Note: We knew this was coming but we’ve yet to see a news release from OverDrive with today’s news. Why not? Are there more details available? Did they brief members of the library press? We’ve asked OverDrive for a comment.
OverDrive Inc., a major e-distributor for libraries, announced today the launch of a vastly expanded list for patrons, featuring not just e-books available for lending, but hundreds of thousands of those which include a collected of Edgar Allan Poe stories edited by Michael Connelly to foreign-language titles. Viewers can look at excerpts, purchase books from a retailer or request that their library add an e-book that wasn’t being offered.
“We’re allowing libraries to be better connected with their communities,” OverDrive CEO Steve Potash said during a recent interview. “Right now, we have librarians who are trying to add books to the e-catalog but don’t always know what to add. Now, by exposing a publisher’s entire list, it becomes like crowdsourcing, where patrons can offer their suggestions.”
Potash said he expects the program to begin within a couple of weeks, in a handful of library systems, including New York City, Boston and Cuyahoga County in Ohio.
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