EBooks: Has a Content Divide Replace the Digital Divide? (Patrick Losinski)

The Swiss National Library, CERN and AILIS invite you to the 5th Library Science Talk 2013. Patrick Losinski (Columbus Metropolitan Library, US) will talk about "EBooks: Has a Content Divide Replace the Digital Divide?" The talk will take place on Monday 14th of October at 15.30 in Geneva at CERN. External guests should be at the CERN reception, Building 33, at 15:15 to be guided to the conference room. Please register beforehand by contacting tullio.basaglia(at)cern.ch or by phone at 022-767.79.11. The talk will take place in room 60-6-015 (Room Georges Charpak). Abstract: Public librarians around the world have been feverishly working with publishers in an attempt to gain broad access to eBooks. It’s a daunting task for librarians to capture publishers’ attention while publishers simultaneously strive to understand the implications of moving to new digital platforms to serve public library customers. And at the same time, publishers are strategizing over how to compete in a publishing landscape that reinvents itself each month. · What happens if publishers are ultimately successful in restricting public library access to eBooks? · Will publishers intentionally or unintentionally create a “content divide” now that the “digital divide” has narrowed? · Are there remedies for combatting the content divide that we have not fully explored? · Is it possible for public librarians to understand the plight of publishers who are facing multiple onslaughts to their business model from Amazon, self-publishing, price changes, device proliferation, etc.? · If public libraries are successful in gaining access to all eBook content, will our problems be solved or will another set of challenges unfold? · What will drive public library design and library staffing models of the future? · What service will public libraries provide on a scale that replaces our past and current services? About the speaker: Since 2002, Pat Losinski has served as Chief Executive Officer of the Columbus Metropolitan Library (CML), a twenty-one branch library district serving 820,000 residents in central Ohio. CML is one of the most used public library systems in the United States. CML received the Institute for Museum and Library Services National Medal in 2011, was named Library Journal’s National Library of the Year in 2010, has been a Library Journal five-star library each of the last five years, and has been named the number one urban library in the United States three times. Prior to joining CML, Pat was executive director of Pikes Peak Library District in Colorado Springs and was a library director at two other public library systems in Illinois and Ohio. The talk will be given in English.