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from the today's-borrowers-are-tomorrow's-buyers dept.
In July, Macmillan CEO John Sargent outlined the changes in response to "growing fears that library lending was cannibalizing sales." On September 11, the American Library Association (ALA) started circulating a petition in hopes of pressuring Macmillan to not go through with its plan, which is scheduled to go into effect in November. "To treat libraries as an inferior consumer to the general population, it's the wrong thing to do," said Alan Inouye, director of the Office for Information Technology Policy at the ALA. "Libraries are generally held as amongst the highest esteemed institutions in the community."
"Allowing a library like the Los Angeles Public Library (which serves 18 million people) the same number of initial e-book copies as a rural Vermont library serving 1,200 people smacks of punishment, not support," librarian Jessamyn West wrote on CNN. She also points out that Sargent's claim that apps let people check out books in states and countries where they don't live "betrays a fundamental misunderstanding of how public libraries work." There are a few that let you pay for a library card regardless of where you live, but not many. Digital Trends reached out to Macmillan for comment but did not receive a response.
Source: https://www.digitaltrends.com/news/macmillan-e-books-library-waiting-period/
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday September 16 2019, @10:18PM (1 child)
There are definite up sides to using ebooks. For one, you can search an ebook much faster than you can a print book. Though, a lot of the hard work may have already been done for you, if there's an Index in a physcial book. An obvious advantage for ebooks is the ability to access entire libraries worth of items wherever you have your electronic device. The downside for ebooks is that you must have power and sometimes internet access to make use of those. Also, the personal computer is a relatively new phenomenon. Libraries have usable copies of physical items that are hundreds of years old. I wouldn't hold out the same hope for ebooks. Sure, the potential for near perpetual access with infinite storage life is possible. That is an as yet to be proven reality. I certainly love my Nook Simple Touch for casual reading, but I would want a physical and electronic copy when doing serious research.
DRM vs Copyright or DRM + Copyright as it would be for an ebook. I can only think of one instance where Amazon pulled purchased copies of ebooks off customer's devices, but that was all made possible by DRM+Copyright. That's some seriously dangerous power to be had. Physical books have more consumer protection laws backing the purchaser, than essentially any Digital item in existence. The best way to combat DRM+Copyright is to support those that aren't shackling their content down with DRM. Places like: https://www.baen.com/ [baen.com] and https://www.smashwords.com/ [smashwords.com] Though, even digital stores like Barnes and Noble provide ebooks without DRM, if the publisher wishes so. Example: https://www.tor.com/ [tor.com]
That still leaves the elephant in the room to deal with and that's Public Domain. Public Domain titles, while being available for free online are still printed and sold. So, while ebooks are useful, print books really do have their own place. Though, in the event you are interested in free ebooks and audiobooks, here's a few good places to go.
http://www.gutenberg.org/ [gutenberg.org] Mostly, e-books.
http://www.gutenberg.org/ [gutenberg.org] Audio Books.
http://childrenslibrary.org/ [childrenslibrary.org] Mostly? E-books
https://archive.org/index.php [archive.org] E-Books, Audio Books, Old TV Episodes, Old Radio Episodes, Some game archival stuff, and just a giant slew of all things digital.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Monday September 16 2019, @10:21PM
The second link should have been: https://librivox.org/ [librivox.org] Audio Books.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"