A new article from the Financial Times about the planned renovation of the New York Public Library’s 42nd St. Building includes the $1 million/45,000 ebooks number mentioned in the headline of our post.
From the FT Article:
…[NYPL President Tony] Marx also knows that the pressures for change are growing. As it happens, his institution is one of the few western libraries where attendance has actually been rising – not falling – with 18.2 million visits last year, up 3.4 per cent from 2010. But it is not necessarily those book stacks that are pulling people in.
On the contrary the library runs a dizzy array of community projects, commercial events, language training and educational programmes, as well as free internet services and ebook lending programmes. [Emphasis ours] Since 2009, the NYPL has quadrupled its budget for ebooks, and spent $1m on 45,000 ebook copies. Indeed, Marx envisages his library as being akin to a giant cyber educational hub, offering anyone access, anywhere in the world, however poor. “We need to be the leading educational programme, cradle to grave,” he says.
Read the complete FT Article
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