Public Libraries and E-Books

From 2011 to 2012, the percentage of Americans who owned an e-book reader leapt from 18 to 33 percent, a rapid climb from 6 percent in 2010.  Attempting to accommodate this shift, more than three-quarters of U.S. libraries allow their customers to check out digital books, but they’ve encountered fierce resistance in access and pricing from the major publishers.  Some won’t even sell e-books to libraries.  If libraries are able to obtain mainstream e-books at all, those sales almost always come with onerous conditions and high prices, especially compared to the traditional discounted rates libraries pay for hardcover copies.  The situation has left libraries looking desperately for a way to make e-borrowing sustainable for customers in the future.  But they have little negotiating power other than an altruistic appeal to the established relationship between library and publisher, both working toward the goal of a more literate nation.  The bottom line is that libraries need to have e-books for their readers to check out, because that’s how people are going to read in the future.  If they don’t have the goods, then what will a library be useful for a decade from now?  Enter Jamie LaRue, who oversees seven libraries in what is now a suburban county of 285,000 people, but is building a nationwide movement based on his principles.  He talks about bypassing the “Big Six” New York publishers, or at least leaving them behind and setting his sights on the next publishing wave: smaller, digitally based presses and self-publishing authors.  He wants to transform the library from a place where you go to find a New York Times bestseller to a local incubator fostering homegrown writing talent.  If the big publishers want to cut libraries out, that’s fine, he says.  He’s going straight to the people.  LaRue’s ideas have inspired an upheaval in the library and publishing worlds.  Libraries from California to Massachusetts are fitting his design to their own systems.  Mere mention of his name attracts audible sighs and knowing nods from top executives at some of the biggest publishers in the world.  Whether he and his philosophy succeed or not could determine the public library’s future.  That’s how many librarians view the stakes, anyway.  If he’s wrong, the library could fade into obscurity, a relic of the pre-digital age.  But if he’s right, and a growing number of acolytes believe he is, it could still thrive in an era when hardback books have gone the way of illuminated manuscripts.  Not every major publisher is selling its products to any library that wants them.  Several, including Simon & Schuster, Macmillan and Penguin, either don’t sell e-books to libraries at all or have only begun to do so through pilot projects that work with select libraries, usually concentrated in New York.  This leaves out the nearly 9,000 other libraries spread throughout the rest of the country.  Even if publishers do sell to libraries, they’ve restructured the rules.  HarperCollins, for example, sets a limit of 26 loans on each e-copy; after that limit is reached, the library has to purchase a new copy license.  Random House hasn’t established such restrictive conditions and makes its full e-catalog of 46,000 titles available to libraries, but the price for each copy is often four or five times ($85 is the upper limit) what the company charges for physical copies.  While their business model is being upended, libraries, along with the rest of the public sector, are enduring the aftershocks of the Great Recession.  Library spending in the U.S. dropped 8 percent in 2013, largely a result of government funding cuts, continuing a decline that started with the economic downturn.   Dylan Scott  http://www.governing.com/topics/education/gov-can-libraries-survive-ebook-revolution.html  Thanks, Julie 

Book review by Lewis L. Gould about two patriotic songs that influence us

GOD BLESS AMERICA  The Surprising History of an Iconic Song by Sheryl Kaskowitz

Oxford Univ. 210 pp. $29.95
THE BATTLE HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC  A Biography of the Song That Marches On
by John Stauffer and Benjamin Soskis  Oxford Univ. 380 pp. $29.95
Interpreting the meaning of songs in our lives has generated probing and insightful studies, such as these books on two classic American melodies.  These examinations of “God Bless America” and the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” not only reflect the growing interest in how songs have affected U.S. politics and culture, they are also lively narratives in their own right.  Irving Berlin’s “God Bless America” has the shorter chronological arc.  Written for a patriotic show in 1918 and then put aside, the tune reemerged from Berlin’s trunk in 1938 and began a journey that has never ended.  Sheryl Kaskowitz, an independent scholar, has constructed an engaging portrait of how the song infiltrated patriotism, business and sports.  Berlin did not write the song for Kate Smith, but he and the tune benefited from the publicity she gave it on her radio show.  In fact, Berlin and Smith’s manager, Ted Collins, vied to get credit for allocating the royalties from “God Bless America” to the Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts of America.  The song also figured in the debate over American involvement in World War II.  At first, Berlin’s lyrics spoke to disillusionment over the nation’s participation in World War I.  As the threat of Nazi Germany mounted in 1939 and ’40, “God Bless America” took on new meaning, especially for its Jewish composer — who faced anti-Semitic criticism, including from the future chaplain of the Senate, Peter Marshall of Washington.  As the threat of war intensified, Berlin’s words seemed to become an argument for greater U.S. involvement n the fight against totalitarianism.  Telling the story of the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” provides complex intellectual challenges for two authors, John Stauffer of Harvard University and Benjamin Soskis of George Mason.  The familiar melody was first heard as a hymn called “Say, Brothers” and went through several other versions before becoming “John Brown’s Body” (about the death of the famed abolitionist) and then, with Julia Ward Howe’s lyrics in the 1860s, the “Battle Hymn of the Republic.”  The authors have traced this intricate process with wide-ranging scholarship that lays out the many ways in which the melody evoked strong passions among Union soldiers during the Civil War. In time, the harder edge of “John Brown’s Body” gave way to the millennial sentiments of the “Battle Hymn.”  http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/review-histories-of-god-bless-america-and-the-battle-hymn-of-the-republic/2013/07/03/d8fbc2ae-be26-11e2-9b09-1638acc3942e_story.html?hpid=z5  

The Madrean Sky Islands are enclaves of Madrean pine-oak woodlands, found at higher elevations in a complex of small mountain ranges in southern and southeastern Arizona, southwestern New Mexico, and northwestern Mexico.  The sky islands are surrounded at lower elevations by the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts.  The northern west-east perimeter of the sky island region merges into the higher elevation eastern Mogollon Rim and the White Mountains of eastern Arizona (southern Anasazi region).  The sky islands are the northernmost of the Madrean pine-oak woodlands, and are classified as part of the Sierra Madre Occidental pine-oak forests ecoregion, of the tropical and subtropical coniferous forests biome.  The sky islands were isolated from one another and from the pine-oak woodlands of the Sierra Madre Occidental to the south by the warming and drying of the climate since the ice ages.  There are approximately 27 Madrean sky islands in the United States, and 15 in northern Mexico.  The major Madrean sky island ranges in the United States are the Baboquivari Mountains, Whetstone Mountains, Chiricahua Mountains, Huachuca Mountains, Pinaleño Mountains, Santa Catalina Mountains, and Santa Rita Mountains.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madrean_sky_islands 

The 11-member Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has quietly become almost a parallel Supreme Court.  The FISA court once focused on case-by-case wiretapping orders, but has become the ultimate arbiter on surveillance issues.  Created by Congress in 1978, the court hears only one side of the case--that of the government.  All 11 judges have been appointed by Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr.  Read extensive article at:  http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/07/us/in-secret-court-vastly-broadens-powers-of-nsa.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0 

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg

makebate  (MAYK-bayt)  noun  One who incites quarrels.  From make, from Old English macian (to make) + bate (contention), from Latin battuere (to beat) which also gave us abate, debate, and rebate. Earliest documented use:  1529.

sconce  (skons)  noun

1.  An ornamental bracket for holding candles or lights.
2.  The head or skull.
3.  Sense or wit.
4.  A small fort or defensive earthwork to defend a bridge, castle-gate, etc.

For 1:  From Latin abscondere (to conceal).  Earliest documented use:  1392.
For 2, 3:  Of uncertain origin.  Earliest documented use:  1567.
For 4:  From Dutch schans (entrenchment).  Earliest documented use:  1587.  

There are nearly two-dozen types of Cypress trees in the world, though the heartiest versions grow in North America.  The Cypress tree produces some of the world's most prized wood.  It is lightweight and durable which makes it an ideal building material.  Adding to the wood's popularity is the fact that it doesn't generate sap and therefore doesn't bleed.  This unique characteristic also means the tree's wood takes well to stains, paint and sealers.  What's more, the Cypress's attractive light to dark honey color is a quality carpenters and artists find highly appealing.  Cypress trees are also valued for their firewood and oil. The wood is easy to split, dries quickly and burns clean, so you don't have to worry about excessive tar and soot residue.  In addition, oil from the tree is used for shampoo and other beauty products.  The Cypress tree has a fascinating history that dates back to the ancient Egyptians who used the durable trees to build mummy cases.  The Greeks were also fans of the tree and used its wood to create urns to store the ashes of those who died in battle.  Perhaps even more interesting is the fact that Plato's code of laws was etched into Cypress wood because it was thought to outlast brass.  See pictures at: http://www.2020site.org/trees/cypress.html 

There’s a new dinosaur in southern Utah--a relative of the triceratops called nasutoceratops (“big-nose horned-face”) and noted for its large nose and big horns.  Find three poems marking the discovery--a double dactyl, haiku and short verse--at:  http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/compost/wp/2013/07/17/three-horned-poems-for-the-new-dinosaur-nasutoceratops-relative-of-the-triceratops/?hpid=z8 

July 19 is the 200th day of the year (201st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar.  There are 165 days remaining until the end of the year.  Events: 

64 – Great Fire of Rome: a fire begins to burn in the merchant area of Rome and soon burns completely out of control.  According to a popular, but untrue legend, Nero fiddled as the city burned.

1848 – Women's rights: a two-day Women's Rights Convention opens in Seneca Falls, New York.
1900 – The first line of the Paris Métro opens for operation.
1903 – Maurice Garin wins the first Tour de France.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/July_19