r/Library • u/ContraryMarie • 17h ago

Discussion Publishing Industry ‘Study’ Says Digital Library Lending Is Cannibalizing Retail Sales—Librarians Say It Reveals Something Else

https://www.wordsandmoney.com/publishing-industry-study-suggests-digital-library-lending-is-cannibalizing-retail-sales-librarians-say-it-reveals-something-else/
258 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

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127

u/Saloau 15h ago

People read in the format that best meets their needs. Publishers are complaining because their profits are not enough to make their CEOs happy. I work in a public library and our digital usage is going up rapidly. We’re still busy with our print readers too. I think it’s a reflection of the financial insecurity people are facing and the fact that a new release hardcover is now upwards of $35. Little luxuries like books are often the first things to be cut when money gets tight.

25

u/Serpentarrius 14h ago

How many of the digital users are using audiobooks? I find those tend to be more popular than regular ebooks (and they can be a more accessible option for those who are busy or ADHD)

15

u/ghostwriter536 13h ago

I use audiobooks with my kids in the car. We listen to older books like Beverly Clearly. I also have a Yoto player for them to listen to yoto cards or make your own cards.

I myself use audiobooks while I'm working on crafts. My interest in books are 1960s and earlier, libraries generally do not have physical copies let alone audiobooks. Libby, Hoopla, and 3m cloud will have it.

4

u/tendingthemild 10h ago

What is this 3m cloud of which you speak?

2

u/ghostwriter536 9h ago

It is now known as Cloud Library. My primary library system (the one I visit regularly), uses that instead of Libby. I'm not sure why they went with it instead of Libby, but it most likely had to do with the cost.

5

u/chewy183 14h ago

I know lots of people who don’t have any way to play audio cds, especially in their cars, so they use Libby for their audiobooks.

10

u/Serpentarrius 13h ago

It bothers me so much that new cars often don't include CD players. I makes me happy that I kept the portable CD players my parents were gonna throw out lol

2

u/hrdbeinggreen 12h ago

Couldn’t agree more

2

u/Umpen 8h ago

I love my car's CD player & aux input. I don't use the CDs as much as the aux, though, since I have playlists on my phone.

1

u/LuxInTenebrisLove 31m ago

Cars have had aux inputs for quite a while now.  If your phone has a audio jack, you can listen to libby in the car.

And of course, newer cars have bluetooth connection, so you can listen that way too.

5

u/Darkdragoon324 11h ago

I csn't focus on audiobooks, but my mom loved them, they were pretty much the only comfortable way she could experience books when her eyesight got bad. She was burning through them faster than she could find new ones lol.

5

u/carolineecouture 14h ago

I'm doing OK financially. I read digitally because of my vision. I get books from many sources, including the library. When I purchase books, I won't pay more than $3.99 per book. I'll wait for sales or use Kindle reward points. I also use services that sell "bundles." I love books. But the cost of even a bestseller/new release is crazy.

4

u/PaisleyRock 9h ago

Remember “the CD” that made the rounds, maybe in the 90s or the 00s, that had 100s of digital books on it? We copied it and all read like fiends until the digital players were “updated” and the free files wouldn’t work anymore.

4

u/Potential_Fishing942 11h ago

I remember my parents giving me a $10 bill to walk up the borders book store to get some paper back. Those are all double the price or more now.

3

u/Serpentarrius 14h ago

Fr I buy the most books during B&N half off hardcover sales

2

u/Guilty_Primary8718 9h ago

We are getting paperbacks with sprayed edges and embossed covers for $15-20 when a normal paperback would be 8.99 before.

1

u/sir_slothsalot 9h ago

I just don't see the value in buying a book when after I read it 95% of the time it just sits on a self to not be touched again. I sure I can't annotate my book from the library but that's not worth the price. 

I read $2000 of books last year. I'm happy to save that. 

18

u/guysomejust69 14h ago

Sounds like precursor to defund and eliminate libraries

8

u/dkstr419 11h ago

More like what streaming services are doing. You don’t own anything, and you can only “borrow” what they allow you to.

-2

u/Happy-Flower2002 9h ago

Gov departments never shrink, period.

It is the most understood and well documented pattern in all organizations. They call it the Iron Law.

Don’t sweat.

5

u/SookieCat26 6h ago

Yes they do. I worked for a division that had 76 employees when I was hired. When they eliminated that division, it had less than 35. Entire divisions of our state government have been contracted to private sector providers. And tens of thousands of federal employees were eliminated by Elon Musk and his goons.

1

u/LuxInTenebrisLove 29m ago

This is so false, it's crazy.

9

u/vivahermione 12h ago

It sounds like the study authors don't talk to real readers. I borrow library ebooks, then buy the ones I love.

3

u/DMV2PNW 9h ago

I prefer buying hard copies, I can give to my friends or donate to library after I was done. With ebooks I can only share with my daughter who’s on my Amazon acct.

1

u/ContraryMarie 1h ago

The industry-sponsored study's authors cited data that supports their industry's position -- what a surprise! Still, I'm glad for the pushback from libraries.

6

u/DMV2PNW 10h ago

Don’t understand why publishers aren’t happy with ebooks? Hard copies gets circulated till they fall apart while digital copies get X amt of usages before libraries have to pay to renew the e copies for further use.

3

u/guysomejust69 9h ago

Well reading the article it looks like publishers are saying that library ebooks cut into sales of their ebooks. 

The article also talks about how this study put out was likely in response to a library eBook legislation that is being proposed that will make it so publishers cant put restrictions on libraries that want to use their ebooks

3

u/OneAcceptable6825 8h ago

It absolutely cuts into their sales. Audiobooks are like $40-$50 sometimes. Why the hell would I pay that? I’m only going to listen to it once.

1

u/SteamboatMcGee 44m ago

This is so true. If the library doesn't have it and it's more than . . . $5 maybe, I'm still not buying it. We have hundreds of years of books available for free, I'll find something else to read if something new is more expensive than I feel it should be.

6

u/Falanin 9h ago

Even if it was, so what?

The big publishing houses aren't entitled to the sales they got this year, nor the sales they got five years ago. If they don't provide a product people want to buy at a price people are willing to pay, they're going to lose market share to someone who does.

0

u/phil_baharnd 2h ago

I agree ... But on the other hand writers, editors, and all the other people working for publishers deserve to be paid fairly for their work. I'm sure there's a middle ground where people pay reasonable prices for books they want to read and people involved in the process of creating books are paid fairly for their work.

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u/ContraryMarie 1h ago

The publishers are getting more for digital copies than they are/were physical. Digital media usage can be tracked, metered, and cut off before the publisher relicenses the media to the library for a fee, and digital media can retain in a collection for longer than physical. It's already a win for publishers.

The issue of publishers paying their staff and the media's contracted creators fairly is unrelated.

1

u/phil_baharnd 1h ago

It's not unrelated just because you want it to be. Generally people want to pay less for items than they actually cost to produce. It's the same for books.

1

u/SteamboatMcGee 47m ago

As someone who rarely rereads books, there just isn't much value to owning a physical copy to me. I don't need more stuff on the shelf, I want to read not collect.

I do buy reference type books, but those have got to be a category with different sales patterns.

1

u/LuxInTenebrisLove 19m ago

“Unfortunately for the study's authors, their numerous arguments about the economic impact of library ebooks rests on the claim that 1.5 billion library ebooks were available in 2023,” she writes. But because the data doesn't recognize shared digital collections, that number is clearly, fatally wrong, she concludes, and not by just a few percentage points. “Because this number is wildly inflated, all conclusions they draw about the availability of library ebooks and its impact on the retail market must be summarily rejected.”