If digital trends extend to eReaders and eBooks (and why wouldn’t they), prices will drop. This will reduce the perceived value of a digital lending model because the inconvenience of borrowing is simply too great for low-cost items.

With physical materials & the lending model gone, it leaves the question of what librarians & libraries can offer that the public will deem worth funding? I can think of a handful of things and am curious to know what other AL readers think.

With what are his less “affluent” patrons going to read ebooks? Are these less “affluent” patrons spending $75 to $600 to buy ereaders and tablets or even commputers??? Somehow, Losinski spending a small fortunate to purchase ereaders or tablets to lend to his patrons would seem to be overkill!

And, I can’t remember ever GOING to the local public to download an ebook. Usually I logon to my library with my home $broadband$ internet connection, with my $computer$, to browse for an ebook. This probably explains the PEW statistic of 60% of surveyed people not knowing public libraries have ebooks. They don’t have computers or internet access…much less ereaders or tablets!

Hhhhmmm. Do we even need libraries to distribute ebooks? Perhaps local municipalities could cut some of their libraries’ budgets and use it to pay Overdrive directly to provide access to ebooks to their citizens. Leave the physical books and other stuff to the brick & mortar libraries.

DISCLAIMER: While I don’t work at a public library, I’m a regular user…mainly print, with an occasional ebook.

SB

From what I’ve seen, the library community has no appetite for engaging the vital question of durable value. The AL had a great line in “The Silliness Wrap-Up” that summarizes my impression of library-generated dialogue on “libraries of the future”. It’s been short of substance, long on self-expression. There’s no better example of this than Losinski’s closing paragraph:

The stakes are high. We can’t afford to continue to passively accept one-sided propositions from the publishing industry. The legislative or judicial path we must pursue will not be easy. As public librarians, we must rededicate ourselves to advocate for the public that has counted on us to do so throughout our history. Without such action, we just might be the next Borders or Blockbuster.

Just as you say, the history of digital cameras over the last 20 or so may help us predict what could happen to books. Digital cameras quickly went from expensive items for specialists to inexpensive items for everyone. With fewer people using film and related chemicals for development, film developing became much more expensive, driving even more people to digital cameras. Now, movies are mostly shot on digital cameras and few people use film. Film is no longer a viable option for most people.

We may be watching a similar process with books. A year ago, about 1/3 less paperbacks were sold and this trend continues. As people buy more ebooks, fewer popular physical books will be sold. These popular books help subsidize the production and shipment of less popular physical books. We may soon reach a point when printing and binding books is too expensive and that industry collapses or becomes an speciality. So if libraries can’t participate fully in ebooks, it will hurt our ability to produce reading.

I found nothing of value in Losinski’s article. To me the essay read like a rambling, over-the-top expression of library ideology – replete with heroes & villians, scare tactics and empty flag waving.

What you hint at is far more productive and precisely what I don’t see happening within the library ecosystem. You intuitively scanned a few decades’ experience with digital technology and found an illustrative example from which meaningful insights can be gleaned. How has digital photography emerged and evolved? How has it changed people’s relationship with imagery and use of it? What uses and service providers exist today that were not even conceived of 25 years ago? Which products, services & organizations have been displaced?

A range of players are thinking in this way: publishers, artists, entrepreneurs, the tech titans. They’re thinking about their roles & resources and how they can add value in a future that is certain to be different than today. They’re thinking about where they want to be in the continuum of leading change and following it, providing products and services, adding human value and technical value.

Meanwhile, library folk are screaming ever more loudly “we’re here doing what we’ve always done and the rest of you are poopey-heads for not playing with us!” This resonates within the echo chamber and outside it sounds like a mosquito buzzing.