The library world is abuzz about Harper Collins changing the terms by which libraries can license their books on Overdrive. If you haven’t read about it already, here’s some background info. I’m not particularly up-in-arms about what Harper Collins did; I’m far more concerned with the e-content licensing models so many libraries have been blithely accepting for years.
I find it amusing that some vendors and librarians want to apply the print model to e-books, until that model becomes inconvenient for them. Publishers want to impose the one-reader-at-a-time model, because libraries traditionally bought more than one book when demand was high. Librarians compare the new 26-circ limit Harper Collins imposed to the typical life of print hardcover books because print books typically last longer. The simple fact of the matter is, an e-book is not a print book. Hundreds of users can read the same book at once online. It can last forever. And publishers can impose any restrictions they want on them as long as people/libraries are willing to accept them. Personally, I’d be much more annoyed that an e-book is limited to one user at a time than that I’d have to buy another copy if it’s popular.
The eBook User’s Bill of Rights talked about extending the right of first-sale to e-books. I am hugely in favor of this, but if we are to have rights to our digital content, we need to stop paying for things we don’t own. I’m not a lawyer, but in my mind, the question is this: when a library buys an eBook, is it buying a book or licensing access to a book? If the former, then the library is the owner of the electronic book and the first-sale doctrine would apply. If the book is licensed to the library with specific restrictions on its use, then the library doesn’t actually own anything and must abide by any restrictions imposed by the company granting the license to the library. We don’t have Overdrive at my library, so I’m not familiar with the contracts libraries entered into when they signed up, but if they do not outright own the books, I don’t believe first-sale doctrine applies. Whether these publisher and vendor licenses are legal or enforceable will be up to the courts, and it’ll be interesting to see how digital content rights are challenged over the next decade. Oh to be an IP lawyer!
I’m not that angry about the whole Harper Collins, thing, and not just because I’m an academic librarian. I’m not angry because what’s happened is pretty consistent with so many other instances where a content provider middle man has acceded to the demands of a publisher to the detriment of libraries. There’s really no “fair” in e-book licensing and there are lots of crazy schemes for e-book loans. Maybe the big problem is that Harper Collins changed the game in the middle of play. Vendor valuation and pricing of e-books vary wildly. Many publishers charge less for eBooks than print books, some charge the same amount as the print, and some even charge more. Eventually, the market will determine what prices people are willing to pay for e-books, but right now, it all feels like one big experiment (and it probably is).
I am deeply concerned about the rights we give up and the erosion of the long-term health of our collections with every contract we sign. When we look at how much of our collection we own, it becomes a smaller and smaller part of the whole each year. And with some vendors, we lose so many rights that it can sometimes prevent users from getting anything out of the content.
If libraries don’t want to constantly be the ones losing in this equation, we need to show that we actually aren’t going to accept things the way they are. Complaining and threatening do not work when a company is concerned with its long-term financial survival. Real action, taken by a group of libraries large enough to make a dent in a company’s bottom line will. Publishers have all of the power right now, because they are big and their choices have a huge impact on vendors like Overdrive. (Plus, they have organizations that represent their interests!) If libraries aren’t willing to walk away from a bad deal, they will never have the power. Some might argue that in walking away we are hurting our patrons, but I think we’re doing them a much greater disservice when we forget our important role in cultural preservation.
I’ve been saying for a while that libraries need to come together around some organization that will exert pressure on vendors and promote the needs of libraries and their patrons. Without an organization like that, I can’t imagine a future where libraries are dealt with fairly by publishers. We’ll always be the little guy. It’s like unions. An individual complains to a company about being mistreated, they may or may not be heard. A union, made up of lots of individuals, has a lot more clout. Toby Greenwalt suggests that we negotiate, but what do we have to negotiate with as individual libraries? How do we negotiate when there is no we?
We need a large organization to represent our interests and to come up with alternative models for e-book access or ownership that benefit everyone. I don’t know what this organization would look like, but I can’t envision a good future for libraries that doesn’t involve us doing a lot more banding together to pressure vendors/publishers and to create our own content and technology solutions.
I have to say I agree wholeheartedly with the need for an organized group with representation across the library spectrum to tackle access issues like these. Otherwise it amounts to nothing but rumblings.
Likewise, I think you’re correct in saying that until libraries are willing to walk away from the table, we won’t wield any real power in bargaining with vendors. The trouble is, public libraries especially can’t simply pull services out from under their patrons without expecting some sort of consequence, whether that comes in the the form of support (votes and money) or migrating customers (“well, I guess I’ll have to pay then”). The really disheartening thing about this news is that its coming right in the middle of a significant surge in adoption of the technology, on an occasion where finally many public libraries were “with the times” in offering a new media.
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“I’ve been saying for a while that libraries need to come together around some organization that will exert pressure on vendors and promote the needs of libraries and their patrons.”
It seems logical to me that ALA would want to take on this issue since they represent a broad range of librarians and libraries.
Michelle,
do you realize just how much of ALA’s activities are subsidized by the vendors? Why on earth would they want to go attacking the companies who make it possible to bring big-name speakers to the annual conferences? ALA long ago became more about preserving ALA than preserving libraries, at least from any threat aside from censorship.
Meredith,
as a one-time blogger (Scattered Librarian) and a Ph.D student in higher ed administration, I see the writing on the wall for libraries too. Most all of us have no choice but to pay the aggregators with the exclusive contracts. but once we’re all locked in, not only do they have us by the short hairs financially, but it really undermines the library’s long-term position as the “heart of the university”. If all we’re doing for “collection development” is buying contracts to pre-packaged databases, why do they need a whole bunch of master’s-degreed information professionals running around? Our whole value proposition needs to change–we need to fight actively and productively to preserve access to our intellectual heritage in a sustainable manner, AND we’ve got to be able to demonstrate how information literacy and our skills in teaching it improve student success over the long haul. How do we do this? I don’t know yet, but I do know that some sort of coalition of small academic libraries and our parent universities is an interesting first step.
I think this is a very uninformed blog post, and I wish you had at least done some research before you wrote of your colleagues outrage as something amusing. Overdrive content is already limited to one user at a time, so yes, it is very much like a print title in that way. One user, 2 weeks, then on to the next user. I personally think that most librarians are NOT opposed to some sort of limitations on e-books, but this was arbitrary and not even close to being a fair or informed decision. If your read HC’s open letter to libraries, they mention that 26 uses per book should be fair for a popular title to be circulated for one year. Well, most of us don’t weed a popular title after one year, so I don’t see the comparison. I wholeheartedly agree with you that we need to band together as a group. After working as a medical librarian, I know that this is an issue that cuts across all types of libraries. Please don’t alienate your peers by dismissing their outrage at a policy that directly impacts their patrons and their bottom line.
@JFLIN, I think you might be misreading me. I’m not dismissing people’s outrage as amusing. I’m saying that there are already so many ridiculous terms that eBooks are limited by (like the one user at a time limit, which I mentioned) that it’s strange that people are so fired up about this one issue rather than the larger problems we face with licensed digital content.
What does amuse me is that so many people compare eBooks and print books as if they are the same thing and should be sold, priced, replaced, etc. in the same way. You just did it in your comment (“most people don’t weed a popular title after one year”). Overdrive does it with the one-patron-at-a-time model. We need to stop comparing eBooks to print books and work with publisher and content providers to come up with models that will be viable for all parties.
Thanks for a sane post, Meredith. We need more levelheadedness in this whole conversation. You are bringing that.
JP from 8bitlibrary.com
Are you talking about the possibility of forming a library cooperative. Vendors will need to sell their products to the cooperative and then libraries purchase from our own coop. If Walmart can buy large and sell at cheaper cost to the consumer then would it work for libraries?
Thanks for this perspective; I think you raise some really key points, and I’m completely on the same page that licensing content, as opposed to buying it, really shifts not just our rights but our roles.
One point, though: You say ebooks can last forever, and that’s really not true. In fact, I think it’s fair to say that print books are a much more stable long-term format than any digital content will ever be. When we license e-content, we are relying on vendors to maintain that digital content in usable formats. If we own it, we will have to replace it much more regularly as formats change. If we digitize it ourselves, we will have to do a lot of work to ensure it remains accessible.
I’m not saying that work isn’t worthwhile. Just that a print book has a LOT longer life than an ebook.
As we all know, it is technically possible for more than one person to read an eBook at the same time, but the publishers keep thinking “one reader/one book” and that is 20th century thinking – maybe even 15th century thinking. If library users had unlimited access to eBooks and there was a piece of code that automatically paid the publishers per “read” then publishers would make more money because, for one, there would be no waiting lines and more and more people would be reading the same popular eBook at the same time (“one book/many readers”). eBooks that aren’t “read” would disappear because, quite frankly, no one wants them anyway. My $.02.
If you are interested, I wrote a response to the HarperCollins eBook policy change[s] at: http://goo.gl/cDYQv.
Hey Meredith,
I think the post overall is great, but the part I agreee with most is the, “I am deeply concerned about the rights we give up and the erosion of the long-term health of our collections with every contract we sign. When we look at how much of our collection we own, it becomes a smaller and smaller part of the whole each year….” Currently there is no organization that can complete the following analogy: LOCKSS is to e-journal content as X is to e-book content. It’s deeply concerning.
@laura k No, you’re absolutely right. I definitely mispoke there. What I meant is that it can circulate lots and lots of times without falling apart like a physical book.
@Rachel H. I think Portico started an eBooks preservation initiative last year, but I don’t think too many eBook vendors are involved right now in anything like that. I really do wonder what ownership even means in the digital medium (in the rare case when we do own something) if there is no promise from the vendor to preserve the content.
@Chad – Thanks for the response. eBook Library has something like what you’re talking about. We loaded all of their content into our catalog and just pay a small hosting fee each year. Students can either check out a book (in which case we get charged a rental fee) or we can buy the book (in which case we gets 365 uses/re — one use being 1 person on 1 day). Multiple users can use the same book at once and we’re charged for each use. We just started working with EBL, so I’ll be curious to see how well this model works. So far, we are getting a lot of students using the EBL content!
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You buy a REAL book and you own it. Ebooks…? Not so much.
The corporatists own the content.
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