Library moves forward with e-books

Friday, September 30, 2011

The Putnam County Public Library is trying to keep up with technology. The board decided during Wednesday's meeting to move forward with introducing e-books within the coming months.

In the monthly report the board saw some decreases in registered borrowers, circulation and computer use, but the board is hoping the use of e-books will be a good thing.

The board decided to purchase its e-books through Baker & Taylor, one of the largest multi-media retailers in the world, based out of Charlotte, N.C.

The company will provide e-books for viewing through an app called Blio, allowing the library to own its purchases rather than lease the books.

"E-books will bump the circulation up," library director Alice Greenburg said. "It's time to move forward."

The library will finalize the deal with Baker & Taylor by Monday, Oct. 31 and begin the process of getting everything organized. The staff will also have to go through intensive training.

The library will receive a lower rate by signing on for three years. The first year will cost roughly $3,500, including start-up costs and $2,000 the following years.

"When we open the gate, there will be something there for people to check out," Greenburg said.

The e-books will be free to library members and will be available for a variety of devices such as the I-Pad, Android, desktop and laptop computers. It is not yet available for the Kindle, Nook, Kobo, or Sony tablets. Baker & Taylor plans on releasing for those formats by the winter.

It remains unknown how many titles the library will be able to purchase initially. The estimate is around 200.

Funds for the program will be taken out of the endowment fund this year. The board will then plan on budgeting money to support the program for the following years.

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  • This is great idea which should generate more interest and traffic for the library, at least online. I certainly plan to take advantage of the e-books when they are available.

    Still, even as tech savvy as we all are, and as much as we love our e-readers, there is something almost magical about the brick-and-mortar library experience. In fact, I think it's about time for my next visit.

    To paraphrase a sentiment that's become hackneyed in these parts, "seven days without a book makes one weak."

    -- Posted by Balding Eagle on Fri, Sep 30, 2011, at 10:18 AM
  • Great idea! And I have been awaiting this type of improvement for years, since there are some sites like www.baen.com/library/ that have a huge selection of totally free books available for e-reading, in several formats. I would be able to pay a small fee for each e-book that I get from the local library web site, but I don't think a list of 200 will be varied enough to maintain anyone"s interest for very long.

    -- Posted by alfr1 on Fri, Sep 30, 2011, at 11:04 AM
  • "It remains unknown how many titles the library will be able to purchase initially. The estimate is around 200." 200 is the "inital" purchase. You need to read more closesly.

    -- Posted by speaknow on Fri, Sep 30, 2011, at 1:56 PM
  • Two hundred books will last some folks a lifetime, and should be enough to "hook" others. In this case, some is definitely better than none.

    -- Posted by Balding Eagle on Sat, Oct 1, 2011, at 7:05 AM
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