Friday 10th August

Article – Continuing the Conversation: Choosing an e-Book Platform that Works for Your K12 Library.

Author – Submitted by Daniel A. Freeman on August 8, 2012 - 9:21am ( The article was placed on a blog but the actual author of the presentation was Buffy Hamilton.

Located -  http://www.alatechsource.org/blog

Viewed on Friday 10^th August

Basically this presentation went about showing how to pick an ePlatform. What questions to ask when looking to purchase a system. What features do they come with, what support do they supply, can it be incorporated into your current system or do you have to run two separate systems to accommodate e-Books. Then the presentation went onto discuss five known systems. What they each had to offer, what their drawbacks were and what they posed to do in the future.

This presentation was really interesting because it was something I hadn't even thought of. I am still very much the physical book person. I like holding an actual book. As with people and libraries, you go into a bookshop, find a book and purchase it. You have this item physically in your hand. You can cover it, label it, put it on a shelf and lend it to people. But with e-Books, it’s an electronic copy, so of course it would be handled differently. The presentation put forth so many questions that you would have to ask yourself. For example, most systems are subscribing ones. You pay a subscription each year, what happens to “purchased” e-Books if the subscription is not renewed. I don’t know how e-Books work. I don’t know anything about the systems that you need to read and access this information. It makes it all seem very daunting and waters that seem a little scary to be jumping into.