Librarian Patience Has Run out on E-Book Lending Issues, Library Association Says
Speaking at a private gathering of publishers organized by the Association of American Publishers, Sullivan was explaining why earlier this week the ALA sent a strongly worded open letter to publishers about the need to figure out way for publishers to sell libraries e-books for “equitable use at a reasonable price.”…“We recognize that e-books are a different character than books in print,” said Sullivan, clarifying the ALA’s position. “We want to ensure with e-books that there is equitable access and that access is at a reasonable price.”
But the most pointed questioning came from Wiley’s director of digital business development Peter Balis.
“When will the ALA start proposing to us some best practices on what models you think will work from your digital solutions working group? You put a lot on us and it’s created a lot of chaos and clearly it’s [e-book library lending] broken. We have twelve different models,” he said. “You have to come back to us with more than just ‘equitable access at a fair price.’”
As the question was being posed, many heads in the publisher-heavy audience were nodding in ascent.
Bob Wolven, associate university librarian at Columbia University and head of the ALA digital working group agreed that it was incumbent now upon librarians to think of models that can work for both publishers and librarians. Wolven also referred to a document issued to the public by the ALA in August but sent to six of the largest U.S. publishers months earlier reviewing the state of e-book library lending and proposing several new business models for publishers to consider.
The document, titled EBook Business Models for Public Libraries, includes a list of three essential characteristics that libraries will look for in plans to buy e-books from publishers — inclusion of all titles, enduring rights (the option to own the e-book) and integration of e-books into the existing library processes — but no concrete recommendations on models.
The business model suggestions have to “come from you and [have] to be a lot more specific than what I’ve heard here. I challenge you with that,” said Balis.
“That’s a good challenge,” said Wolvin.
![danhickey:
elibrarian:
danhickey:
Google is running an online course designed around becoming a power searcher. Has anyone signed up yet? I might give it a go, if I’m not too busy. I’m mostly interested in the project to scope out the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) learning format borrowed from Stanford and MIT. […]
I had a late start on this, but last week I had enough time to work my way through this tutorial. I was expecting this to mostly just be a bunch of Google-specific tips and tricks, but I was actually impressed with the depth the went into explaining important principles of developing and refining one’s search. They explain the basics of identifying and using search terms in a way that I think undergraduates would find very accessible.
For most librarians, the basic principles of good researching, this will feel very familiar. Since I’m a couple years removed from the reference class I took at library school, this was a nice refresher - and a nice perspective on doing effective research outside of any library context (which I think can sometimes bog librarians down). And there were still plenty of specific tools and tricks that the course covers, so I did get to learn some completely new things as well.
Fantastic! I was thinking of powering through this over Thanksgiving, and with your endorsement I think I’ll have to make it a priority. MOOCs have been getting tons of attention in higher education, so I think it’s only a matter of time before librarians begin thinking about library applications. As a business librarian, I think it would be amazing to design MOOCs around competitive intelligence, market research, &tc. Hire an instructional designer into the library for support, and you have an opportunity to push library instruction from a local to international scope. We have the expertise, so why not?
I would love to get another librarian’s perspective on this course. In my first post I failed to mention that I didn’t spend any time on the class forums (only had time to plow through it solo), so I was not able to observe how well this worked as a MOOC where participants have conversations about what they’re learning and what problems they’re running into when following the lessons or working on the exercises (which did have some flaws, I thought).
The forumla that Google chose for their course is pretty similar to what most academic libraries do in a typical library session: breifly explain the concept, have the student do hands-on practice, allow for discussion, then transition to the next concept. More or less. Besides a required 50-minute session for freshment, my university’s library also offers optional in-person classes on using Google for academic searching, which covers Scholar, Books, Patents, etc. But the challenge with something like that is trying teach a lot of info in a very short period of time and even just getting an interested audience to show up in the first place.
A class like Power Searching with Google seems to overcome both of those challenges - its online format is very accessible and participants can go at their own pace. I think this could be a great model for what libraries can do to make information literacy and research more accessible to their students while also making this kind of knowledge available to a much wider audience.](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m6eatg2aMc1r1dzx9o1_500.jpg)
View high resolution
Google is running an online course designed around becoming a power searcher. Has anyone signed up yet? I might give it a go, if I’m not too busy. I’m mostly interested in the project to scope out the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) learning format borrowed from Stanford and MIT. […]
I had a late start on this, but last week I had enough time to work my way through this tutorial. I was expecting this to mostly just be a bunch of Google-specific tips and tricks, but I was actually impressed with the depth the went into explaining important principles of developing and refining one’s search. They explain the basics of identifying and using search terms in a way that I think undergraduates would find very accessible.
For most librarians, the basic principles of good researching, this will feel very familiar. Since I’m a couple years removed from the reference class I took at library school, this was a nice refresher - and a nice perspective on doing effective research outside of any library context (which I think can sometimes bog librarians down). And there were still plenty of specific tools and tricks that the course covers, so I did get to learn some completely new things as well.
Fantastic! I was thinking of powering through this over Thanksgiving, and with your endorsement I think I’ll have to make it a priority. MOOCs have been getting tons of attention in higher education, so I think it’s only a matter of time before librarians begin thinking about library applications. As a business librarian, I think it would be amazing to design MOOCs around competitive intelligence, market research, &tc. Hire an instructional designer into the library for support, and you have an opportunity to push library instruction from a local to international scope. We have the expertise, so why not?
I would love to get another librarian’s perspective on this course. In my first post I failed to mention that I didn’t spend any time on the class forums (only had time to plow through it solo), so I was not able to observe how well this worked as a MOOC where participants have conversations about what they’re learning and what problems they’re running into when following the lessons or working on the exercises (which did have some flaws, I thought).
The forumla that Google chose for their course is pretty similar to what most academic libraries do in a typical library session: breifly explain the concept, have the student do hands-on practice, allow for discussion, then transition to the next concept. More or less. Besides a required 50-minute session for freshment, my university’s library also offers optional in-person classes on using Google for academic searching, which covers Scholar, Books, Patents, etc. But the challenge with something like that is trying teach a lot of info in a very short period of time and even just getting an interested audience to show up in the first place.
A class like Power Searching with Google seems to overcome both of those challenges - its online format is very accessible and participants can go at their own pace. I think this could be a great model for what libraries can do to make information literacy and research more accessible to their students while also making this kind of knowledge available to a much wider audience.
(via libraryadvocates)
A Practical Guide to the Georgia State eReserves Copyright Case for Librarians
Super late in posting this, but still worth re-reading even if you’ve already seen it.
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Google is running an online course designed around becoming a power searcher. Has anyone signed up yet? I might give it a go, if I’m not too busy. I’m mostly interested in the project to scope out the Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) learning format borrowed from Stanford and MIT.
Becoming a Google power searcher is an idea that I broach frequently in my library instruction, especially with undergraduates. It resonates with them, because they feel comfortable using the search engine and like the idea of improving their skills. It’s also a jargon-free way to introduce more complex information literacy concepts. (A pill in the jam, if you will. Haha!)
Unless undergrads are already technologically literate, they’re often unfamiliar with basic strategies for searching Google. Most have heard of Scholar, but may not know about other specialized searches (Books, News, News Archive, Uncle Sam [r.i.p.]) or how to leverage advanced searches (site searches, &tc).
It will be interesting to see how deep this course goes, if it’s a success, and how much it overlaps with library concepts.
I had a late start on this, but last week I had enough time to work my way through this tutorial. I was expecting this to mostly just be a bunch of Google-specific tips and tricks, but I was actually impressed with the depth the went into explaining important principles of developing and refining one’s search. They explain the basics of identifying and using search terms in a way that I think undergraduates would find very accessible.
For most librarians, the basic principles of good researching - this will feel very familiar. Since I’m a couple years removed from the reference class I took at library school, this was a nice refresher - and a nice perspective on doing effective research outside of any library context (which I think can sometimes bog librarians down). And there were still plenty of specific tools and tricks that the course covers, so I did get to learn some completely new things as well.
In case you were wondering why libraries aren’t as able as they want to be in providing our patrons with access to ebooks, check out the whole article.
from What’s A Library Dollar Worth? by Peter Brantley, Publisher’s Weekly
(via brkteenlib)
Yeah. Publishers are really holding libraries feet to the fire with e-books. It is the suck.
(I am so glad to be done with e-book support. I really shouldn’t bitch about working the non-fiction desk. There is a finite number problems one can experience there.)
This is some bullshit right here.
(via offthetable)
I’m presenting to our board tomorrow evening on this topic.
(via pandamans)
Explaining this mess to users is one of my least-favorite things to do.
(via punkassbookjockey)
(via megzam)
