Sla Solol feb.2013

Frankenbooks: Understanding the eBook Opportunity

Stephen Abram, MLS, FSLAConsultant, Dysart & Jones

SLA Solos and METROFeb. 26, 2013

Is this graphic correct? What’s wrong?

Questions for Today:

1. What is REALLY happening with eBooks?2. Where is all this change taking us?3. Does the eBook have a different value? 4. Today’s session is about frameworks. For

details see the webliography at the end or online.

5. What is the role for special librarians in our info-future?

eBook Penetration: Specialized Libs?

2010 2011 20120

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

100

School Public Academic

Source: Library Journal Survey of Ebook Penetration – 2010-2012

Is the book in your head?

eBook Benefits

Credit: Polanka

What makes an e-book better or worse from the user’s, reader’s or librarian’s POV?

The Physical Act of Reading

Think harder about book components and workflow!

Is it really expensive or just a matter of ROI and value?

Have Journal Prices Really Increased Much in the Digital Age? (Scholarly Kitchen blog) http://bit.ly/11b3hP2

Good Questions

•What if prices of the predominant journal form have actually been falling?

•What if we’ve been measuring the wrong things, or measuring insufficiently?

•And what if the growth in expenses are not the result of price increases but a result of the growth in science?”

The Real Digital Story•Print subscription prices are a misleading and

inaccurate method for tracking library serials spending

•“. . . libraries’ spending on periodicals has increased three-fold while their collections have tripled in size . . . Spending three times as much to get three times as much tells a very different story from the “price increases” story. . . .”

•Published article output and research spending has grown 3.o% to 4% per year since 1990

Whose needs are met by e-books and e-libraries?

Deer in headlamps slide here.

There is no guarantee that the e-book scenario will play out to include libraries

What is an EXPERIENCE?

What is a library experience?

What differentiates a library experience from a transaction?

What differentiates special libraries from Google/Bing?

The Evolutionof Answers

Why do people ask questions?

Is your library experience conceptually organized around people, answers and programs?Or collections, technology and buildings?

Why do people ask questions?

Who, What, When, Where How & Why Data – Information – Knowledge - Behavior To Learn or to Know To solve a problem To Acquire Information, Clarify, Tune To Decide, to Choose, to Delay To Interview, Delve, Interact, Progress To Entertain or Socialize To Reduce Fear To Help, Aid, Cure, Be a Friend To Win A Bet

READING EXERCISE

Why do people read?

What is the workflow context for reading in special libraries?

Why do people read?1. To learn2. To engage in hearing other’s opinions (to agree or disagree or

understand)3. To develop more knowledge about myself and develop as a whole

person4. To be entertained and laugh, to engage and interact5. To address boredom and the inexorable progress of time6. To research and keep up-to-date7. To participate well in civil society (everything from news to voting)8. To be informed (and maybe smarter)9. To understand others (individually and culturally)10. To escape our day-to-day lives11. To stimulate the imagination and be inspired or spiritual12. To write and communicate better through reading others13. To teach14. To have something to talk about15. To connect with like-minded people

Books

Fiction

Non-Fiction

Encyclopedia

Framing tools

Reference

Quick, source, credit, proof …

Directories

Workflow in targets, mailings, etc.

Dictionaries

Textbooks

Scholarly

Quality, proofs, positioning …

E-Learning MOOCs

How would you reinvent the book?

Mobility

Understanding the different form factors and target user environments

What are thegood and badthings aboute-books?

GOOG

Harper Collins OverDrive Kindle Library e-books Advertising Malicious Links Vanity Press vs. self publishing

Skirmishes but Big Ones App Store Rules Porn – e.g. Sports Illustrated No Criticism rule Politicians’ apps Satire Pulitzer Prize winner Books as an app require approval Potential restraint of trade Who chooses? Censorship . . .?

What does all this mean? The Article level universe The Chapter and Paragraph Universe Complete integration of books and serials Integrated with Visuals – graphics and charts Integrated with ‘video’ Integrated with Sound and Speech Integrated with social web Integrated with interaction and not just

interactivity, workflow… How would you enhance a book?

Device Issues

Borders Kobo, B&N Nook, Amazon Kindle, Apple iPad, Sony, etc. . . .

Mobility

InterdisciplinaryCross-disciplinaryIntegrated

Grocery Stores

Grocery Stores

Grocery Stores

Cookbooks, Chefs . . .

Meals

Technology Context• Cloud (SaaS, PaaS, IaaS)• Laptops and Tablets• Mobility / Smartphones• Bandwidth (Wired, WiFi, Whitespace)• Learning Management Systems• Streaming video and audio vs. download• HTML5 and Apps – the battle• Advertising auction models and ‘product’• New(ish) Players (Amazon, Apple, G, B&N,

Uni’s, states/provinces/nations)

Book e-Challenges• Format Agnosticism• Browsers: IE, Chrome, Firefox, Safari• Devices: Macintosh, PC Desktops & Laptops• Mobile: Laptops, Tablets (iPad, Fire, etc.)• Mobile: Smartphones (iPhone, Blackberry, Android,

Windows, etc.)• Container: PDF, ePub, .mobi, Kindle, etc.• Learning Management System: Blackboard / WebCT,

D2L, Moodle, Sakai, MOOC, etc. • Purchasing (Amazon, B&N, Chegg, CengageBrain,

Apple Store, University Textbook Store, direct, aggregator, etc.)

Pricing Models• Buy the print copy• Buy the exact electronic copy of the print • Buy both (bundling)• Rent the print or e-copy for a specified period• Create custom coursepacks in print or e-copy• Buy at the course level included in fee• Buy at the institution / enterprise level• Buy at the state/province level• Espresso Book Machines• Pay-per-use, micro-payments, ‘Square’ and

phones

Sample Evaluation Matrix

Chart courtesy of University of California Irvine Libraries

We are in an evolving space with e-books(just like articles in the last century).

• Don’t fossilize your positions too soon• Remain open to innovation and

experimentation• Keep librarian values as a touchstone• Focus on the end-user & enterprise needs

What is the priority?

Price, Cost, Value, ROIManaging or Mandating the Adoption CurveLearning and ProgressSocietal Impact = 17%, 40%, 70%?IMPACTS of Value to the Enterprise ROI, ROE, Productivity and efficiency and effectiveness

This era will see a Fundamental Reimagining the Book

For the present there will be those who resist and the resisters will be the majority.

eBooks

Access

DRM

Budgets

Accessibility

FormatsLibraries

PublishersArchiving

PatronDriven

Aggregators

Consortia

LicensingDownloads

Platforms

Devices

ILL

Via Polanka

Keeping Up Blogs

• No Shelf Required – www.noshelfrequired.com • LJ/SLJ ebook blog– www.thedigitalshift.com • ALA eContent blog-

http://americanlibrariesmagazine.org/e-content • ALA TechSource blog - www.alatechsource.org/blog • Teleread – www.teleread.org • INFOdocket– www.infodocket.com • eBooknewser - www.mediabistro.com/ebooknewser/ • The Digital Reader - www.the-digital-reader.com/ • Go-to-hellman - go-to-hellman.blogspot.com

Must Reads

84

Resources

• Sue Polanka’s presentation on eBooks for ALA:• Purchasing eBooks for Your Library• http://www.slideshare.net/ALATechSource/2013-ala-purchasi

ng?ref=http://lonewolflibrarian.wordpress.com/2013/02/14/purchasing-e-books-for-libraries-02-14-13/

• Sue Polanka’s ALA LTR book:• The No Shelf Required Guide to eBook Purchasing• Ellyssa Kroski’s presentation on eBooks:• Evaluating e-Book Offerings• http://

www.slideshare.net/ellyssa/evaluating-ebook-offerings?utm_source=slideshow&utm_medium=ssemail&utm_campaign=download_notification

• JISC Compare eBook Platforms• http://adat.crl.edu/ebooks • Wellesley College eBook Vendor Evaluation matrix• http://

spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?key=pCQ6JLSQYx1F4gVAKNBUedg

Suggestions for readings

• E-Book Media and Communications Toolkit▫ http://www.ala.org/transforminglibraries/ebooktoolkit

• Ebook Business Models: A Scorecard for Public Libraries▫ ALA Digital Content & Libraries Working Group▫ www.districtdispatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Ebook_Scorecar

d.pdf

• Library Services in the Digital Age▫ Pew Internet▫ http://libraries.pewinternet.org/2013/01/22/library-services/

• Library Patrons and Ebook Usage▫ Library Journal Patron Profiles, v1 n1 (fee-based report)

• A primer on eBooks for libraries just starting with downloadable media▫ Polanka, Sue, in Library Journal http://bit.ly/Iz9jwE

Via Polanka

Stephen Abram, MLS, FSLAVP strategic partnerships and markets

Cengage Learning (Gale)Cel: 416-669-4855

stephen.abram@cengage.comStephen.abram@gmail.com

Stephen’s Lighthouse Bloghttp://stephenslighthouse.com

Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn, Plaxo : Stephen Abram

FourSquare, Pinterest: Stephen AbramTwitter, Quora, Yelp, etc.: sabram

SlideShare: StephenAbram1

Thanks