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Elementary particles: e-book rental: not market distortion, but market opportunity

2019-12-07T08:36:51.715Z


My first big trips took me to the most remote places, Amundsen to the South Pole, Armstrong to the moon. After school jumped on the bike, ten minutes later I was there - in the reading room of the city library in Hannover with her ...



My first big trips took me to the most remote places, Amundsen to the South Pole, Armstrong to the moon. After the school jumped on the bike, ten minutes later I was there - in the reading room of the city library in Hanover with her widely visible book tower made of red brick, which signaled: Here there are provisions for Kopfreisen.

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The city library still exists, but more and more users do not even have to cycle anymore, because they simply borrow their e-books by mobile phone. In contrast, some publisher lobbyists are now resisting. They do not want e-books to be treated like paper books and want a veto right against their rental. In addition, they warn against distortion of competition and legal enforcement. Now the policy has to decide.

The European Court of Justice ruled in 2016 that the lending of e-books is legal, provided that the libraries pay a fair license and lend it to one user at any one time ("one copy - one user"). This is exactly what public libraries have long since done. Annually, they pay around € 112 million for books and licenses.

But that's not enough for some lobbyists. The Börsenverband des Deutschen Buchhandels (BDB) published a study at the end of November, which allegedly proves how much the lending of e-books harms the book market. The survey shows that around 1.9 million people use e-book rentals compared to over 27 million book buyers. A stumbling block: Anyone borrowing e-books is "well-off and educated". Is not that unfair? The Börsenverein complains: "The bond reduces the willingness to buy book affine and purchasing power strong target groups on the book market."

Westend61 / picture alliance

But, is this really the truth? Here is worth a second look. The study also allows the opposite conclusion: who lends to digital books, buys almost twice as many e-books as the average: 15.9 per year. In part, the e-book sales increased even eightfold in parallel to the online rental, which at least revealed the so-called panorama study in the USA. Forming books - and libraries train book customers.

The fact that the digital bookworms have more education and money than the rest should not be misused for an envy debate. Reading makes you smart. But that does not speak against the e-book rental, but for him. It should be an incentive to broaden libraries' educational offerings so that even poorer, less educated readers can be better reached.

Almost 20 percent of the teenagers tested are barely able to read, as the current Pisa study has just revealed. Those who come from a poor family or from an immigrant family have particularly bad cards. Libraries can provide a remedy and of course this includes rental books that you can read on the phone. So far, some publishers are delaying and restricting online rental. And damage yourself. The rental of e-books is not a market distortion, but market opportunity. Because it provides more people access to the labor and education market. And increases the potential customer base for booksellers.

In any case, as a student, I would not have dreamed that later on I would be able to start my world travels in my head simply by mobile phone. This progress should not be a reason for strife and envy. But to celebrate. And browsing.

warmly

Your Hilmar Schmundt

Twitter: @hilmarschmundt

Feedback & suggestions?

Abstract

My reading recommendations this week

  • Does the e-book rental damage the book market? The latest study by Gfk gives a few insights.
  • Here is an assessment of the German Library Association on e-book rental with additional links, including the Panorama Project.
  • Researcher James Black predicted climate change in 1977, but unfortunately he worked for the oil giant Exxon.
  • Is there life after Google? A journalist has tried it and advises imitation.
  • Chinese researcher He Jiankui claims to have changed the genes of twins to be immune to HIV, but internal documents raise doubts.
  • Video streaming causes around one percent of global carbon dioxide emissions, does the Netflix shame come after the flying ash?

Elementary Particles - The Weekly Science Newsletter. Elementarteilchen is free and lands every Saturday around 10 clock in your mailbox. Subscribe to the newsletter here:

quiz

Benjamin Franklin was author and printer. Did he deny lending libraries because they undermine book sales? Did he find her okay, as long as they have lightning rods? Did he found one himself?

What does the shooter, a relative of the nightingale, actually do in winter? Does he keep his beak and does he spare his throat for the courtship time? Does he softly hum his standard tunes? Is he practicing a lot of new phrases for the next season?

How many people are buying their Christmas tree online? About ten percent of Germans? Nobody, because the fire police is forbidden? About half a percent, is paid mostly with the cryptocurrency Xmascoin?

* The answers can be found at the bottom of the newsletter

Picture of the week

viewpoint / imago images

Northern lights dance over Norway, caused by the "solar wind" particle stream when it hits the earth. As the spacecraft "Parker Solar Probe" has found out, the particles spewed out by the sun are accelerated by magnetic fields to extremely high speeds. The robot has approached the sun as far as no other terrestrial missile has ever come before. The space probe "New Horizons" in turn has measured far out in space how interstellar matter slows down the solar wind.

footnote

Constant rain for 1,000,000 years, maybe even two million years - that's how long a wet phase lasted around 232 million years ago. That's what paleontologists like Paul Wignall at Leeds University think. The never-ending rainy season, which can be detected in rocks, followed a long period of drought. The climatic swing probably facilitated the rise of dinosaurs to the dominant form of life on land.

SPIEGEL + recommendations from science

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  • Medicine: Healthy in the asylum - a bestseller on misdiagnosis in psychiatry causes a sensation
  • Psychology: lifestyle products against stress and anxiety
  • Behavioral research: Cats are obviously much smarter than expected

* Quiz answers: Benjamin Franklin founded in 1731 in Philadelphia the "Library Company", one of the first lending libraries, initially with 50 members. / The shooter (Luscinia luscinia) likes to practice new vocal phrases during wintering in Africa, according to Abel Souriau's team. / Every tenth German citizen buys his Christmas tree online (according to a representative survey commissioned by digital association Bitkom among 1003 German citizens aged 16 and over).

Source: spiegel

All tech articles on 2019-12-07

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