"Bookless library" What do you think?

[daydreamer]

Here's a story about the opening of an all digital library in the previously library-less outskirts of San Antonio.

www.salon.com/2013/05/23/bookless_library_set_to_open_in_texas/

[daydreamer]

I hope it works out for them. I know my 70 year old mom would have trouble with the system, but if these are newly settled areas with lots of young families, it may be the most cost effective way to go. I think, however, they may be getting ahead of themselves given how publishers have not yet come to terms with the ongoing digital switchover. Aren't there some publishers who flat out refuse to allow libraries to buy digital licenses to their products? Maybe the opening of all digital libraries will force the issue to be resolved.

[duckduck]

(College) Librarian here.

There are publishers who will not sell their ebooks to libraries, yes. And even the ones that do sell to libraries usually mark the cost up 4-5 times what the general consumer pays for the same book. Some some publishers also set an "expiration" of 26 or some other number of loans, meaning the library has to buy the book all over again after 26 people have borrowed it (any librarian can tell you that a paper book can usually survive many more circulation transactions than that). So those are all problematic issues, as well as the socioeconomic divide between the people with and without internet access/devices.

Still, I think it's an interesting project, especially for such a far-flung and sparsely-settled region. And any library is an improvement over none, right?

The digital divide is also getting a little bit better. While poorer families still are unlikely to have high-speed internet at home, lower-income people are actually pretty likely to have smartphones with internet access, and you can read library content on those. Older folks often like the large-print options on e-readers, too, though the learning curve can be a challenge. Still, any mobility issues the elderly might have when it comes to getting to a library would be less of a problem, so it's a bit of a trade-off.

So, basically, I don't think this is a good idea yet for most areas, but I think it might be a good solution in this case and I'll be watching with interest to see how it works out for them.

[booknerd]

duckduck your response was interesting. I did not know about the expiration of book loaning in libraries. I was wondering how publishers were still making money because if I understand correctly after a certain number of loans, a paper book usually has to be replaced because it is worn out from so many readings? Thanks for your input.

[duckduck]

Well, since you asked and you are a self-proclaimed book nerd... Here is more than you ever wanted to know:

Eventually paper books would need to be replaced, yes. But it doesn't actually happen all that often, at least for YA and adult titles. Think about a new "hot" title, say Breaking Dawn when it was first published. The library is going to buy multiple copies to meet the heavy demand; let's say 6. So for the first 3-6 months, all of the copies are going to be in use pretty much all of the time. But after a few months, demand dies off and maybe you only need to keep 1 or 2 copies. So the other 4 copies get weeded because you don't need them and you do need the shelf space for the next hot thing. The remaining copy or two might get pretty battered after years of use, but more likely people are going to lose interest in it because everyone who cares has already read it. So those 4 that you weeded out maybe only got borrowed 20 times and were pulled when they were still in decent shape. Over the next several years, those two remaining books might eventually get pretty high circ counts; say 45-50 loans each. (Obviously these numbers are going to vary wildly from library to library and title to title!)

So basically, a paper book is FAR more likely to be weeded out due to lack of interest or being outdated than it is to fall apart to the point where it needs to be replaced or removed. Unless it's something like Where the Wild Things Are that is ALWAYS popular. Those ones do fall apart and get replaced.

Libraries do something similar with e-books. They can usually only lend one e-book copy to one person at a time, so they'll buy multiple copies of an e-book to meet that initial heavy demand. So if you borrow from the Free Library of Philadelphia, that's why you'll see the "72 holds on 8 copies" thing.

A lot of librarians threw a fit about the 26-limit from Harper Collins (now they are looking like the good guys by comparison with some of the other publishers, heh), but I think it's relatively reasonable. One individual copy can usually last for far longer than 26 loans, yes, but if you buy 6 copies and demand gradually tapers off, you can just use up your 26 per copy across 6 copies and after you use those up you can just "buy" one more e-book copy if you need to. If that makes sense.

Loan limitations are really only an issue for a book that you buy one copy of but that will go out steadily over the long term. Then the libraries do lose out because they could repair that one paper copy and keep it going for a long, long time, but they would have to re-purchase the e-book after X number of loans. But that's a relatively small percentage of what is happening.

[booknerd]

I am actually fascinated by all of this. I'm not sure how dorky that makes me sound...but it is what it is.

I always assumed that books that the library initially loaned several copies of were reduced due to wear and tear from so many readings. I never thought about the book being less in demand and being weeded out. Though this makes perfect sense to me since about 80% of my home library is from library book sales lol. Thank you for sharing!

[daydreamer]

Thanks for the explanation from me too. I had heard there were limits to number of checkouts, but I didn't realize it was such a low number.

So basically, when it took me 4 check outs to get through a 2000 page book compilation, I could have been using 15% of the library's rights to it. That doesn't really seem fair. I could have had several renewals if I had taken out the hard copy. I've also checked out ebooks that I haven't read. I will keep this in mind in the future as I don't want to cost the library system extra money.

Are the shorter loans credited differently. As in, if I know that I will read the book immediately, does a 7 day, rather than a 21 day, loan preserve more of the license to the ebook?

[msmerymac]

I don't know about the need to build a physical digital library, but the lack of libraries is a really interesting issue.

I know in certain developing areas, specifically rural Africa, tons of people have satellite phones because they're reliable, even when their electricity/running water isn't (so without electricity in your house, it's hard to have a wired phone line). It makes me wonder if ebooks are the solution to literacy in places like that, since it would be easier and cheaper to download digital books than to ship in heavy physical books, which can wear out.