Slashdot Mirror
Offline Book "Lending" Costs US Publishers Nearly $1 Trillion
An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from a tongue-in-cheek blog post which puts publisher worries about ebook piracy into perspective:
"Hot on the heels of the story in Publisher's Weekly that 'publishers could be losing out on as much $3 billion to online book piracy' comes a sudden realization of a much larger threat to the viability of the book industry. Apparently, over 2 billion books were 'loaned' last year by a cabal of organizations found in nearly every American city and town. Using the same advanced projective mathematics used in the study cited by Publishers Weekly, Go To Hellman has computed that publishers could be losing sales opportunities totaling over $100 billion per year, losses which extend back to at least the year 2000. ... From what we've been able to piece together, the book 'lending' takes place in 'libraries.' On entering one of these dens, patrons may view a dazzling array of books, periodicals, even CDs and DVDs, all available to anyone willing to disclose valuable personal information in exchange for a 'card.' But there is an ominous silence pervading these ersatz sanctuaries, enforced by the stern demeanor of staff and the glares of other patrons. Although there's no admission charge and it doesn't cost anything to borrow a book, there's always the threat of an onerous overdue bill for the hapless borrower who forgets to continue the cycle of not paying for copyrighted material."
Voyeur and amateur stuff abounds! How they came up with the names like "National Geographic" still confuses me, though. Ask for that or the "medical journal" sections. Don't forget to wink knowingly.
"Common sense will be the death of us all"
When the authorities have requested copies of patrons borrowing records, the libraries almost always refuse to provide it without a search warrant!
Actually I believe you'll find that libraries now tend to delete all records after the books are returned, so a search warrant is useless. Hence the publishers can't even find out who the evil 'borrowers' might be.
These are the people arguing against making publicly funded research publicly available. Here's the full article: Pat Schroeder's New Chapter.
Unlimited growth == Cancer.
No disconnect. The book isn't lent out to ten people simultaneously - one person has to return it before another can have it. There still is only one physical representation of the book. In digital form, there is no real limitation to the number of copies and any number of people could have it simultaneously.
Wherever did you get this silly idea? Libraries pay the same discounted rate as bookstores, usually in the neighborhood of 45-55% BELOW retail. Most books are purchased from Ingram or Baker & Taylor, wholesalers. If you do the math on this, it winds up that a million dollar book budget buys 2 million dollars worth of books. (Take the 45% you just saved; buy more books. Take the 45% you just saved; buy more books. Repeat until funds=0.) I supervised the Technical Services Department of my library (and IT) for 25 years, which included the book budget.
How about a moderation of -1 pedantic.
Fact 1: Public libraries are just about the best return on investment for your tax dollar. For every dollar you spend supporting the public library, you get about $8.00 back in services. If you had to pay retail (or even discounted) for every book borrowed from the public library, that's the ROI you would see. Name another government organization that can give you a better ROI. (Note: You can't.)
Fact 2: If you have a recession, usage of the public library goes up. Ironically, the library budget is subject to the recession as much as any other business or government entity. For most businesses, if traffic goes up, so does income. It's the opposite for a public library.
Fact 3: If it were not for public libraries, many books would not be published at all. That's because publishers factor in the public library market in their decision to publish. Larger public libraries buy a given title in the hundreds of copies. There are over 16,000 public libraries in the US. The market is not trivial.
Fact 4: Public libraries are largely responsible for publishers' 'Backlists' of older titles. Nobody else buys them.
Fact 5: It is an established fact that people who use public libraries buy far more books than people who do not. Public libraries help create the market that gives profits to publishers.
Fact 6: Research libraries, especially, are a captive audience for the over-priced, rip-off "scientific" journals that cost hundreds, even thousands of dollars a year that academics "must have." No individual can afford them. If libraries "just said no" those journals would fail in a heartbeat.
Fact 7: Cutting off libraries is a stupid idea. It's cutting off your nose to spite your face.
How about a moderation of -1 pedantic.
You need to work on your reading comprehension. That statement in no way states or implies what you claim, to wit: "Libraries already pay a fee to the author each time a book is loaned out." PLR is an organization funded by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and in 2008-09 received £7.4 million pounds in grant-in-aid, of which £6.6 million was distributed to authors. Funding for 2009-10 has been set at £7.5 million.
It exists solely in the UK, every Author does not receive money even for books borrowed in the UK (they have to sign up.) The portion received by those who do is in no way comparable to compensation for "piracy losses" experienced when someone "pirates" a book by borrowing it from the library. Again, the library doesn't pay a penny.
Furthermore, it is not necessary to take a book out of the library to read it.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun