You Asked... We Answered!

Your Opinion Matters to us. We've received hundreds of responses to our Library Survey in the past year. We are trying to provide answers to some of the many interesting questions asked by you in the Survey results. 


#3 

• Why can’t I find a copy of Nora Robert’s Naked in Death eBook in your catalogue, or in your downloadLibrary.ca selection? I know I found it there last week, and now I can’t find it.”
• “Why do you have such long waiting lists for Audiobooks & eBooks on downloadLibrary?”

Library customers have taken to Electronic (or “e-“) content like ducks to water. Hundreds of you have borrowed thousands of eBooks, audiobooks and videos (travel, kids documentaries and more) since January 2011!


SPL staff work hard to keep up with skyrocketing demand:

• New titles are added weekly
• Electronic budgets have been doubled for 2012
• Nearly 13,000 eBooks, Audiobooks and Videos can be borrowed from www.downloadLibrary.ca.

Challenges for libraries purchasing and loaning e-content:

• Libraries cannot buy the same digital books as individuals. 
• A few key publishers don’t make their catalogue available to the Library market. Simon & Schuster (new Steve Jobs biography) is a good example.
• Other publishers sell library editions for a time, and then withdraw particular titles. Nora Robert’s Naked in Death (eBook) was recently made unavailable. We know you want to read them, we just can’t buy them.
• Libraries also agree to different contractual conditions than a person who has purchased eBook content directly from the Internet.

Electronic publishing is in its infancy and is still evolving. Canadian libraries – including Stratford – continue to work with eBook vendors to make more books available to our library customers. Stay tuned…. and do check out www.downloadLibrary. As always, call, e-mail or come on in if you need a hand with any of it.

Wendy Hicks, Deputy Director