Against the Grain
Volume 22 | Issue 2 Article 13
April 2010 Op Ed -- Pelikan's Antidisambiguation: Books: Ownership, Conveyance, Licensure Michael P. Pelikan Penn State, [email protected]
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Recommended Citation Pelikan, Michael P. (2010) "Op Ed -- Pelikan's Antidisambiguation: Books: Ownership, Conveyance, Licensure," Against the Grain: Vol. 22: Iss. 2, Article 13. DOI: https://doi.org/10.7771/2380-176X.5502
This document has been made available through Purdue e-Pubs, a service of the Purdue University Libraries. Please contact epubs@purdue.edu for additional information. AgainsttheGrain / 54 Op Ed — Opinions and Editorials of that same eBook reader’s computer- reader’s eBook same that of that I download and install a new version system on operating my personal 64-bit laptop, requiring a to moved I as time same the at change format a underwent store reader’s eBook an from content licensed the occurrences: coincidental Y by Books: Ownership,Conveyance,Licensure Op Ed—Pelikan’s Antidisambiguation books. Sometimes a particular volume particular a Sometimes of books. spines the on appear to began ally gradu dots months, ensuing the Mom. Over my for was green and yellow, used sister my red, got I blue, took He ored dots, about a half-inch in diameter. col little of supply endless seemingly volumes forward. My brother bought a these pass to how of question the with dealing to approach an with up came I interest, evenmanyyearslater. his caught that passage particular any with the book, he’d always be able to find by a page number. When he was finished to a list at the end of the book , followed music — you name it. He’d add the term particular person, breed of dog, piece of a mention of a mountain range, sailing, a books. These would be called tags today: own his hand-written add index he’d to book, the back a of through his worked he As hand. his in pencil a with read vast seaofliterature. and history,art history,atlases, music a and geography biography, histories, national and political — organization the hall, the collection took on thematic down went you as Then, forth. so and were his working tools: reference works, arranged within the room itself — these within arm’s always reach, few some hundreds a morestudy, his in lived these volumes. of Aof sands number certain out aswewentforward. made years earlier, some we had to work a scholar. Some of these plans had been as work lifetime’s a of effects physical the of distribution and dismantling the achieve to process thorough yet life he wanted an orderly, humane, when my Dad neared the end of his even ofwhatbooksare. ownership, selling, of publishing, understanding our challenge out yet” about eBooks, even as eBooks figured yet quite “not what’s of heart a of Really, books. of number the to goes it licensure and conveyance, ship, side software. Anyway — my brother, sister, and and sister, brother, my — Anyway always who those of one was Dad The books he used: there were thou Always a consummate planner, owner the about narrative a is This Michael P. Pelikan quences of two simultaneous but dealing with the hours unsought conse several spent I esterday April 2010 (Penn State) - - - - -
Reader Library Reader Sony store into the ePub ePub the into store Reader continued onpage 55 Sony Store
Reader software (now (now software itself — just — itself Reader software), software), software can also in the Sony Sony in - - Op Ed — Pelikan’s ... from page 54 Your users need Economic Information. what would happen if our freshman students were suddenly unable to access, say, a textbook needed for a test? My guess: the savvy ones would find a way to work around the propri- What’s in etary nonsense, break the DRM, decrypt the files, and then post the results somewhere. The un-tech-savvy students would do a search for a solution, find the posted files, and download YOUR library? them — after all, they’d think, they’d paid for the textbook to begin with, so why shouldn’t they have access to their files? If it’s EconLit your fortunate users know they can: Issues like this are made much more com- plicated by the proliferation of Reader devices r'JOEFDPOPNJDTBSUJDMFTJOOFBSMZ KPVSOBMT and formats. In the group in which I work at Penn State, Emerging Technologies, we try to r"DDFTTGVMMUFYUBSUJDMFTUISPVHITVCTDSJQUJPOT stay ahead of these things — not just regarding r0CUBJOXPSLJOHQBQFSTWJBEJSFDUMJOLTUPGVMMUFYUPOXPSLJOHQBQFST the devices in isolation, but their behavior in a TFSJFTXFCTJUFT group. Unquestionably, each device will find representation in the population we serve. We r%JTDPWFSIPXTFBSDIJOHXJUIUIFJournal of Economic need to know how nicely they play, by them- Literature (JEL)DMBTTJàDBUJPOTZTUFNJNQSPWFT selves and with each other. SFMFWBOUSFTVMUT Each of these readers is tied, to a greater r4FBSDIGPSTQFDJGJDUPQJDT BVUIPST UJUMFT LFZXPSET or lesser extent, tightly or loosely, to a par- KPVSOBMT BOENPSF ticular format, retail front end, and approach to DRM. r6TFHFPHSBQIJDEFTDSJQUPSTUPàOEFDPOPNJD These are old questions by now, but I must TUVEJFTPGDPVOUSJFTBDSPTTUIFHMPCF ask again: What’s going to happen when the textbook EconLit is a comprehensive bibliographic database of publishers either move into this space on citations and abstracts to peer-reviewed journal articles, purpose, or find themselves drawn in by the books, collective volume articles (including conference howls of their marketers, the demands of their papers), dissertations, working papers, and book reviews. distribution channels, or the usage patterns of EconLit provides broad, in-depth coverage of more than their customers? thirty- ve years of economics literature from across the What’s going to happen when these many globe! The EconLit database offers powerful search tools and various ecosystems come into contact with to obtain relevant citations and full-text articles. materials in our university’s Course Manage- ment System, or our university library’s Course Reserves system, or its subscription-based electronic resources? EconLit on your library’s web site provides Honestly — until I can buy you an eBook the answers your users need! — not a gift card good for use at an eBook store, but an eBook — until I can give you the eBook — or sell it to a total stranger — or donate it to a book drive to raise money for a www.econlitPSHrJOGP!econlit.org charity — or pass it down to my kids — until the Digital Rights Management can handle all of our uses of eBooks in a manner resembling www.ProquestDPNrXXXDIALOG.com our uses of printed and bound books, maybe www.EbscoHostDPNrXXXOCLC.org even give us some standards-based way to track www.OVID.com licensure and provenance, we’ll be stuck in the Stone Age with these things.
Book Reviews — Monographic Musings Column Editor: Debbie Vaughn (College of Charleston)
Column Editor’s Note: April 11-17 is other special populations, as well as to the Librarian extraordinaire Eleanor I. Cook National Library Week, described by the public at-large. Moreover, librarians play a returns to MM and offers her take on two American Library Association as “an an- myriad of roles, from information providers marketing tomes. A hearty welcome to MM nual celebration of the contributions of our to educators to publicists to supervisors to newcomer Gretchen Gueguen, who examines nation’s libraries and librarians.” Librar- collection architects. Joan Giesecke and Beth McNeil’s Funda- ies and librarians indeed make a number This issue’s Monographic Musings col- mentals of Library Supervision. Gretchen, of contributions to schools, colleges and umn features reviews of a number of new a 2005 graduate of the College of Information universities, archives, and businesses and ALA titles that address these many functions. continued on page 56 Against the Grain / April 2010