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Just need something that forces Amazon to keep innovating and keep pricing competitive.

Thanks, B&N!

The innovation I want most right now is the ability to cleanly borrow DRM'd library books. Right now, libraries are hashing out their e-book lending schemes. From the San Francisco Public Library, I can borrow some e-books in one or more of several formats, some with DRM (epub, mobi) some without (PDF, mobi). (SFPL doesn't roll their own e-book lending system, they use OverDrive and NetLibrary.)

So on my kindle2, I can read non-DRM'd books and DRM'd mobis (legally, but through a clunky process to overcome kindle's hostility towards books not bought from Amazon). But I can't read the stuff that requires Adobe Digital Editions, which is a lot of the good stuff. (And after using a kindle, reading a book on the PC is unbearable.) IIRC the Sony Reader does support Adobe Digital Editions (but Sony doesn't have the online commercial library of Amazon or B&N, plus is it safe to stop hating Sony yet?).

Dear Amazon Kindle Team,

Please improve Kindle's support for commonly used public library e-book formats. Specifically:

1) Support legally acquired DRM'd mobi's without requiring clunky conversion with kindlefix or the like.

2) Support Adobe Digital Editions (DRM'd epub).

Thank you, and have a nice day.

It's obvious why Amazon would prefer you to buy a new bestseller from their store rather than borrow it for free from a public library, but I want to do some of both, and I hope competition from device makers will spur improvement in the public library lending scene.

I don't know about your library, but the ones around here provide e-books through the website. You've got to install a DRMed Win program to use them, but I don't think you can use it with the kindle, which is going to cost you opportunities. I'm sure that's not a big deal to the Kindle audience, but it may be to some people.

Service for that is through http://www.netlibrary.com/ if anybody's interested, it may or may not be available in any given library system.

>> a world where we're exposed to more information in a day than many people
>> experienced in a lifetime thousands of years ago.

> Not really more, just different. For example prehistoric hunters tracking down their wooly mammoth would be

No, really, it's more information. I'm not trying to start an argument or anything, but it's pretty indisputable. A large part of intelligence hinges on dealing with information that's more than just sensation. A shark, like the prehistoric hunters you mention, has a phenomenal sensory system, but you wouldn't say it's as intelligent as a human.

Here's the first definition of intelligence from the American Heritage Dictionary: (a) The capacity to acquire and apply knowledge. (See more at http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/intelligence) Like most skills, practice makes perfect; the more you deal with novel information and situations, the better you get at it. The burgeoning complexity of our lives is arguably a cause for greater _average_ intelligence --and evidence that it must have increased from 10,000 years ago.

Here's some interesting reading on the subject of how much information we swim in:
http://www.netlibrary.com/ebook_info.asp?product_id=20851

We have evolved and continue to evolve. I think we're certainly much smarter than Neanderthals, wouldn't you agree? We've got better cranial hardware. Will future humans be more intelligent on average? Or dumber and more technologically dependent than at present? I'll reserve judgment on that.

A lot of libraries are making digital checkouts available... the larger ones my do it themselves, but smaller ones partner with places like netlibrary/mymediamall/tumblebooks/etc. They perhaps don't fulfill your entire vision, because they're heavily DRM'd. Libraries have never been able to just make copies of normal books and hand them out, they have to pay for every copy that's in circulation. In the same way, libraries need to pay for a fixed number of digital copies, and make sure that users actually return them at the end of the checkout period, and DRM unfortunately seems to be the way to implement that...

1. Ebooks don't take up shelf space
2. Ebooks can be accessed anywhere and anytime
3. Ebooks reduce the workload of staff members though they still count in our circulation statistics
4. Ebooks don't need to repaired or replaced
5. Libraries don't need multiple copies of the same book
6. New editions simply replace old editions (though there are downsides to this)

Limit each song to only one person accessing it at a time

Actually, that's an interesting idea. NetLibrary already does something like that with books, so it sounds reasonable to do it for other media under copyright.

Of course, someone who wanted to start something like that would have to pay a lot of money to defend himself in court, and would probably opt to shut it down.

Check out your local library and see if they're registered with NetLibrary, it's free if your library is registered with them. They have a decent collection of books.

Adobe offers a few free ebooks, both fiction and non-fiction. However, let me warn you, they are DRM'd.

Then there is also the Gutenberg Project as many others have already mentioned.

If you are using MS Reader, then Microsoft offers some free books as well.

NetLibrary has a stupid interface - you log in from a member institution, then you can view books online. Good idea, right? Wrong. All of their content is crippled - you can't print it more than a page at a time, save it to a file, or even look at more than two pages consecutively without going through a screen that says "Please type the letters you see in the box. This is to protect against actions you have performed that appear to violate copyright." This is after simply viewing three pages in a row quickly, because I wanted to find a particular equation!

So what did I do?

Right.

I wrote a script that brought up each of 280+ pages sequentially and printed them to TIFF files, popping up a browser so I could perform their human-detection action when required. The I packed the whole thing into a PDF, and ran an OCR on the whole thing. Presto! The original book, in un-DRM'd form, happily readable and printable.

The county I am living is affiliated with http://www.netlibrary.com/. So being a member of my local library (free), i get access to lotsa computer books via netlibrary. Some books may not be accessible, because local library did not purchase it(or something).

If I cannot find the book online, google and other search engines provide answers to me. Though, not as comprehensive as (e)books, it would serve most of my purpose.

Next stop would be local user group. Become a member of local user group, they have lotsa expertise and knowledge.

I would rather spend $30.00 on pizza (thats 3 large, w/ coupons, ofcourse) than print books, which get outdated in couple of months. Ofcourse, online versions get updated with new versions (u have to read fine print, some may not provide this offer).

And not the first time.

The same guy, John Guagliardo, World eBook Library, also runs NetLibrary.NET. There is a netLibrary.COM, owned by OCLC, not Guagliardo, which sells access to online books, including framed HTML versions of Project Gutenberg texts, to libraries.

The search at Project Gutenberg 2 takes you off-site to the same search used by NetLibrary.NET.

Do a search for:
yet again

Compare ***The Project Gutenberg Etext of Yet Again, by Max Beerbohm***, at World eBook Library
Yet Again, at World eBook Library, and
Yet Again, at Project Gutenberg. Basically World eBook Library strips out the Project Gutenberg license and slaps their own copyright on it.

What eBook titles are available from MCPL?
The Montgomery County Public Libraries eBook Collection includes Cliff's Notes to literary works and many Computer related titles. The Computer eBooks cover topics such as database management, HTML, the Internet, MS Office, networking, operating systems (Linux, Macintosh, Unix, Windows), and programming languages (ASP, Java, Javascript, Perl, and SQL) and more.

Computer Title List

The Publicly Accessible netLibrary eBook collection includes over 3,500 titles that are in the public domain. These are works of fiction, speeches, and government documents. When searching netLibrary, click the checkbox to include Publicly Accessible eBooks in your search.

I first started reading this book via netLibrary through my school's library. Just the first two chapters are enough to explain regular expressions to the point where one can use them effectively in programs. The remaining chapters expand on this information and discuss language specifics. I bought a paper copy to have on my shelf, and I constantly find myself referencing it.

To those at universities, see if your school offers netLibrary-based books. It's easy to read and it's free.

I can't speak to who is the first, but I have checked out an eBook online 8 months ago through my local library: San Diego Public Library.
SDPL uses this company: NetLibrary.
It looks like NetLibrary provides this service for other libraries, but I'm too lazy to look for details.

My local library belongs to NetLibrary, a wonderful way to distribute content online.

I sign up at the library, and then can get exclusive use of books that my library has or has purchased rights to distribute and can exclusively check that electronic copy of the book out for a predetermined amount of time (my library sets it at 4 hours). And it is web-based, so you can reference books anywhere.

I also do plan to donate more books and CD's to my library in the future.

the freedom to take a digital copy of the book, leaving the original on the shelf for someone who is not able to use a digital copy.

The biggest impediment to the type of access you describe nowadays isn't the technology, it's capitalism and all its derivatives, such as copyright.

Case in point: A few years ago, the ebook vendor netLibrary offered an offline reader. This product was removed due to publisher paranoia. Currently you can only view netLibrary titles one page at a time while connected to the Internet. Furthermore, despite the medium, only one patron per purchasing library can check out a book at any given time. But never fear, now they're offering - for an extra fee - the ability to use a (somewhat) DRM crippled offline reader.

Publishers are about as up to date with technology and new pricing models as the RIAA. Copyrights disputes have been cited as the reason several publishers have pulled their titles from full-text databases. So instead of moving towards the single search box method for library resources, we now have hundreds of competing library database vendors, each with different coverage and search interfaces. It is the most difficulty time in history to do library research (and the slack that Google is picking up is a detriment to research skills) not just because of varying library materials formats, but because of copyright.

Libraries Are 31337

the freedom to take a digital copy of the book, leaving the original on the shelf for someone who is not able to use a digital copy.

The biggest impediment to the type of access you describe nowadays isn't the technology, it's capitalism and all its derivatives, such as copyright.

Case in point: A few years ago, the ebook vendor netLibrary offered an offline reader. This product was removed due to publisher paranoia. Currently you can only view netLibrary titles one page at a time while connected to the Internet. Furthermore, despite the medium, only one patron per purchasing library can check out a book at any given time. But never fear, now they're offering - for an extra fee - the ability to use a (somewhat) DRM crippled offline reader.

Publishers are about as up to date with technology and new pricing models as the RIAA. Copyrights disputes have been cited as the reason several publishers have pulled their titles from full-text databases. So instead of moving towards the single search box method for library resources, we now have hundreds of competing library database vendors, each with different coverage and search interfaces. It is the most difficulty time in history to do library research (and the slack that Google is picking up is a detriment to research skills) not just because of varying library materials formats, but because of copyright.

Libraries Are 31337

Well, they'll simply have some sort of access control, sort of like NetLibrary.
There you can check out a book and that stops everyone else from reading it during that time.

Another source of Books in Print is through Gale Group. Many local libraries are purchasing access to the Gale Group databases (Books in Print, InfoTrac, etc) for their users. For instance, Virginia residents can type in the bar code number from their library card to get access to these databases from home.

I work in a library, but I'm not a librarian.

I am married to a man I've been with since 1978 - Terry Gross

Full interview here.

Alexlit, one of the first e-lit sites, which started out with an ubercool collaborative filtering book recommendation system and added on from there.

Mind's Eye Fiction, which Alexlit subsequently bought.

Fictionwise, another e-lit publisher, which, if I'm not mistaken, actually has a contract to publish some of Harlan Ellison's works.

Peanut Press, which publishes e-books for Palms & PocketPCs--and was bought by NetLibrary.

Now, granted, most of what these sites deal in is reprints, and save for Peanut Press, they focus more toward short stories than entire books. But they seem to be doing rather well, even in the age of the dot-com crash.
--

Netlibrary has a bunch of free books on their site - 'though I think most of them are just from project gutenburg.

Forget free though: Anyone interested in cognitive science can get access to all the MIT press books in cognitive science* at netlibrary (in encrypted downloadable and web form) for just $120 (students) or $240 (everyone else) by going to cognet.mit.edu. It also includes access to the MIT Encyclopedia of Cognitive Sciences, and The New Cognitive Neurosciences 2nd Ed, and everything else they say they offer (the "community" aspect is non existent though - it basically consists of announcements {talks, seminars}, and interesting links.

*(includes hundreds of books in: neuroscience, psychology, philosophy, AI {genetic algorithms, computational intelligence, neural networks, etc}, linguistics, culture, evolutionary biology, and several other topics).

I also work at one of the 'other' companies that are distributing this book, and my recollection was that the big players don't actually get the books for free. They still have to pay, but they are eating the cost for all the books that are downloaded on the first day.