At the ALA Executive Board spring meeting, held April 21–22, board members voted to intensify and expand e-book advocacy efforts. According to a post at the American Libraries web site, ALA president Molly Raphael reported that although recent discussions with publishers initiated by ALA over the past several months represented “a good beginning,” the board concluded that it was time to complement those discussions with “an increased focus on other stakeholders in the e-book ecosystem,” including “reaching out to the media and bringing public attention to the need for libraries to be able to provide access to e-books.”
At the meeting, Raphael said board members “reaffirmed ALA’s stance that ‘libraries of all types must be able to provide effective access to electronic media for their users at a reasonable price and consistent with ALA core principles.” The board decision follows similar comments Raphael made to PW following the recently concluded PLA meeting, and efforts will also include talks with e-book vendors and individual authors who might “help in develop and advocate,” for solutions. “We also want to more fully engage and support our members and library patrons in this effort, and we are developing plans now for doing so.”
Currently five of the big six publishers restrict e-book lending, with three of those publishers, Penguin, Simon & Schuster, and Macmillan, not allowing e-book lending at all. Random House is the only publisher that allows for e-book lending of its full list, but it recently announced price increases.
