On Demand Book Service

Hi Brian,

Thanks for being so active here. You raise a very good question with valid concerns, esp the environmental one.

Here are some advantages to print to consider. Maybe others can suggest some too.
- It does not tire the eyes.
- Books require less care, esp for younger readers. (Not sure if I'd want to leave an e-reader like a kindle w/a 3 yr old....)
- Books are more mobile than computers and laptops.
- e-readers (content and technology) aren't free.
- Some people prefer a more tactile experience.
- Locally printed material could help librarians save on shipping costs for heavy books and from an environmental perspective, the gas needed to ship them.

Another useful aspect of ODBS is the portal Systems is designing. This portal would make it easy for anyone to search a database of materials to print. Local materials could be uploaded and organized. Ideally, you wouldn't need to search around the whole web for materials; they would be centralized in one, user friendly database. I think it would be entirely possible for more than one community to manage the same portal but maybe Margaret can speak to this.

Ultimately, it should be up to a community leader(s) to weigh the costs and benefits of ODBS. It is very customizable though. If people want just the binding part or the portal part, I don't see why they shouldn't be able to pick and chose. The portal has a lot of potential to be developed into something fun, or useful for local knowledge. The Digital Contents team has suggested adding multimedia material several times in class. Perhaps ODBS can evolve in different directions to suit different communities that demonstrate an interest. Hopefully after the survey results come back we'll have a better understanding of how useful ODBS could be.

Further to Erica's points, here's an online blog summarizing the challenges magazine publishers in Canada is facing, and "Print On Demand" is at the top of the list, second to e-readers that are both accessible privately and publicly.

Makes me think that book publishers, who are on different productive timelines, will start to experience similar supply chain problems as well.

Hi Brian,

Thanks for these questions. Why print if you can just download, read, and then move onto the next book? Seems likely to be a pretty satisfying task on its own... Perhaps Jerry Seinfeld was right when he did that whole spoof about "Why do people collect books? You read a book and that's it, there's no more point to keeping it around..."

I have a feeling the ODBS will be useful for learning about interesting online content as a feature alone; and if the content is good enough, then at least the option to print off the book is there.

But I know that I feel much differently towards a physical book I can hold than one on my laptop. I love to tote books around with me, give it dogears, maybe lose it, or even purposely leave it somewhere for the next guy to pick up. It's true that there is an environmental cost with the physical remnant, but isn't there also one (energy) when reading a book off a computer or palm pilot?

Anyways, I think the good thing about the ODBS will hopefully be its versatility; its ability to accommodate this variety of reading styles.

For the contents and systems teams, I assume there won't be a prob if a user just wants to read and not print? It won't be awkward for this purpose?