MoCo Council E-Book Resolution Is About Libraries -- Not Authors

The Montgomery County Council July 23 approved a resolution putting the County on record as saying that patrons of County libraries "should have equitable access to e-books at fair prices."   The vote was 8-0-1.

One Councilmember abstained from the vote. Nancy Floreen, whose husband, David O. Stewart, is an author, said the issue of e-book pricing was "complicated," and said from the bench she didn't think the Council should get into the issue because it didn't have jurisdiction. Rather than raise a fuss, she said she would abstain and let the resolution go through. She, and Stewart, are concerned about how authors make money in the digital age.

That's a reasonable attitude for authors to take, but it is irrelevant to the discussion and the resolution. The Council first and foremost is speaking about an issue that impacts the County library budgets and the services it provides to the two-thirds of County residents who use the libraries.

If the County has to pay $50 or $80 to lease one e-book, it will lease fewer copies from the companies which supply the e-books. This fact has a couple of implications. First, it hurts the libraries because patrons will have to wait much longer for materials they request. Obviously there are limits, but some can be prevented.

Second, the high prices hurt authors. Instead of spending $80 on one e-book, the library could spend the same money on four if the book were reasonably priced. That means four times the number of people will have access to the author's work, leading to greater chances that he or she might find a reader willing to buy a book, to say nothing of the greater satisfaction of library patrons.

It's in the nature of e-books to present more challenges to authors and publishers than do printed books. Then again, as with digital music, publishers have been able to abolish through computer code that part of the law that allows for resale of any normal good. It's called the First Sale doctrine. If you buy a physical book, you can do what you want -- give it away, donate it, sell it to someone else. You can't do that with e-books. Every e-book is a new e-book. Authors should factor that into their equations also.