Even a well-used popular item can last decades in physical form with minor maintenance. Most digital data has yet to prove to have nearly that longevity. Any established library is going to have “popular” titles, first editions, and the like, that can easily be 50-100 years old.

They can’t be loaned out indefinitely or thousands of times because we ALREADY agree to DRM and checkout limits, artificial ones that physical books do not possess. You can’t “check-in” a library eBook early so another user can access it. Once it’s checked out, it’s unavailable for 2-3 weeks no matter what.

So, basically, at 2 weeks a pop, for us to achieve your scenario of a thousand of checkouts for a single copy of an eBook would take almost 40 years.

Let’s assume a generous copyright length of 120 years (if an author was 30 at the date of publication and live 50 years), to reach the doomsday scenario you’ve painted a single book would have to remain constantly checked out for over a century to hit 3,000 checkouts. At which point it would enter the public domain anyway. Even the Da Vinci Code isn’t that popular.

Copyright length can vary since for currently published materials it is the life of the author + 70 years, but the example is still valid, since life expectancy is about 78 in the States.

Which is kind of ludicrous, but I’m just putting it out there to emphasize how unrealistic the idea a library’s use would drive publishers out of business or result in “thousands” of checkouts for a single title.

Your scenario is further flawed because while libraries cannot archive EVERY book, interlibrary loan makes it possible to get almost any book from a cooperating library who is likely to have one of the titles you’re looking for. You can still purchase it, but most consumers who are that impatient will avoid the library in the first place.

So my alternative strategy to prevent them losing money is that we ALREADY acquiesce to their often arbitrary requirements, and this is an example of a publisher overreaching to snatch even more dollars out of the budgets of institutions whose budgets are already flagging.

Honestly, a simpler longterm solution would be for libraries to show some backbone and negotiate terms that involve a much smaller royalty per checkout, while doing away with DRM and other limitations. If publishers are going to force us to license rather than own materials, we should negotiate on the basis that we are LICENSING, NOT PURCHASING those same materials. Both parties are guilty of trying too hard to replicate physical models and scarcity. Allow the library to archive the digital copies as they please, make as many copies as they please, but charge a small fee every time it’s checked out, with a term limit (10 years? 25 years? 50?) on how long they must pay these royalties.

It would require a significant change in how libraries approach their budgeting, and more control over their own spending. Unfortunately, I’m not sure the current crop of administrators has the imagination or competence to make that happen.

HarperCollins may not be smoking crack when they come up with the figure, but what they need to do next is not go all Amazon-Orwell and yank the books, but instead look at amending their library sales model so that they get a fair revenue from the eternal ever-lendable book.

They need to bear in mind that a lot of those sticky ripped potboilers have very low lending potential, too: the long tail being a long but also a shallow, flat thing. It’s not like 26 loans in the first five years, then 26 loans per year ad infinitum. Get that actuary back in here!

But overall: DRM is a sign that says “Buttsecks me plz!”

However, your post made me think. Why don’t publishers just make the ebooks available themselves for a two-week window of checkouts, bypassing libraries altogether for their popular titles? Libraries could then (maybe) continue handling physical media, and provide loci for research, education, and so on.

When I mentioned this to her she had a negative reaction and it probably will affect her future purchase and borrowing habits.

Great way to shoot yourself in the foot.

Take a look at the list of HarperCollins authors (www.harpercollins.com/author/browse.aspx), and see about contacting one of your favorites. If they respond, please post it here: http://www.theanalogdivide.com/2011/02/the-publisher-that-kicked-the-hornets-nest/. We are attempting to document the response, and show that it’s not just librarians who have a stake in this.

1) Bloody expensive
2)Huge fail if Publisher goes under and does not maintain DRM server
3) Libraries are aggregators of interest and engagement with books … when was the last time you spent much time on a single publisher’s web site, shopping for books? Amazon came into being for a good reason, after all.

We have books in our local library a century old. Some are taped up. They still lend them.

Many are out of print, not worth publishing, according to the publisher, never transferred to ebook, but still copyrighted. Does that mean they should disappear?

How about this: The publisher has the rights to the ebook as long as it’s keeping the paper book in print. If it’s not printing the book, it loses the electronic rights some (short) period after.

Think about it. With ebooks, the publisher NEVER has to have a “Second Printing”, much less a 25th printing, or whatever “The Hobbit” is in. (Aside from the WWII paper shortages, “The Hobbit” has never gone out of print – wikipedia)

Is it “fair” that the publisher should have what is now essentially eternal exclusive rights to a single printing of a book?

And for libraries, with ebooks, the library can loan out hundreds of copies to hundreds of readers as long as it has bought those hundreds of copies. That gave the publisher (and the author) hundreds of sales.

Why must ebooks be circulated the way physical books are? Hell, if you wanted to, everyone could have the same book at the same time, and people could keep the files as long as they want, probably only limited by data storage space. Moreover, every library on Earth could have every edition out there. Instead, last’s century’s model of distribution is used. The advantages inherent in digital media are ignored.

RikF wrote, “Each person who borrowed the book would get to keep the book. Why would anyone ever have to buy an ebook, if that ebook was in the library system?”

American tax dollars get used on a lot of worse ideas than free ebooks for all.

But minus the pipe dream, I agree with previous commenters, that a “Public Lending Right” for digital media should be explored by Congress.

1) All charges legally stay within the library system. They can’t be used for anything else, ever, ever ever.
2) All charges are on a sliding scale. If you make less than, say, $20k a year, you’re free. Kids are free. Adding kids reduces what you pay. Single moms get in free. Kind of like how a non-profit clinic operates.

Sorry, I’m new, and I didn’t quite grasp how to reply to individuals.

They don’t because they have no interest in lending materials. It’s something libraries and the few exceptions in copyright law have bullied them into. Plus, libraries are much more localized than a single publisher or entity. To a certain degree, eBook lending at your local library is further minimized because it’s just that, local. You can check it out from Portugal, but you still have to be a member at your local institution and no other members can check it out while you have it.

DRM and current copyright laws make preserving the digital information much harder than preserving a physical copy. Sometimes we’re not even legally allowed to backup digital materials, even when we can circumvent their digital protections, and the libraries that do are taking kind of an “easier to ask forgiveness than permission” approach.

If libraries were simply allowed to purchase a title without DRM, preserve it however they wished, and pay the publisher a fee every time it’s checked out, there would be a lot fewer headaches and then our materials could truly be budgeted based on actual use rather than projected use. Money could alternatively be earned (or saved) on both sides.

But that’s a new approach, in professions were new ideas aren’t always welcome.

They’ve established a one-loan lease cost at 1/26th of the ebook cost. Why the hell would they insist on the library buying these 26 at a time? Why not enable the library to carry infinite copies of all of the publisher’s books? And to be able to issue them for 1/26th of the cost of an ebook? That might actually be a win-win. The publisher gets the rate it’s set, the library gets more selection, no waste, and no waiting list access to the publisher’s books at a pretty reasonable price. Instead of having to pick and choose which small selection of popular books ebooks to “buy” (and we’re already into “lease” territory here) the library gets the whole ‘long tail’ to loan.

Win-win, indeed, Anon. Even better might be a sliding per-loan cost that provides a quantity discount at the popular end of the sales cycle and perhaps a slight premium at the ‘long tail’ end. I’m thinking this might have the added benefit of encouraging libraries to continue to manage their ebook collections as they do print (based on a cost-per-use basis similar to what the anonymous commenter above the one who suggested the 1/26th idea said here).

And for all that, libraries normally buy print books at a substantial discount off the cover price, while paying full print-cover-price for ebooks. So the publishers are already charging libraries substantially more for ebooks, for somewhat less in every way except the fact that ebooks don’t wear out–and now they want to make them “wear out” MUCH FASTER than any normal print book. Faster than cheap mass market paperbacks, in fact.

There is nothing reasonable about this. It’s insane, and economically unworkable for libraries.

I see a great opportunity for you to partner with Libraries. Offer data storage and e-book checkout GUIs to the Libraries and in exchange you can put a “purchase now” button next to the “place a hold” button for those customers who do not wish to wait if there is a queue for a particular title. You could also have a link to a “buy a Kindle” button. This would be a Win-Win-Win scenario. Libraries would get needed data storage and technical expertise, Amazon would get easy sales from the impatient American masses, publishers would get increased sales. You’re all welcome.

Shannon

My local public library has numerous 20-30 year old books that are works of fiction.

I checked out I, Claudius a few months ago and noticed that it was a 1930s edition. And had quite obviously been checked out hundreds of times.

Then there are the books offered in streaming format–I’m thinking of Scholastic’s Bookflix and Trueflix–where we pay an annual fee. Forever.

HarperCollins is just the latest. And so I regretfully conclude that it would not be fiscally prudent to continue to buy from these vendors. My patrons don’t need magic evaporating books.

http://www.thebookseller.com/news/agency-could-be-hold-new-publishers.html

“It is unclear who made the complaints to the OFT”, O RLY ;)

(also just submitted on the main form, as I don’t think I’ve seen it published on here)

Doesn’t the USA have similar competition law?

But as someone who works with physical books, something that has been checked out 26 times is probably a little rough and will probably be on its way to the recycling bin. Paperbacks rarely make it past 10 users before they’re shot. Hardbacks less likely.

Also, they don’t reach the library market that way, which is where they find new readers for their authors.