Librarian by Day

Bobbi L. Newman

Will Libraries be Able to Loan the Nook and eBooks from Barnes & Noble?

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Will Nook and Barnes & Noble play ball with libraries?  Librarians have been trying to figure out a way to lend Kindle titles and Kindles since they were first available. But its complicated and Amazon hasn’t given any indication they want to work with libraries. Yes there are libraries doing it but they do not have Amazon’s official blessing.

But the Nook and Barnes & Noble might be different. They might be willing to officially give libraries permission to loan Nooks & their ebooks.  Why?

  1. They have already built in 2 week loaning and borrowing
  2. Loaning can be made to a variety of devices – Mac, PC, iPhone, iPod Touch, PC, Mac, BlackBerry, or Windows Mobile (soon).
  3. You can load ebooks from your public library onto The Nook*
  4. Barnes & Noble has a history of work with libraries.

*All signs point to yes as Barnes & Noble has adopted Adobe® Content Server but none of the players have specifically addressed this issue.

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8 responses to “Will Libraries be Able to Loan the Nook and eBooks from Barnes & Noble?”

  1. Tweets that mention Librarian by Day » Will Libraries be Able to Loan the Nook and eBooks from Barnes & Noble? — Topsy.com

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  2. Tim Avatar
    Tim

    The lending is a once-per book thing. Libraries could never get on board with that. I see no signs at all they’re going to do true lending. For one thing, they’d need buy-in from publishers and, in most cases, authors would need to agree to sign away that right.

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    1. Bobbi Avatar
      Bobbi

      I think this is the wording “You can lend many of your eBooks one time for a maximum of 14 days.” http://www.barnesandnoble.com/nook/support/

      Even if that applies libraries could just loan the device. Thats what the libraries loaning kindles are doing.

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  3. Bobbi Avatar
    Bobbi

    Keep an eye on this question in the B&N support forums. Someone specifically asked about libraries.

    http://bookclubs.barnesandnoble.com/t5/eBooks-Help-Board/nook-and-Libraries/m-p/401481#U401481

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  4. Jeff scott Avatar
    Jeff scott

    I think it is just to lend to friends. It. Would have to have the drm to work with adobe digital editions. It isn’t lending in the librAry sense, it goes around libraries and is just peer to peer

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    1. Bobbi Avatar
      Bobbi

      The technology is already there for lending. Theoretically if you can lend it to a friend by knowing their email why couldn’t that friend be a library patron?

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  5. Jeff Scott Avatar
    Jeff Scott

    That’s true, a library could buy one, pay for the books and lend to other people’s devices that way. That’s kind of what some libraries do with netflix. They have the subscription and lend out the dvds.

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  6. Bobbi Avatar
    Bobbi

    I’m a bit late in adding this information – Barnes and Noble confirmed – “eBooks may only be loaned one time, for a maximum of 14 days. If you lend a book but the person doesn’t “accept” it, you may lend it again. But the limit is one successful lend per eBook at this time.” http://bookclubs.barnesandnoble.com/t5/eBooks-Help-Board/nook-and-Libraries/m-p/401481#U401481

    As many others have asked/stated – why just 1 time? It doesn’t make sense from the customer end, what if it doesn’t get finished in those 14 days. I can loan my print books as many times as I want, why not ebooks?
    Let’s hope this policy/practice changes!

    Customers are frustrated by publishers & sellers efforts to maintain strict (unreasonable?) control over their items. I’m hoping that similar to the music industry they can be forced to see the light.

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