only lend out one physical copy at a time, as they can only lend out one eBook licence at a time. But they can have many physical copies, but are only allowed to have one eBook licence.

Except libraries are restricted by the laws of physics with how many physical copies they can have in any one branch way more than they are with ebooks. Something that fits in the palm of my hand can hold billions of ebooks. Try holding even a hundred copies of a book.

Physical books also do not walk themselves back to the library on their due dates. I'll ignore the wear and tear issue since most of the time a book will last longer than the 90 day restriction that exists for ebooks by a not insignificant amount before it needs to be repaired or replaced.

[issybird]

By what arithmetic has eight weeks morphed into 90 days?

My take on censorship: it's either directed at content, which is clearly not the cases with embargoing Macmillan's books, or purveyor because of the type of book it sells, e.g. crackpot political or religious publishers. Buying decisions which are purely economic, in this case, directling purchases with limited funds toward books that have just been published rather than two-month old ones, are not censorship. Another

I think the embargo is a poor choice but it doesn't offend me. If I were a customer of a library instituting such a ban, I might or might not send them a protest, but I wouldn't feel as if my rights had been trampled. I fail to understand why so many discussions here seem to involve a forced moral component (Censorship! It isn't fair!) about what is purely business, impersonal and amoral.