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07/04/23 Essex County Council1

If Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, Do Public Librarians Dream of Electronic Books: E-books in

Essex

Martin Palmer, Strategic Manager: Transformation & Resources, Essex

County Council

Linda Berube

Co-East, Regional Manager


E-Books and Essex: presentation overview

Regional context Project summary Procurement and implementation Sample searches Preliminary findings and recommendations Inspiration for the future…


The East of England Context: The Co-east Partnership

Consortium including all library authorities in the East of England: Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire, Peterborough; Hertfordshire, Thurrock, Bedfordshire, Luton, Southend-on-Sea

Resource discovery and sharing using Z39.50 and ISO/ILL protocols Joint e-procurement New partners, from other library sectors, through Co-East Plus Managing of national and regional services - Ask A Librarian, Familia, transport Fostering partnerships through regional and national working groups: MLAC;

EEMLAC; JISC; CONARLS; Combined Regions; CILIP etc Supplier partnerships: FDI; Dynix; DS/CrossNet; BiblioMondo; GEAC; ebrary;

Overdrive Projects: Co-East Plus (completed); Learn East (an EQUAL project); Essex e-books;

EEMLAC’s Source-East; Ask Cymru; Virtual Reference Toolkit trial


E-books in Essex: who and how…

Recipient of first round of LASER grants April 2003 Project partners: Essex Libraries (Martin Palmer); Loughborough

University (James Dearnley); Co-East (Linda Berube) Essex Project team: Saffron Walden; Loughton Supplier partners: Overdrive; ebrary; HP User Advisory Group: PLR; JISC; CBC; UKOLN; Richmond;

Blackburn Project website:

http://www.lboro.ac.uk/departments/dis/disresearch/e-booksinpublib/index.html

Progress reports: http://www.bl.uk/concord/laser-reports.html

mailto:[email protected]




E-books in Essex

Feasibility/proof-of-concept/live service delivery E-books accessible via PC or mobile

technology… E-book formats: Palm, Adobe 6, MobiPocket… Distributed to special user groups: mobile

library users; housebound; day care centres; etc


E-valuation…

Evaluation Methodology: Evaluating collection usage during the nine

month period Evaluating user perceptions of the ebook

collections(PC-based) and mobile technology Evaluating professional perceptions of the e-

book collections.


Some tasks we set ourselves

Orientation for staff Regular meetings with library staff Recruiting volunteers Training guides Paper and online questionnaires User and staff evaluation Publicity programme Progress reports

http://www.bl.uk/concord/laser-reports.html



Some questions we had at the start of the project…

What demand was there? None that we were aware of…

What content was there? Fiction? Non-fiction? Anything for the general reader? Anything for children?


Some more questions…

What was the best format? Don’t know, but there were lots to choose

from…

What kind of hardware? Dedicated e-book readers… PCs PDAs


And even more questions…

What kind of supply model? Traditional –

Select individual titles? One copy lent to one person at a time

Newer - Buy collection(s)?

Simultaneous multiple access: entire collection always available


And…

Who were the suppliers? Net Library Ebrary Safari Gale Overdrive…..


Some answers…

Were provided by the project itself Target audiences to include

Housebound people Mobile library users Visually impaired people

So: Hardware had to include

Handheld device


Handheld device…

Dedicated ebook reader? No longer available… No longer desirable!

So - PDAs – but what type? Palm Pocket PC/Compaq Ipaq Sony Zire

etc etc

Chose Ipaq 1910 – Screen size/price…


Content for PDAs

Formats – Palm Reader, Adobe Acrobat, Microsoft Reader… etc

Supplier – Overdrive, in Cleveland Ohio Wide range of titles in Palm and Adobe


Ebooks and PDAs

Bought 250 titles, accessible via website Also accessible via library catalogue

record… Mainly Fiction in Palm, Non-fiction in

Adobe- initially… Traditional model – 21day loan

(but no fines…)


E-Books and PCs

Ebrary –

Accessible via People’s Network PCs, and remotely from home…


E-books and PCs

Buy whole collection(s)

Public Library “General Interest”

2500 + titles – mainly nonfictio


There have been 52 separate book titles downloaded in the period 010104 – 210404. The desriptor above of 4 titles represents the ‘titles’ of the categories above I.e the month headings.


The users speak (the good)

"The ebook site is wonderful: It's what the Internet was invented for..." recommending it to all my friends, and a neighbour - who is blind - has just started to use ebooks as a result

I enjoyed the experience, and I feel with time I could get more used to the experience

Useful to take on holiday or even private study when a paper book is less easy to cope with.

I think they might be useful for people who travel a lot or have problems holding a book

Ease of transport. I seem to spend a lot of time waiting in hospitals or travelling

Can be used anywhere; takes up a small space in bags etc if travelling


The users speak (the bad)

A fairly long learning curve to concentrate on small page size. However, after this period I found it easy

Printed paper books are visually better (palm being closest software to book), but iPAQ is good enough in the light of added portability

It seems to be for quick, casual reading only. It is difficult to "lose yourself in a book" I was very aware of my surroundings, and the people near me.

It is a completely difference concept. Would appeal more to young people, though might help elderly who cannot hold a large book (probably too small though).


The users speak (the ugly)

I read quickly and was irritated by the flicker of moving the small pages on. Not easy to check back when I want to. I found it very irritating

The iPAQ is a much less enjoyable reading experience. The 'page-size' is too small. The iPAQ imposes it's pressure on the experience in a way that the paper book does not

Feel-look-texture-look of a library. Books more personal - just more technology, not as interesting as a book can be - older appreciate a book. Think it puts you off reading. Long term eyesight effects? Would turn us off reading. Not clear how we buy. How we get books - costs?

Cost and browser use. End of libraries such as Loughton and Debden


And the very polite…

It was very good to try it out but I feel it is just not for me. I lost the story and could not get it back, and it needed charging halfway through. But thank you I will stick to paperbacks


What we now know

Demand clearly exists

Content increasing daily – now over 1 million copyrighted e-books

Technology growing and improving


What we liked

Portability, via PDAs (or tablets…) Change font size, so every title can be

large print Access, 24/7 remotely “Read Aloud” in some formats Search whole text “Added extras”, like DVDs…


Our concerns

Collections: Availability of Content Fiction vs Non-fiction Fewer (one?) formats “Not every print book makes a good e-

book…eg cookery…” Wider range of pricing/supply models?


More concerns…

Technology (implementation and use of mobile technology):

Corporate/Local authority IT partners Collections software functionality PDA functionality Privacy Managing users fears/expectations


If you want to try this at home…

Guidelines from Final Report:

Product Selection Product Negotiation Technical Implementation Collection Development Staff Training/Champions Promotion Evaluation


And still we rise: Co-East Information Commons

Equity of Access Region-wide, potential for cross-regional

collaboration Virtual e-procurement E-interlending Adding suppliers : Safari, netLibrary etc Selection of mobile technology: PDAs,

notebooks, laptops, smart phones


E-books in Essex

Service now being offered countywide New titles being added regularly Being integrated into new LMS as part of

standard service


Assumptions challenged…

“Everything we thought we knew about who’d use e-books was wrong…”

Patricia Lowry, Cleveland (Ohio) Public Library


The future…

“The e-book market is set to explode…

…What better institutions to evangelize new reading than libraries…”

Steve Potash (President of the Open Ebook Forum– and CEO of Overdrive…)


Questions and Information contacts

Martin Palmer [email protected] Essex Team: Elaine Adams, Janice Waugh, Jill Palmer, Lee

ShelsherLinda Berube [email protected] John [email protected] Dearnley [email protected] Morris [email protected] McNight [email protected]: Overdrive http://www.overdrive.com/Ebrary http://www.ebrary.com/index.jsp (UK representative:

Coutts)Hewlett Packard: http://welcome.hp.com/country/uk/en/welcome.html


http://www.overdrive.com/




http://www.ebrary.com/index.jsp

http://welcome.hp.com/country/uk/en/welcome.html

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