eBooks and Overdrive – from a librarian
By Paul Biba
Received the following email:
Hi Paul,
I write for a site called ChamberFour.com, and I recently did an interview with a librarian at the Seattle Public Library about ebooks, libraries and the OverDrive catalog. I thought it might be interesting to you and your readers. The post is up here: http://chamberfour.com/2009/06/25/interview-with-a-librarian/
I think it provides an interesting glimpse of how libraries handle their catalog and e-catalog, and it shows how libraries and librarians think of both p-books and ebooks as different sides of the same coin.
Feel free to post a link or excerpt on TeleRead
Thanks
Nico Vreeland
It is always interesting to hear something from a librarian’s perspective. We don’t get enough postings on library matters here. I guess I now have another site to add to my RSS feeds.
June 25th, 2009 at 2:05 pm
Good find. Very interesting interview, and insights into this whole process.
I must say, however, that having a waiting list for an ebook sounds downright barbaric. For the life of me, I can’t figure out this whole Overdrive thing.
June 25th, 2009 at 3:40 pm
One thing I don’t understand is why the publisher needs to be involved in the process at all. Based on the first-sale doctrine, is there anything legally preventing an individual from buying an electronic book, and then lending (or renting) it out using ACS or some other mechanism to enforce that more than one person is not borrowing a book at a time?