How popular is Overdrive?

[Leep]

This is a very interesting question and discussion. However, a variable that could greatly scew your data is how long the library has been offering ebooks. This presents two variables actually,
1. if ebooks are new to a library, then many of their card holders may not yet be aware of the ebook service. I am often first in the que for new fiction in my small regional library, but #10 on the wait list at the much larger city library even though they have more copies.
2. If ebooks have been offered at a given library for a long time, then older books may have been checked out many times in the past, and now most patrons have already read the ebook. As was pointed out, old ebooks are not weaned from the libraries offerings, so my library may now have more than 15000 ebooks. I always look only for new books offered, since I've long ago picked through the older ebook at my library. This may be true for other card holders as well, and we all rush for the new stuff.

cheers

[Ankh]

Originally Posted by Fbone

But still 52% utilization rate sounds better than 14% at a quick glance.

With all due respect... no it does not. At least, it does not sound good to me.

52% utilization translates to long waiting times across the board and is a telltale sign of underfunding. Very high utilization can be easily achieved by adding only NYT bestsellers to your collection and purchasing a single lending license. There you go, 20 to 30 titles per year, guaranteed high utilization percentage.

Is that what we want our public libraries to do? Chase the utilization percentages and cut out titles that did not reach the bestseller top 10 lists?

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by Ankh

Is that what we want our public libraries to do? Chase the utilization percentages and cut out titles that did not reach the bestseller top 10 lists?

I would prefer my local library to use my tax dollars wisely.

Subscribing to hundreds or thousands of ebook titles that are not borrowed would be wasteful. Having limited budgets my library had to sacrifice other purchases and services to be able to obtain ebooks which may be considered nonessential items.

So, when I saw a 67% usage on that particular day I was satisfied (and surprised) that it's money well spent.

[Ankh]

Guilty as charged, it is very difficult for me to remember that simple truth, that "the cheapest public service is the one that does not exist". The one that is not funded from the taxes.

The thought of public library system where the collection is driven by utilization percentages horrifies me. "The illustrated Kama Sutra", for example, was named one of the most pirated books, and I have no doubt that it would be highly popular if it was offered by the library. Definitely more popular than "The War and Peace", that much is certain.

[SeaBookGuy]

I don't want my library concentrating that heavily on "mainstream" titles. Fortunately, they have quite a good selection of current non-fiction, in addition to all the vampires, etc.

[Fbone]

I recalculated today to see if my first post was an anomaly.

73% of fiction titles
69% of all titles
32% of all audiobooks have wait times

[simplyparticular]

I've been using the eNYPL since 2005. In that time, they originally started with Mobi and PDF (mostly Mobi), but have shifted almost exclusively to ePub and PDF. So a lot of the older titles that are Mobi aren't being checked out much now that cell phone/PDA access to Mobipocket is lessening. So that probably skews their results.

Also, when I first started borrowing from eNYPL, wait lists were at most 2-3 people - I usually got a title within a month. Now, waits on popular items are 30-60 patrons, and it can take months to get a book. Luckily my local library (Buffalo) joined OverDrive two years ago, and has smaller waitlists, and purchases most of the same fiction. But I really rely on eNYPL for the nonfiction.

[SeaBookGuy]

Wouldn't mobi be good for all those Kindle users? Seattle's mobi seems to be a residual/vestigial collection as well. I think they try for Epubs whenever possible, but some books (with maps n such) are only released as a PDF.

[ATDrake]

The problem with library Mobi for Kindle users is that all those Kindle users would have to learn to use the necessary non-DRM-breaking scripts to tweak the files just enough so that the Kindle will accept them as readable while still honouring the library expiry dates and so forth.

Given the task of public education at that level and going with the easy, out-of-the-box partial-compatibility-with-selected-ereaders option, if I were a librarian I'd quite cheerfully go add only ADE-ePub/PDFs to the future collection and save myself the hassle.

And I say this as a Kindle owner who regularly uses the e-resources of my local library.

[twobits]

Originally Posted by Fbone

I would prefer my local library to use my tax dollars wisely.

Subscribing to hundreds or thousands of ebook titles that are not borrowed would be wasteful. Having limited budgets my library had to sacrifice other purchases and services to be able to obtain ebooks which may be considered nonessential items.

So, when I saw a 67% usage on that particular day I was satisfied (and surprised) that it's money well spent.

Guess it is a matter of what one thinks/wants libraries for. For some reason the big holding times and large number of copies of a book like 'The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo' bugs me. The ebook can be bought for $5-6. I find it hard to imagine that someone who wants to read that on their ereader can't spring for it themselves. On the other hand if I find myself with the need to research, so on a legal theory or a medical issue, those books are often very expensive. To get enough to do good research can be hard , especially at a time when possible sick and money is not coming in. Hopefully people do not need them all the time, so the check out rate would be low. However when you do need them it could be literally lifesaving to be able to get easy free access to them.

So guess I have a strong bias towards libraries having good reference/research collections that may not be commonly needed, but are hard to duplicate quickly privately. To me the supplying of books like The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo that are popular, but cheaply available are the waste of the tax dollars, even though they do lead to high utilization rates it seems.

[Fbone]

Originally Posted by twobits

So guess I have a strong bias towards libraries having good reference/research collections that may not be commonly needed, but are hard to duplicate quickly privately. To me the supplying of books like The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo that are popular, but cheaply available are the waste of the tax dollars, even though they do lead to high utilization rates it seems.

Libraries now offer online databases to help with research. Evidently, it is more affordable than the print versions.

With limited budgets libraries are forced to make tough choices.