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Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Why Public Libraries Matter: And How They Can Do More

By focusing too heavily on giving patrons access to bestsellers and popular movies, libraries risk missing the significant opportunity afforded by the explosion in the number of new books published each year.
 
The growth of electronic reading holds significant opportunities and threats for both public libraries and publishers. This is no small affair: new research from the Pew Research Center shows that a third of Americans now own eBook readers or tablet devices, and Amazon sells more eBooks than print books.
 
This article is the second in a two-part series on libraries and their role in the marketing and readership of books. The first part focused on the current dispute between libraries and publishers. This article details the opportunities and obstacles for libraries in a changed world of publishing and reading.