E-Books – Page 9 – DigitalKoans

"E-Book Monopolies and the Law"

Angela Daly has self-archived "E-Book Monopolies and the Law" in SSRN

Here's an excerpt:

This article will examine the legality of the digital rights management ("DRM") measures used by the major e-book publishers and device manufacturers in the United States, European Union and Australia not only to enforce their intellectual property rights but also to create monopolistic content silos, restrict interoperability and affect the ability for users to use the content they have bought in the way they wish. The analysis will then proceed to the recent competition investigations in the US and EU over price-fixing in e-book markets, and the current litigation against Amazon in the US for an alleged abuse of its dominant position. A final point will be made on possible responses in Australia to these issues taking into account the jurisprudence on DRM in other scenarios.

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E-Reading Rises as Device Ownership Jumps

The Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project has released E-Reading Rises as Device Ownership Jumps.

Here's an excerpt:

The percentage of adults who read an e-book in the past year has risen to 28%, up from 23% at the end of 2012. At the same time, about seven in ten Americans reported reading a book in print, up four percentage points after a slight dip in 2012, and 14% of adults listened to an audiobook.

Though e-books are rising in popularity, print remains the foundation of Americans' reading habits. Most people who read e-books also read print books, and just 4% of readers are "e-book only." Audiobook listeners have the most diverse reading habits overall, while fewer print readers consume books in other formats.

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Stop the Presses: Is the Monograph Headed toward an E-only Future?

Ithaka S+R has released Stop the Presses: Is the Monograph Headed toward an E-only Future?.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

Can we expect the print monograph to disappear anytime soon?

While the road to a fully digital future for scholarly monographs is not clearly in sight, the widespread availability of e-books is already transforming researchers' reading habits. As librarians and publishers consider their options, they must take into account how the usage behavior of academics is evolving. In this Issue Brief, Roger Schonfeld explores the challenges and possibilities if we "Stop the Presses."

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"Books, E and P"

Walt Crawford has published "Books, E and P" in the latest issue of Cites & Insights: Crawford at Large.

Here's an excerpt:

You might think of this discussion as Part 3 of WORDS: THE EBOOK MARKETPLACE. It is another set of notes and comments on material ranging back as far as May 2010 and related to ebooks, but it's really about books and the media in which they appear.

Note another key distinction from previous discussions in this area: E and P, not E versus P. Sure, some of these items make the digital-triumphalist assumption that print books will die out within the next generation (or next five years!) or become irrelevant collectibles, and there may be a few suggesting that ebooks will disappear or become a niche segment (although that seems unlikely). But my sense—not yet tested, since I'm writing this preface before beginning the essay—is that much of the discussion is now more nuanced and plausible, starting with the real-world fact that old media rarely die and the likelihood that there's room in this world for both print books and ebooks, in very large quantities in both cases, for the foreseeable future.

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"Cost Differentials between E-Books and Print in Academic Libraries"

College & Research Libraries has released an e-print of "Cost Differentials between E-Books and Print in Academic Libraries."

Here's an excerpt:

A survey conducted at Auburn University at Montgomery (AUM) has confirmed for academic libraries the work of Gray and Copeland on e-books being more expensive than print for public libraries. For AUM, the mean cost for e-books are significantly higher than for the print counterpart of those titles. The cost differentials between the two formats show e-books as being consistently higher than print in initial price. This consistency holds true across all LC classifications, regardless of whether or not the title is published by a university press or a commercial press.

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OAPEN-NL: A Project Exploring Open Access Monograph Publishing in the Netherlands

SURF has released OAPEN-NL: A Project Exploring Open Access Monograph Publishing in the Netherlands.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

Between June 2011 and November 2012, fifty Open Access monographs in various subject areas were published in Open Access by nine participating publishers. For every Open Access title, the publishers provided a similar title that was published in the conventional way. Data were collected about usage, sales and costs, to study the effect of Open Access on monographs. OAPEN-NL consisted of a quantitative and a qualitative research component, measuring the effects of Open Access publishing and the perceptions and expectations of publishers and authors.

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"A Perspective on the Merits of the Antitrust Objections to the Failed Google Books Settlement"

Pamela Samuelson has published "A Perspective on the Merits of the Antitrust Objections to the Failed Google Books Settlement" in the Harvard Journal of Law & Technology Occasional Paper Series.

Here's an excerpt:

This Article responds to critics of the antitrust objections to the ASA [Amended Settlement Agreement] by making three main points. Part II explains that Judge Chin's incomplete and unpersuasive analysis of the antitrust objections to the proposed settlement agreement is best understood as an effort to encourage the settling parties to adopt more competitive terms in any revised settlement agreement. Part III points out that the DOJ did not reach definitive conclusions on antitrust issues posed by the ASA. The DOJ was, however, obliged to submit an interim analysis because Judge Chin wanted the government's input before he ruled on whether the settlement should be approved and the DOJ did a creditable job under the circumstances. Part IV contends that there was more merit to the DOJ's antitrust concerns about the proposed settlement than some commentators have recognized.

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Perception Analysis of Scholarly E-Books in the Humanities at the Collegiate Level

ACLS Humanities E-Book has released Perception Analysis of Scholarly E-Books in the Humanities at the Collegiate Level.

Here's an excerpt:

At present, there is significant market confusion regarding e-book selections in the academic marketplace, particularly in the humanities. University acquisition librarians, unsure of what the offerings actually are, have found themselves unsure of where to allocate funds, which has resulted in the postponement of e-book purchases. This paper provides a current assessment of the status of e-book offerings in the humanities.

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"A Pilot Using OverDrive: E-lending in Academic Law Libraries"

Nina E. Scholtz has published "A Pilot Using OverDrive: E-lending in Academic Law Libraries" in the latest issue of AALL Spectrum.

Here's an excerpt:

With these increasing signs of a strong future for e-books, and possibly for e-lending as well, in spring 2012 Cornell University Law Library decided to pilot OverDrive for the Cornell Law School community. . . .

Exploring the future of e-book lending was a natural fit for us. And by embarking on a pilot of the OverDrive service, we could test the waters of e-lending in a cost-efficient way that would not be prohibitive in terms of staff time and library resources. The service would allow us to see specifically how our users would respond to an e-lending program. The library had already successfully introduced a popular small-print reading collection. Trying out an online component to this simple but well-liked outreach program seemed like a logical progression. With these thoughts in mind, in June 2012 we signed a contract with OverDrive for a one-year pilot period.

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Open Monograph Press, Release 1.0

The Public Knowledge Project has released the Open Monograph Press, Release 1.0.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

OMP is designed to assist university presses, learned societies, and scholar-publishers interested in publishing scholarly books in print-on-demand and multiple electronic formats, whether on an open access or purchase basis. OMP is intended to:

Handle edited volumes, with different authors for each chapter;

Involve editors, authors, reviewers, designers, indexers, and others in book production;

See submission through multiple rounds of both internal and external reviews;

Utilize industry standard ONIX for bookseller metadata requirements (e.g., Amazon);

Create document libraries for submissions, recording contracts, permissions, etc.;

Handle thumbnail covers in Catalog, as well as Spotlight features; and

Enable Series Editors to see books through review to publication.

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"Beyond TEI: Returning the Text to the Reader"

Christian Wittern has published "Beyond TEI: Returning the Text to the Reader" in the latest issue of the Journal of the Text Encoding Initiative.

Here's an excerpt:

Much research and effort has been invested in creating a versatile format for digital texts and the TEI is now widely used in many communities. Much less consolidated thought has been spend to publish and distribute digital texts in ways that are most useful to scholars. To remedy this situation, this paper proposes new, additional publication forms for digital texts through distributed version control systems. This will allow publication and maintainence of several different versions of a text. In some respects, this will be similar to publishing a college or paperback edition of the text established in a critical edition. In addition to this, the user of a text published through such a system can subscribe to later changes or corrections of an edition. The architectural model proposed in this paper tries to contribute to a fundamental protocol that could form the base for applications serving the long-term needs of research and scholarship.

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eBook Use and Acceptance in an Undergraduate Institution

Springer has released eBook Use and Acceptance in an Undergraduate Institution.

Here's an excerpt :

The survey finds high use of eBooks at Wellesley College, with 70% of the respondents indicating they have used eBooks. Other recent international surveys of eBook use have shown 52-64% of students or faculty responding that they have used eBooks (Figure 10). Within the general U.S. population 21% of adults reported having used eBooks in 2011. Some eBook use by Wellesley students and faculty may be non-academic, leisure reading, but half of Wellesley's eBook users report having used eBooks from the Wellesley College Library's collection.

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The Thinkpiece "Libraries, eLending, and the Future of Public Access to Digital Content"

IFLA has released The Thinkpiece "Libraries, eLending, and the Future of Public Access to Digital Content".

Here's an excerpt:

In October 2012 IFLA therefore commissioned an independent consultant, Civic Agenda, to prepare a 'thinkpiece' to inform discussion at a meeting of experts from the library and publishing sector. This meeting took place over three days at IFLA Headquarters in The Hague in November 2012. The thinkpiece was the starting point for discussions on desirable characteristics for public access models for library digital content, library user expectations' regarding eBooks, and the relationship between libraries and publishers in the eBook age. During the meeting participants focused on the role of copyright, licensing and legislation in access to digital content like eBooks, as well as reviewing advocacy campaigns and the potential for IFLA as an advocate for library access to eBooks.

| Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography 2010 ( paperback and PDF file; over 3,800 entries) | Digital Scholarship |

"The Authors Guild v. Hathitrust: A Way Forward for Digital Access to Neglected Works in Libraries"

James Aaron has self-archived "The Authors Guild v. Hathitrust: A Way Forward for Digital Access to Neglected Works in Libraries" in SSRN.

Here's an excerpt:

This Comment begins by describing the HathiTrust Orphan Works Project and what it renames the neglected works problem. Next, it examines the legality of the project under current copyright law, focusing mainly on fair use under section 107, and concludes that it is unclear whether the project violates copyright law. Finally it analyzes whether this result fits the policy goals of copyright, and because it does not, proposes both legislative and judicial changes to copyright law to make it clear that in the proper circumstances, nonprofit, educational uses of neglected works do not violate copyright law.

| Google Books Bibliography (XHTML website; over 320 entries) | Digital Scholarship |

EBook Business Models: A Scorecard for Public Libraries

ALA's Digital Content and Libraries Working Group has released EBook Business Models: A Scorecard for Public Libraries.

Here's an excerpt:

The Digital Content & Libraries Working Group (DCWG) began documenting and describing attributes of various licensing arrangements libraries may have with publishers in the August 2012 report Ebook Business Models for Public Libraries. Now we are pleased to share The Ebook Business Model Scorecard, which more fully examines the variables often seen in ebook license agreements or contracts. At the same time, the variables, when considered as a whole, can help libraries conceptualize licenses holistically instead of fixating on one aspect of a contract in isolation.

| Google Books Bibliography (XHTML website; over 320 entries) | Digital Scholarship |

"Who’s Tracking Your Reading Habits? An E-Book Buyer’s Guide to Privacy, 2012 Edition"

The EFF has released "Who's Tracking Your Reading Habits? An E-Book Buyer's Guide to Privacy, 2012 Edition."

Here's an excerpt:

As we've done since 2009, again we've taken some of the most popular e-book platforms and combed through their privacy policies for answers to common privacy questions that users deserve to know. In many cases, these answers were frustratingly vague and long-winded. In nearly all cases, reading e-books means giving up more privacy than browsing through a physical bookstore or library, or reading a paper book in your own home. Here, we've examined the policies of Google Books, Amazon Kindle, Barnes & Noble Nook, Kobo, Sony, Overdrive, Indiebound, Internet Archive, and Adobe Content Server for answers to the following questions:

Can they keep track of searches for books?

Can they monitor what you're reading and how you're reading it after purchase and link that information back to you? Can they do that when the e-book is obtained elsewhere?

What compatibility does the device have with books not purchased from an associated eBook store?

Do they keep a record of book purchases? Can they track book purchases or acquisitions made from other sources?

With whom can they share the information collected in non-aggregated form?

Do they have mechanisms for customers to access, correct, or delete the information?

Can they share information outside the company without the customer's consent?

| Digital Scholarship's Digital/Print Books | Digital Scholarship |

Authors Guild et al. v. Google: "Brief of Amici Curiae Academic Authors in Support of Defendant-Appellant and Reversal"

Pamela Samuelson and David R. Hansen have self-archived "Brief of Amici Curiae Academic Authors in Support of Defendant-Appellant and Reversal" in SSRN.

Here's an excerpt:

Summary of argument: Class certification was improperly granted below because the District Court failed to conduct a rigorous analysis of the adequacy of representation factor, as Rule 23(a)(4) requires. The three individual plaintiffs who claim to be class representatives are not academics and do not share the commitment to broad access to knowledge that predominates among academics. . . .

Academic authors desire broad public access to their works such as that which the Google Books project provides. Although the District Court held that the plaintiffs had inadequately represented the interests of academic authors in relation to the proposed settlement, it failed to recognize that pursuit of this litigation would be even more adverse to the interests of academic authors than the proposed settlement was. . . .

In short, a "win" in this case for the class representatives would be a "loss" for academic authors. It is precisely this kind of conflict that courts have long recognized should prevent class certification due to inadequate representation. The District Court failed to adequately address this fundamental conflict in its certification order, though it was well aware of the conflict through submissions and objections received from the settlement fairness hearing through to the hearings on the most recent class certification motions. Because of that failure, the order certifying the class should be reversed

| Google Books Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

DOAB User Needs Analysis—Final Report

The Directory of Open Access Books has released the DOAB User Needs Analysis—Final Report.

Here's an excerpt:

This final evaluation and recommendation report is based on the user experiences, needs, and expectations as they emerged from the qualitative components (survey, workshop and online discussion platform) that were used to conduct the DOAB User Needs Analysis. This final public report, intended for the wider academic and publishing community, aims to advise in the establishment of procedures, criteria and standards concerning the set-up and functioning of the DOAB platform and service and to devise guidelines and recommendations for admissions to DOAB and for its further development, sustainability and implementation.

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Books at JSTOR Launches

JSTOR has launched Books at JSTOR.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

JSTOR is pleased to announce the launch of its new books program, Books at JSTOR, which brings scholarly monographs from leading university presses and other academic publishers to the JSTOR platform. Books are deeply integrated with the 1,600 current and archival journals on JSTOR. All content is cross-searchable, and books are linked with millions of book reviews and from hundreds of thousands of book citations within the journal literature.

| Digital Scholarship's Digital/Print Books | Digital Scholarship |

Digital Copyright: Google Asks Court to Reverse Class Certification Decision in The Authors Guild et al. v. Google Inc.

In a brief, Google has asked the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse the class certification decision by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York in The Authors Guild et al. v. Google Inc. case.

Here's the brief.

| Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography 2010 | Digital Scholarship |

Copyright: Authors Guild Appeals HathiTrust Ruling

The Authors Guild is appealing the Authors Guild, Inc. et al. v. HathiTrust et al. ruling.

Here's an excerpt from the "LCA Issues Statement on Authors Guild's Appeal of HathiTrust Decision":

We are deeply disappointed by the Authors Guild's decision to appeal Judge Baer's landmark opinion acknowledging the legality, and the extraordinary social value, of the HathiTrust Digital Library. Libraries have a moral and a legal obligation to provide the broadest possible access to knowledge for all of our users, and the HathiTrust and its partners have assembled an invaluable digital resource that will ensure for the first time that library print collections can be made available on equitable terms to our print-disabled users. The database also facilitates preservation and cutting-edge scholarship, all with no harm to authors or publishers. As we predicted, Judge Baer did not look kindly on the Guild's shortsighted and ill-conceived lawsuit, saying, "I cannot imagine a definition of fair use that . . . would require that I terminate this invaluable contribution to the progress of science and cultivation of the arts that at the same time effectuates the ideals espoused by the ADA." If there is an upside to this misguided appeal, it is that the Second Circuit will now have the opportunity to affirm that powerful insight.

| Digital Scholarship's Digital/Print Books | Digital Scholarship |

E-books: Developments and Policy Considerations

The OECD has released E-books: Developments and Policy Considerations.

Here's an excerpt:

The essential distinction between permanent and effective ownership of a physical book, and conditional rights of access to the e-book, has, so far, been somewhat obscured by marketing strategies and use of visual images, which tend to present e-books as a superior, but also substitutable, version of the print book product. Given the virtual reality of "traditional books" presented by e-Book platforms, buyers of e-books are likely to confuse their rights (i.e. after purchase) with the property rights model for print books. Users may be surprised to find that they are prevented from doing certain things7 with their e-book, within their private/ personal sphere.

| Reviews of Digital Scholarship Publications | Digital Scholarship |

What Open Access Book Has Had over 11 Million File Requests?

What open access book has had over 11 million file requests? Answer: the Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography. As of the end of 2011, it had over 11.9 million file requests.

The Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography presents selected English-language articles, books, and other printed and electronic sources that are useful in understanding scholarly electronic publishing efforts on the Internet. The bibliography covers a wide range of topics, such as digital copyright, digital libraries, digital preservation, digital repositories, e-books, e-journals, license agreements, metadata, and open access.

Since initial publication, the digital versions of the Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography have been freely available. On July 13, 2004, the Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography was put under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License.

The Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography was published by the University of Houston Libraries from 10/25/1996 to 10/17/2006 (versions 1 to 64).

Digital Scholarship began publishing the Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography with version 65 of the bibliography (11/02/2006).

Over the years, the bibliography has been made available in a variety of formats: HTML, Microsoft Word, paperback, PDF, and XHTML. Currently, 80 HTML/XHTML versions and three paperback/PDF versions have been published (Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography: 2008 Annual Edition, Digital Scholarship 2009, and Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography 2010).

The Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography is archived at Digital Scholarship and the Internet Archive. The University of Houston Libraries have an incomplete archive that contains versions 60, 61, and 62.

| Digital Scholarship Overview | Digital Scholarship |

OAPEN-UK HSS Researcher Survey Results

The OAPEN-UK project has released the OAPEN-UK HSS Researcher Survey Results.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

Here are some of the highlights:

Only 50% of researchers are aware of OA and only 30% familiar with it.

Around 50% of researchers think it is ok to make a profit from OA publishing as long as that profit goes back into supporting the discipline or making more OA content available — 20% think you can make a profit and use it however you like and 20% think that you can make a profit but only to cover costs.

Almost 80% would prefer the most restrictive Creative Comms licence, but what is interesting is that the responses show that researchers are more concerned about protecting their work than it being used commercially.

60% had read a monograph in the last couple of days â 39% had bought it and 33% had got it via the library

Early career academics are more willing to consider self-publishing than later career researchers.

| Transforming Scholarly Publishing through Open Access: A Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |

"Libraries, Scholars, and Publishers in Digital Journal and Monograph Publishing"

Rowland Lorimer has published "Libraries, Scholars, and Publishers in Digital Journal and Monograph Publishing" in the latest issue of Scholarly and Research Communication.

Here's an excerpt:

In the 1970s, research libraries developed data systems and expertise that, in the 1990s, led to new services such as institutional repositories and journal hosting and, in the 2000s, led to forays into monograph publishing. In contrast, also beginning in the 1970s, university presses found themselves being cast out of their traditional role as providers of research publishing services that created the public record of knowledge and into the marketplace. Continued development of information and communication technology (ICT) in library operations and in research activity stimulated entrepreneurship and scholar/library partnerships with scholar-controlled digital journal publishing. Again in contrast, the market orientation of university presses, combined with a lack of appreciation in the library community for the value added by professional publishers, hampered the extension of collaboration into three-way partnerships among scholars, libraries, and publishing professionals. Recognition of the roles of all parties holds the greatest promise for the evolution of digital scholarly publishing.

| Transforming Scholarly Publishing through Open Access: A Bibliography | Digital Scholarship |