I attended the American Library Association MidWinter Conference in Seattle, Washington January 26 -29th.  While there, I was able to speak with several eBook companies about new features and services.  Below you will find a list of companies (alpha order) and new features complete with links for more information. I also want to bring your [...]

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NSR 2012 Interviews With 2012 coming to a close, I wanted to take another opportunity to introduce you to the wide array of interviews NSR offered this year. The 2012 interviews highlight  innovative new products and services from librarians, publishers, and information professionals, a focus on information literacy and core competencies, and creative business models.  [...]

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Last week I spoke with Rachel Gut, the Outreach Service Manager at the Dayton Metro Library.  Rachel and her colleagues launched an eReader lending program for homebound patrons.  The program started due to the lack of large print titles.  Rachel offers an overview of the program, details on the readers, and suggestions for funding. Interview [...]

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The Handheld Librarian 7 conference will be held virtually next Wednesday and Thursday, August 15th and 16th.  On day two, a 2-hour workshop on the state of the eReader is available. More information is below: State of the eReader:  This featured workshop will focus on the legal, ethical, and technical aspects of eReaders. The goal [...]

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Read this news on a Teleread post from last week.  Libraries who are lending eReaders, what are you doing to accommodate visually impaired patrons?  Are you purchasing audiobooks or another type of device that allows text-to-speech functionality? Is that an acceptable solution for the NFB, to have the same content but in a different format? [...]

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Ebook Talks Continued:  ALA Meets with Distributors – eContent blog Boopsie Approaches Integration in Its Own Way; New Competitor Emerges at PLA | Digital Shift Ebook Providers, ILS Vendors Move Rapidly to Remove Friction From E-Lending; OverDrive APIs Coming in April Digital Shift OverDrive’s Library eReader is Better Than 3M’s Library eReader – The Digital [...]

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Last week while roaming the exhibit hall at the ALAMW conference in Dallas, Texas, I discovered Mediasurfer.  Mediasurfer offers self-checkout machines for iPads (and other tablet devices in the near future).  Users swipe a library card to borrow the iPad.  Upon return, the devices are returned to original settings. If you’d like to know more [...]

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The past few weeks there have been several interesting articles and interviews related to libraries and digital lending, the pros/cons of lending eBooks readers, and publisher/library relationships.  A few are listed below: Threats to Digital Lending – American Libraries Magazine Interview with Michael Porter of Library Renewal – via Teleread Interview with Paul Biba from [...]

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Why Might A Publisher Pull Its E-Books From Libraries? by Laura Hazard Owen « INFOdocket Which E-Books Are Most Borrowed From Libraries, And Why? | paidContent So you want to start a Kindle lending program | code4lib How to add public domain books to the Kindle, by Piotr Kowalczyk | TeleRead: News and views on [...]

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Go To Hellman: Book Lending Ignorance Go To Hellman: SOPA Could Put Common Library Software in the Soup More controversy over Amazon price-checking versus independent bookstores | TeleRead Amazon Doesn’t Care About Your Local Bookstore | Epicenter | Wired.com Stop Treating $9.99 As The Magic E-Book Price | paidContent E-Book Readers Face Sticker Shock – [...]

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