But I can also see the librarians’ side. Large publishers have made it difficult for public libraries to own e-books for real—making E more risky financially for already-cash-strapped libraries.

However, just as you say, the typical public library should be spending more than now on E (as long as the librarians don’t overdo it, considering both local demographics and the less than ideal terms that publishers inflict on them).

The DPLA initiative could help public libraries organize their own national digital system and gain more clout. The public digital system could also benefit from a common technical services organization shared with academic libraries (along with plenty of content).

We do need two national digital systems, one public, one academic, so the academics don’t dominate at the expense of the publics. So much needs to be done at all levels of the public library community, and I fear that many academics will just write off the publics.

Content and infrastructure aren’t enough for the publics; they certainly need to focus on the resources actually being used. Lots and lots of outreach, tech support and training, please (of staffers and end users alike)!

Set up the right kind of public library system online—well integrated with physical libraries and able to help them change with the times—and local and state libraries will be stronger than ever.

Finally, let’s remember that public libraries are about a lot more than books. They are also community centers and homework centers and offer social-worker-style services (a Good Thing).

David

Demand for ebooks is skyrocketing, and yet most libraries only allocate a small amount of their collection budget to them. Demand for consumer technology training is skyrocketing amongst our patrons, and yet the Public Library community buries its head in the sand…waiting and hoping that “the next generation of Public Library Leaders” will swoop in and save them. Heaven forbid a 25-year librarian learn how to handle what is really just a basic reference question becoming all too common from our patrons: “How do I get a Library book onto my phone?”

All this talk about a national library is just fine. Unless perceptions WITHIN the public library community of the importance of electronic media, and how it should be used, shift dramatically and quickly, it would be just another underused resource. Or, even worse, it will be offered to citizens for free, sidestep the public library completely by leaving them out because of their complacency, and secure the death of the Public Library.

I’m in favor of experimentation with a variety of business models. No matter which one is in use, however, we need to consider the financial surprises that bestsellers can bring, as well as the eagerness of most publishers to earn extra fees for simultaneous checkouts. Also keep in mind that the collections of books for rental could reside anywhere–not just on local libraries’ own servers; perhaps one place would be a national digital library system’s servers.

Unrelated: I’ve published a follow-up to the original essay. It’s at http://librarycity.org/?p=6279.

David

Too much attention is being devoted to imposing the old ‘buy to loan’ model of physical books on the very different world of ebooks. With digital, copies are essentially free and even the smallest library can have an enormous collection, with several people checking out the same book at the same time. That creates the opening for a new ‘rent to read’ model.

Let every interested library, no matter how small, offer the same large collection of ebooks. None are bought. All are rented, with the library paying a fee only when an ebook is checked out, a fee that’s likely to be less than the cost of moving a physical copy around a library system. Most of that rental fee would be passed on to the publisher and author, ensuring a steady income even on books released years earlier.

The Gates Foundation could help by creating and offering to libraries all the software necessary to set up and run the system.