Tallinn Central Library’s e-book lending and reading environment for e-books in Estonian Triinu Seppam Tallinn Central Library Director of Library Services CoBal Trakai

In Estonia: About 1.3 million inhabitants, 30.7% of them live in Tallinn. 478 public libraries, inc. branch libraries. The biggest public library: Tallinn Central Library with its’ 17 branch libraries and a mobile library. 28.6% of Estonians use the public libraries’ services. 18.7% of all public library users use the services of Tallinn Central Library. In Tallinn 17.8% of inhabitants use a public library service.

Why do we want to lend e-books in Estonian? Estonia’s goal is to preserve Estonian nation, language and culture. Therefore there should be as easy access to Estonian literature as possible and access for all. To ensure social equality

Why do we want to lend e-books in Estonian? There are people who don’t read books, but maybe they would read an e-book, especially if it would be in their mother tongue. There are people who prefer to read e-books (e. g young people). There are people who can‘t afford to buy e-books (some books might be published only as e-books). There are people who physically can´t come to the library (e. g library is located too far, workplace outside of Tallinn, distance learners etc), including people with disabilities. Estonian language and knowledge of Estonian literature among those, whose mother tongue is not Estonian, would improve at all levels. Opportunities to introduce Estonian authors and their creation would be better.

E-books in Estonian: National Library of Estonia has issued 1145 ISBN’s to e-books to: - Estonian Digital Books’ Centre - Ersen - Digira etc.

E-book lending and reading environment: 1. Administration module: - search - acquisition - description - statistics - system parametres (how many people can read e-book at a time etc) 2. Lending and reading environment - search - borrowing - online reading environment - user functions (loans, history etc)

E-book lending and reading environment: Online - no need to protect the e-book with DRM or other anti-piracy software, which places limits on devices and requires more thorough knowledge from the user - technology infrastructure "in the cloud“ - all the user needs is a PC and an internet connection (same with popular YouTube) - access from the library’s webpage and from the online catalogue - anyone can search the e-books, but to borrow one you have to be a user of Tallinn Central Library

E-book lending and reading environment: Convenient access to library service and Estonian literature: - people can borrow books 24/7 - people don’t have to leave home or work to borrow books - borrowing a book takes only a few minutes and returning the book is easy - after the due date the book “returns” itself - e-book allows people to change the font size

Two different copyrights: For books For e-books - online reading is a service If the library borrows to a library user an e-book with an e-book reader and it gets registered in online catalogue ESTER or URRAM, the author gets paid for the loan from the Estonian Author’s Benefit Fund (Autorihüvitisfond). But it doesn’t apply for e-books which are borrowed and read via internet. The model we prefer today is that libraries purchase e-books with higher prices than individuals – that the author’s fee is included to the price and it doesn’t matter how many times book gets borrowed. E-books today are only ~30% cheaper than books.

The budget No, we don’t get more money for buying e-books! Designing the library’s collection is going to be more difficult than it is today.

VAT 1. books: 9% 2. e-books: 20%

Tallinn Central Library’s e-book lending and reading environment for e-books in Estonian Triinu Seppam Tallinn Central Library Director of Library Services CoBal Trakai