eBook Puzzle

After listening in on another rah-rah session about 3M's Cloud Library, I'm beginning to wonder if there isn't an even better solution out there.  Don't get me wrong - I think 3M has a great plan and idea, I'm just not sure that they aren't going to be a stepping stone to other things in the world of ebooks.  I am tired of hearing about it rather than being able to at least see how it works in real life.

As my colleagues pointed out at the webinar I attended, there is not so much a lack of content out there (ebooks) but a lack of platforms to distribute the content.  After all, public libraries have been circulating content in the form of paper, tape, vinyl, polycarbonate disks, canvas, cardboard, downloadable files, etc. for over 100 years.  In all forms save the last, we've been able to devise systems on our own.  With electronic files, librarians are largely held back by lack of computer programming degrees.  It's hard to devise a system if you don't have the expertise to develop a robust, flexible tool.


The more I think about it though, something else that was mentioned after the webinar is really puzzling.  Why haven't the companies that provide libraries with automated circulation systems jumped into the ebook arena?  They have already created highly sophisticated systems that check in and out materials, keep inventory, track users and the material they have out, track purchasing and receiving, and a myriad other tasks.  Why can't a library purchase an ebook, store it on a server somewhere, and circulate it through these sophisticated systems?  In fact, every third party ebook lending system I've seen uses the library's automation system to authenticate users of the ebook borrowing system.

Why is this thing so hard to grapple with?

There are smart people out there in the library world and in the library automation world.  While I've largely given up on my flying-car-that-folds-into-a-briefcase, I want to know:  Where is my automated library system that can circulate ALL my library's materials?  (I'm looking at you, Polaris.)