Because libraries are, at most 5% of a general trade publisher’s business and far less of the ebook business, and because the market is changing so rapidly and because every retailer except Amazon can be said to be struggling to carve out a sustainable position in the global ebook marketplace, there are many legitimate reasons for the biggest publishers to take a wait-and-see attitude about libraries and ebooks. [...] Of course, libraries view this differently because the big books from the big publishers are a lot more than 5% of their patrons’ interest. This is an imbalance that would explain the difference in attitude of the parties, for anybody who cares to accept the reality of it. That is, the atavistic “instinct of self-preservation” leads libraries and publishers to somewhat different conclusions about what the best outcome would be and how quickly the industry should move to it.

My line?

“If there’s a popular author, like Jodi Picoult or Jeffrey Archer, that you’re looking for on our Library’s Overdrive website, and you can’t find it, here’s the likely reason why: 4 out of the 6 big major publishers refuse to sell their eBooks to Libraries.”

I usually try to refrain from editorializing further, but I’ll say this here: HELL yes I have an agenda. My agenda is the continued existence of libraries; my agenda is to incite these publishers to get off their duffs, grow a pair, and try to get a clue. If librarians can embrace eBooks and see them as a boon then by god, the publishers can, too, the bloody cowards.

One of the patrons–a major donor, as it happened– that I taught stated, “If those publishers won’t sell eBooks to Libraries, I won’t buy eBooks from them.” Bless her heart, but it gave me an idea that kind of goes along with your post: perhaps advocating through libraries and the ALA and our various governing bodies is not the way to go. Perhaps we should be launching our campaign through our patrons…

…Because OUR patrons are THEIR consumers, too.