Acting as a reputable source on ebooks

Last week I was interviewed for an article on e-books for the Springfield Republican.  Ultimately only a very small fraction of what we discussed made it into the article, but it was still fun and always exciting to make it into the paper (and in a story on the front page).

At the Westfield Athenaeum, the city’s public library, technology services librarian Tegan Mannino said the boom in technology has translated into “getting new patrons and serving long-term patrons in a new way.”

On the other hand, while circulation at her library has “skyrocketed” in the past year, “e-book lending is comparatively a small fraction of what we circulated,” Mannino said.

The full article can be found here.

All of the complications concerning library ebooks aside, and there are many, booms in technology are bringing new opportunities to libraries.  The internet has not killed libraries, but it did drastically change aspect of our services.  Ebooks are changing libraries, and the needs that we meet are changing as well.  Flexibility in meeting is necessary to sustain demand and viability of libraries, but ebooks aren't the end of the road for books, and books are not the only service libraries provide.