'Astronomical' hold queues on year's top e-books frustrate readers, libraries | CBC News
peter.suber's bookmarks 2024-12-21
Summary:
"But despite offering 75 copies of the e-book, the library's waitlist currently sits at about 1,200 people. With a maximum borrowing period of 21 days, someone placing a hold on the e-book today could be waiting well over a year before it comes available....
In response, both readers and libraries are adapting — but librarians say the root cause of the backlog remains the same: restrictive e-book publishing practices....
In addition to high prices, Chevreau said the "big five" multinational e-book publishers "throttle" access to e-books by selling them to libraries for either a limited time or a limited number of circulations — sometimes both.
Those publishers — Hachette Book Group, HarperCollins, Macmillan Publishers, Penguin Random House and Simon & Schuster — will often license copies of e-books for just 12 or 24 months. Once that licence expires, libraries must repurchase access to the same book...."