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Libraries struggle to afford e-books, seek new laws in fight with publishers

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Re: Libraries struggle to afford e-books, seek new laws in fight with publishers

#51

Post by karaterobot »

bluish29 wrote: post #4

The argument in publishing industry (about papers and textbooks) is that if you cannot afford to buy/rent at the current market value then you still can use a public/university library to get it. This became actually more of a cliché than an argument over time. Now with a significant portion of textbooks (and books in general) become mainly E-books, the industry limited library capabilities and required pay per lend…

> Now with a significant portion of textbooks (and books in general) become mainly E-books

I don't know about textbooks, but the overall share of publishing industry revenue that comes from ebooks is really low. Something like 7%, and falling steadily. I had assumed it was much larger.

https://wordsrated.com/ebooks-sales-statistics/

Re: Libraries struggle to afford e-books, seek new laws in fight with publishers

#52

Post by [deleted] »

aleph_minus_one wrote: post #39
derbOac wrote: post #6

I get so frustrated by these games. Publishers should lose copyright to every work they do not offer in perpetuity with every purchase in every format, and there should be no postsale restrictions on any item beyond what is implied by copyright.

> Publishers should lose copyright to every work they do not offer in perpetuity with every purchase in every format If such a law comes, the publisher will set the price to, say, 1 billion USD.

[deleted]

Re: Libraries struggle to afford e-books, seek new laws in fight with publishers

#54

Post by beej71 »

ghaff wrote: post #48
perihelions wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm absolutely sincere and I'll reply to any well-intentioned questions. I don't think I'm out of touch. I think this is the future of society and technology—meaning for the future for absolutely everyone, not just a few tech elites. It's jarring to me to see that flavor of accusation, when pirate libraries are freely available to billions of people who don't even have theoretical access to the stuff you people are t…

Who is going to create all this content once it's going to be put up on this pirate library that billions of people use for free? I've written a couple free books but you don't need a pirate library to access them. They're on my website. But if I were thinking of writing a book partially to make money and I knew it was just going to be given away and there was no reason for anyone to buy it, I wouldn't bother. Especi…

Data point: my stuff is all free online, yet people still buy for-profit paper copies. So it's not impossible.

Re: Libraries struggle to afford e-books, seek new laws in fight with publishers

#55

Post by miah_ »

beezlebroxxxxxx wrote: post #8
bluish29 wrote: post #4

The argument in publishing industry (about papers and textbooks) is that if you cannot afford to buy/rent at the current market value then you still can use a public/university library to get it. This became actually more of a cliché than an argument over time. Now with a significant portion of textbooks (and books in general) become mainly E-books, the industry limited library capabilities and required pay per lend…

If I buy an ebook, can I give it "used" to a library? I would like to, but I don't even know if that's a thing. (Let's assume for the sake of the question that the book I buy is also DRM free.)

Its very rare that "buying" a ebook results in you "owning" the copy you bought, at best its a rental. A physical book though, if you are holding it in your hands, you own it.

Re: Libraries struggle to afford e-books, seek new laws in fight with publishers

#56

Post by ghaff »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #45
beej71 wrote: post #44

> "They do have a funding problem, but the answer is not to take it out of the pockets of authors and destroy the rights of creators and pass unconstitutional legislation,” said Shelley Husband, senior vice president of government affairs at the Association of American Publishers I'm guessing Husband's solution is to raise taxes to pay themselves for more expensive books. The AAP is also suing Internet Archive, incid…

The Internet Archive is participating in the legal process to get to a conclusion that ebooks are the same as physical books, otherwise the concept of libraries is over (except for those who can pirate and the data stores that exist across the internet, Anna’s Archive, Zlib/libgen, etc).

The concept of libraries, especially those that aren't large research libraries, has already shifted quite a bit. I almost never go down to my small town library to take out a book or read a magazine. Maybe a DVD now and then that catches my eye. Sometimes I discount museum passes. I could go to talks. Their e-book service isn't that compelling.

Other people probably have different behaviors. People I know with younger children in particular use local libraries for children's books quite a lot.

But libraries as a place you checkout books is almost certainly already on the decline. For me, the pirate sites aren't even competition. I only have limited time. I read a lot on the Internet. If there's some new book I want to read, I'll probably just buy it for my Kindle. (Obviously many people are much more price-sensitive but I wonder how many of them are using libraries today.)

Re: Libraries struggle to afford e-books, seek new laws in fight with publishers

#57

Post by namekyd »

ghaff wrote: post #56
toomuchtodo wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Internet Archive is participating in the legal process to get to a conclusion that ebooks are the same as physical books, otherwise the concept of libraries is over (except for those who can pirate and the data stores that exist across the internet, Anna’s Archive, Zlib/libgen, etc).

The concept of libraries, especially those that aren't large research libraries, has already shifted quite a bit. I almost never go down to my small town library to take out a book or read a magazine. Maybe a DVD now and then that catches my eye. Sometimes I discount museum passes. I could go to talks. Their e-book service isn't that compelling. Other people probably have different behaviors. People I know with young…

My wife and I are voracious readers, it would be a very expensive habit to have off we were buying everything for kindle. We are members of 2 local libraries with listings on overdrive/libby and rent the majority of our ebooks there.

I suppose it depends on your library’s offering and how many books you go through

Re: Libraries struggle to afford e-books, seek new laws in fight with publishers

#58

Post by [deleted] »

ghaff wrote: post #56
toomuchtodo wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Internet Archive is participating in the legal process to get to a conclusion that ebooks are the same as physical books, otherwise the concept of libraries is over (except for those who can pirate and the data stores that exist across the internet, Anna’s Archive, Zlib/libgen, etc).

The concept of libraries, especially those that aren't large research libraries, has already shifted quite a bit. I almost never go down to my small town library to take out a book or read a magazine. Maybe a DVD now and then that catches my eye. Sometimes I discount museum passes. I could go to talks. Their e-book service isn't that compelling. Other people probably have different behaviors. People I know with young…

[deleted]

Re: Libraries struggle to afford e-books, seek new laws in fight with publishers

#59

Post by ghaff »

beej71 wrote: post #54
ghaff wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who is going to create all this content once it's going to be put up on this pirate library that billions of people use for free? I've written a couple free books but you don't need a pirate library to access them. They're on my website. But if I were thinking of writing a book partially to make money and I knew it was just going to be given away and there was no reason for anyone to buy it, I wouldn't bother. Especi…

Data point: my stuff is all free online, yet people still buy for-profit paper copies. So it's not impossible.

I'm sure some of that happens. But generationally (and what's happened with vinyl notwithstanding) I have to believe that large bulging bookshelves in homes will become less common than in the past. Especially to the degree that more people may be inclined to live in smaller urban apartments.

Re: Libraries struggle to afford e-books, seek new laws in fight with publishers

#60

Post by ghaff »

namekyd wrote: post #57
ghaff wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The concept of libraries, especially those that aren't large research libraries, has already shifted quite a bit. I almost never go down to my small town library to take out a book or read a magazine. Maybe a DVD now and then that catches my eye. Sometimes I discount museum passes. I could go to talks. Their e-book service isn't that compelling. Other people probably have different behaviors. People I know with young…

My wife and I are voracious readers, it would be a very expensive habit to have off we were buying everything for kindle. We are members of 2 local libraries with listings on overdrive/libby and rent the majority of our ebooks there. I suppose it depends on your library’s offering and how many books you go through

To be fair, I don't go through anything like the number of books I used to. I have a ton of unread stuff on my Kindle--some of which is admittedly large collections of classics which I got for $1 or $2 each.
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