The Wall Street Journal published the article, “Why the Public Library Beats Amazon – for Now,” which talks about the growing number of subscription, fee-based eBook lending services. If you haven’t heard of them yet, these services are a lot like Netflix for movies-- you pay a flat rate fee in order to check out eBooks to read on your eReader device. Amazon has recently released Kindle Unlimited for $10 a month where you have access to 600,000 eBooks. Other eBook lending services, such as Playster and Scribd, work basically the same way. My question, which is the same as the Wall Street Journal’s, is why pay this monthly fee – even if it is nominal – when your public library has eBooks for FREE?
Lafourche Parish Public Library (LPPL) offers thousands of eBooks and eAudio for different age groups in a variety of genres and we are purchasing more weekly. We buy best sellers, popular authors and fulfill patron requests. So if there is a title you want and we don’t have it – let us know – we will purchase it! The library offers the very easy to use Cloud Library, formerly 3M. Amazon, Playster, and Scribd do not have access to all of the latest books or bestsellers. Their collections are composed primarily of older titles. This is because subscription service companies generally do not have affiliations with all of the publishing houses that libraries have access to.
So what do libraries offer that Amazon, Playster, and Scribd don’t? New releases, best sellers and the titles you want to read in eBook format. And for an added bonus, many of your favorite titles are available in eAudio formats. You never have to physically visit the library, worry about returning books
on time, or pay overdue fines. You can peruse the library catalog and download our eBooks from the comfort of your home (or anywhere!), 24/7. So what is the negative about borrowing books from the LPPL eBook collection? Well… you may have to go on a short wait list for a book you want to read. But again, this is a service already paid for with your tax dollars and the library has the books you want to read. The Lafourche Parish Library has purchased 15 out of the current top 20 titles from Amazon’s bestseller list and 18 out of 20 of the New York Times Bestsellers. Your library has the latest and most popular titles in their eBook collection without you having to spend more money while feeding your love of books. Sounds to me like a win-win situation all around.