Bibliotheca Calls Out Amazon for Meddling in the Library E-Book Market - Publishers Weekly

Today Panzer made a trip to the Publishers Weekly site. There with a little digging in the posts our adventuresome kitty pilot found a post about Amazon's perceived influence on libraries.

Mom and I like libraries.

According to the Publishers Weekly post by Andrew Albanese, Bibliotheca SVP of Digital Products Tom Mercer is blaming Amazon for publisher Macmillan's recent embargo on libraries and other publishers' changes to library terms. Panzer told you about the embargo earlier this month. Tom Mercer says Amazon has access to the company's customers' library usage information and is giving that information to publishers and authors.  He believes Amazon collected the library usage information through vendors such as OverDrive. OverDrive offers online library patrons the ability to read their checked-out ebooks using the OverDrive Libby app or patrons can choose the Kindle app. He wants libraries to pressure OverDrive to stop allowing patrons to use the Kindle app. There are links in the post to a copy of Tom Mercer's letter to librarians and to other information about Amazon.

Panzer says, "This little kitty knows Mom uses the Libby app for library ebooks."

Note: This is a h-u-m-u-n-g-o-u-s post. Bring a gallon of lemonade and a dozen muffins for today's reading selection. If you plan to follow the links in the post, bring another gallon of lemonade and a dozen muffins.

To read the post tootle over to Amazon

To read Panzer's earlier post about Macmillan's embargo tootle over to Macmillan

Draft2Digital Partners with bibliotheca - Indies Unlimited

Panzer was tootling around in the Catosphere when he decided to stop in at the Indies Unlimited site. With a little digging around in the posts there, he found one about Draft2Digital and bibliotheca.

Exactly why are you changing the royalties?

According to the post by Melinda Clayton, Draft2Digital (D2D) and bibliotheca have partnered. D2D already works with Overdrive to distribute their authors' ebooks to libraries. The partnership will allow D2D to offer a better checkout experience for readers. There's also a change to the royalties for library purchases authors will want to read. The post has information about opting into or out of the new programs. There are two links included in the post. One is for information about bibliotheca and the second is for information about D2D's new library pricing page.

Panzer says, "Why do humans have to make things so complicated?"

Note: This is a long post. Bring a cup of tea and one and half muffins for today's reading selection. If you plan to follow the links, bring two extra muffins.

To read the post tootle over to Draft2Digital

Smashwords to Supply Nearly 300,000 Titles to Bibliotheca cloudLibrary - Smashwords

Panzer was shaken from his afternoon nap by cheering and clapping. Jumping into the Panzermobile our sleepy kitty followed all the noise to the Smashwords site. There he found an announcement about Bibliotheca.

Libraries are good for readers.

According to the post by Mark Coker, Smashwords announced an agreement with Bibliotheca to distribute ebooks to the 3,000 libraries in the U.S., Canada, U.K., and Australia that use Bibliotheca's cloudLibrary service. Mr. Coker points out that because of the large volume of Smashwords ebooks to be uploaded to the cloudLibrary system, it will be several weeks before all ebooks will be available. To use the service a patron to log into the library through the service and "checks out" their ebook. The ebook then resides on the patron's computer, tablet or device for a specified amount of time and is then "checked back into the library."

Panzer says, "There are several links in the post, including one to download the app."

Note: This is a shortish-long post. Bring a cup of tea and a muffin to read the original post and, if you plan to follow the links, bring an extra cup of tea for today's reading selection.

To read the post, tootle over to  Smashwords: