Comments on: NetLibrary reaches 200,000 ebook and audio titles http://www.teleread.com/library/netlibrary-reaches-200000-ebook-and-audio-titles/ News & views on e-books, libraries, publishing and related topics Wed, 15 Feb 2012 08:05:45 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Mike Perry http://www.teleread.com/library/netlibrary-reaches-200000-ebook-and-audio-titles/comment-page-1/#comment-1115621 Mike Perry Mon, 03 Aug 2009 18:18:44 +0000 http://www.teleread.org/?p=26158#comment-1115621 I've been impressed with how quickly OCLC is improving. They really do get the Internet. As a resource, they're amazing. They even know to link my Lord of the Rings chronology, Untangling Tolkien, to its Polish translation. I only wish they'd be like the Library of Congress and let authors/publishers get an OCLC number in advance. Sometimes one edition ends to two or more entries in their database. That can get very confusing. Linking to where readers can get an ebook like you describe is a big step forward, as are the 'buy it" links. But linking only to Amazon, B&N and Better World Books is a bit skimpy. They need to include The Book Depository, which ships free to some 70 countries, as well as any online store preferred by the author/publisher. For my Chesterton books, I'd rather refer people to the American Chesterton Society, where the money does more good than when it goes to Amazon. For in-print books, it'd also be great if they let the author upload a PDF or ePub sampler. I do my best by entering excerpts and the contents from my book into their database, but more than that is needed. I suspect that in the next decade we'll go from too few online book resources to an embarrassment of riches. I can remember a time only a few years back when the only way to get access to OCLC from home was to go to a certain large used bookstore's website, enter a bogus title, and when the 'not available' page appeared, use the OCLC search engine they so kindly offered. I’ve been impressed with how quickly OCLC is improving. They really do get the Internet. As a resource, they’re amazing. They even know to link my Lord of the Rings chronology, Untangling Tolkien, to its Polish translation. I only wish they’d be like the Library of Congress and let authors/publishers get an OCLC number in advance. Sometimes one edition ends to two or more entries in their database. That can get very confusing.

Linking to where readers can get an ebook like you describe is a big step forward, as are the ‘buy it” links. But linking only to Amazon, B&N and Better World Books is a bit skimpy. They need to include The Book Depository, which ships free to some 70 countries, as well as any online store preferred by the author/publisher. For my Chesterton books, I’d rather refer people to the American Chesterton Society, where the money does more good than when it goes to Amazon.

For in-print books, it’d also be great if they let the author upload a PDF or ePub sampler. I do my best by entering excerpts and the contents from my book into their database, but more than that is needed.

I suspect that in the next decade we’ll go from too few online book resources to an embarrassment of riches. I can remember a time only a few years back when the only way to get access to OCLC from home was to go to a certain large used bookstore’s website, enter a bogus title, and when the ‘not available’ page appeared, use the OCLC search engine they so kindly offered.

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