There\’s a nice Piece At The NYTimes on Librarians squaring off with publishers who fear that free remote access costs them book sales.
They say Web sites of more than 7,300 libraries provide patrons 24-hour remote access to the texts of a few hundred to several thousand electronic books, occasionally even in languages like Chinese and Russian.
But of course, locking everything up is the response from the largest publishers. They say the major trade publishers are refusing to cooperate.
\”Lending over their Web sites — I think that is a problem,\” said Laurence Kirshbaum, chairman of the books division of AOL Time Warner. \”There is an inherent danger that would worry me — you are opening yourself up to being copied wildly without any control.\”
Recent Comments