E-Books Strain Relationships between Libraries and Publishers

As someone with a Master's in Library and Information Science, I'm always interested in what's happening to libraries. Since the advent of ebooks, publishers have yet to figure out a reasonable working model of how to manage library loans of ebooks.

Although OverDrive and other resources make these electronic books available to library patrons, publishers retain a lack of ease with the loan of books that never wear out and a distribution model that doesn't charge the person using the material. Each publisher seems to have its own method of calculating prices of books to libraries, for example, and policies about how many times a library may loan the title.

Listen to this seven-minute NPR news feature as Lynn Neary reports on the relationships between publishers and libraries regarding ebooks, which includes a novel platform that may bypass the familiar and traditional models. This platform may interest you if you're a self-published author, or if you're involved with a small press.