Mastodawn

Another day, another instance of someone on the Fediverse telling people not to do something which is essentially a public good.

This time it's a librarian telling people not to borrow ebooks from libraries. The other option isn't cheaper, permanent physical books, I'm afraid. For many people, it's immediately available ebooks on pirate sites.

It's taken me so long to get my friends, nieces and godchildren to use Libby and BorrowBox (for audiobooks).

It is very disheartening to read something so exclusionary and privileged. I know most librarians want you to take advantage of anything and everything a library has to offer because their use justifies their expenditure.

The relationship between libraries and e-books is ridiculous currently and the idea that anyone has to wait in line to download an infinitely-copyable instance of an electronic book rather than simply registering that it's been borrowed and informing the publisher is mental.

I'd love for libraries to be awarded licences for ethical piracy, but that seems a very long way off under the hyper-commercialism we have today.

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Hannah Steenbock Mar 17

@ReggieHere

See, that's not how ebooks work for libraries.

Usually, they either buy a copy (of the ebook) and lend it out to one person after the other, or they have to pay a fee per copy used (Overdrive, e.g.).

It does mean that authors like me do earn a little bit from library borrows.

I saw that post, and it was a simple statement of fact, not meant to condemn people for using ebook services. But those services cost libraries a lot, and physical books are cheaper for libraries.

Absolutely, and I understand the constraints that libraries work under, but an electronic book is fundamentally different to a physical book and users being made to wait for access as if e-books were physical things is kinda nonsensical when thousands of copies exist already and readership could be measured by usage without artificial waiting lists.

@mandy