Maybe a RealVideo will tell a different story. But if you go by the written Congressional testimony from the Library of Congress, e-books would still appear to be a low priority, except for a digital talking book program that’s taking forever to get going. I’ll reproduce every book-related sentence that 77-year-old Librarian of Congress James Billington and other top LOC officials included in their Web-posted text:
–“The overwhelming challenge facing the Library in its third century is how to superimpose the exploding world of digital knowledge and information onto the still expanding world of books and other traditional analog materials. How can we preserve and seamlessly integrate these two worlds so that we can continue to provide Congress and the American people the objective and dependable information and knowledge that is needed more than ever in this information age?” So e-books are just lumped in with “exploding world,” etc.?
–“…the Library also preserves and makes accessible 132 million traditional analog items (books, manuscripts, maps, music and movies) and we constantly seek to bring the best of traditional librarianship into the digital world. ”
–“Planning and designing the upcoming release of a new program of Digital Talking Books for the blind and physically handicapped…”
–“Creating of LCNet, a Congress-only website to provide online information about events at the Library and basic services (book loans, tours, space reservations).”
Bizarre. While modern libraries are about much more than books, methinks LOC is still behind the times when it comes to the “e” variety. One hopes that Billington is more open-minded today than as reported five years ago by Tech Law.
In fairness to Billington: When e-book formats come and go, isn’t it a little harder for him to take the medium seriously? Not to mention the pathetic size of the industry–in no small part due to the Tower of eBabel and Draconian DRM.
Related: TeleRead proposal for a well-stocked national digital library system. and New ‘World Digital Library’: Laudable but of limited scope.
