Hachette will increase backlist ebook prices by an average of 220% starting next month, according to an email from OverDrive released by Gary Price at InfoDocket (and subsequently reported here). I cannot help but ask the same question of Hachette that I asked of Random House when it increased prices over 300% this past spring: … Continue reading Has Hachette Forgotten How to Publish?
In the past months, the prices of ebooks for libraries—and in particular, some large price increases—have received considerable attention. But these discussions typically occur in the abstract. I decided that a focus on actual prices would greatly illuminate the challenges that libraries face. Thus, Douglas County (Colo.) Libraries compiled a new monthly price comparison report … Continue reading The Visible Hand of the Market?
After a productive and hectic ALA Annual Conference at the end of June, there was certainly a temptation to take the summer off from ebooks and libraries, digital content, and anything resembling same. But really, why lounge on the beach or hike in the mountains when you can debate and write about licensing terms for … Continue reading What DCWG Did This Summer (Spoiler: We Didn’t Vacation)
I look forward to this year in which I have the privilege of serving as ALA president. To prepare for this important role I acted on the very good advice of a number of our past presidents and took advantage of every opportunity in my president-elect term to lay a strong foundation for what I … Continue reading The Year Ahead
“FY2012 has proven to be relatively stable,” the bipartisan National Council of State Legislatures (NCSL) said August 7 in its State Budget Update: Summer 2012 (PDF file). “Projected revenues and appropriations in FY2013 also are expected to rise moderately.” Although a sustained robust recovery still eludes state coffers, the NCSL report affirms that “new budget … Continue reading Louisiana Denied State Aid; Support Varies Elsewhere
Based on conversations with publishers and deliberations on the ebook market, the ALA today released “Ebook Business Models for Public Libraries” (PDF file) a report that describes general features and attributes of the current ebook environment and outlines constraints and restrictions of current business models. The report, which was created by the ALA Digital Content … Continue reading ALA Releases “Ebook Business Models for Public Libraries”
David O’Brien, Urs Gasser, and John G Palfrey Jr of the Berkman Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University recently released a briefing document, “E-Books in Libraries.” [Fixed link, SSRN doesn’t support direct downloads] Drawing from a wide variety of sources, the document does an excellent job of summarizing the status to date of … Continue reading Berkman Center Looks at Ebooks in Libraries
James LaRue’s post yesterday detailed the costs of ebook lending. In short, when the ebook costs about five times as much as print, you end up spending a lot of money for not a lot of access. But, if you can believe it, I don’t think LaRue went far enough in his statements about the … Continue reading Ebooks are the new Prius
I wrote here a few months ago about reading—its power and ubiquity and transcendence of format: “The authors and publishers get it; the ways in which the stories are displayed come and go, and what matters are the story and the storytelling.” Events in the ensuing months—the Department of Justice settlement with publishers, which may … Continue reading Amped-Up Ebook Apps
How many books are on your “to read” list right now? 10? 20? More? The real truth about ebook purchasing—really about any content acquisition these days—is that we are so overwhelmed by choices that our to-be-experienced list is already quite overwhelmed. That doesn’t even take into account the revisiting of older content! So when publishers … Continue reading The Real Truth about Ebook Purchasing
Today, Simon and Schuster is trying to drum up a bit of social media attention for the release of the first Judy Blume ebook, her 1975 classic Forever. The tweets are rolling in at #JudyBlumeForever but many of them reveal a darker side of this ebook release. For example, this tweet from YA author Jenny … Continue reading #JudyBlumeForever . . . Unless You Are a Library
OCLC is launching a new project, “The Big Shift: Advancing Public Library Participation in Our Digital Future.” The purpose of the project, funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services, is to more fully understand the challenges that US public libraries face in providing ebook content to borrowers, and to ensure that all Americans … Continue reading ALA and PLA Partner with OCLC on Ebook Research Project
