Some thoughts on reading library ebooks

Here are some thoughts on reading only books borrowed from my local public library and reading them on my kobo ereader (I have the Clara BW model.)

01 - No longer purchasing ebooks - I no longer see value in purchasing ebooks since I rarely re-read books and they would only sit in my ereader or in my accounts. As far as I can understand, when you purchase an ebook, you're buying the rights to read it and that's it. You can't re-sell them because that would require transferring digital rights which frankly, I don't quite know how. But if I really love a book, I might purchase a paper version but I haven't read any books that I love lately. 

02 - Library availability - I have to consider availability from my library when I choose what books to borrow and read. I can request my library to purchase certain books but I rather not since it takes so long for them to fulfill the request and most likely, they wouldn't make the purchase for tons of reason which most likely budgets.
    Public libraries have to purchase rights to ebooks (for a period of time) to loan them out so that right can expired so availability is not a permanent thing for ebooks. I'm wondering why libraries aren't given the privilege to purchase ebooks for indefinite use. It's not like they are making profits loaning them out. But I suppose publishers/authors wants to make money too.
    Also format availability - For example, for a series, book 1 may be available in ebook and audiobook formats but book 2 may be only available in audiobook format. I don't understand this but this hadn't changed in years. I think if you're an audiobook reader, you are likely to have more books available than if you're an ebook reader.

03 - I now waste more time searching for books to read than actually reading them - I don't know why I'm so picky. I usually read a sample of the book to decide if I want to read it. But sometimes I depend on the synopsis or even just by the cover itself. I don't have a definite way to decide, I guess it depends on my mood.
    A lot of times I find books that are in the middle of a series and then when I look for the first book, it's unavailable at the library which is a shame as I do prefer to read from the beginning of a series. I don't get why some book series have no book 1 available but others in the series are available - shouldn't book 1 be the one available?

04 - The more popular a book, the longer the wait time at your library - For example, if you place a hold on a book, you might get to read it in a week or in a few months or even a whole year. Even if it sometimes says the wait time is 2 weeks, that time can extend or shorten depending on readers. I don't mind waiting except when I'm reading a series. 
    And also, the more popular books, the more copies are available which seems unfair. Most ebooks from the library have one or two copies which I guess is the norm. So why are some books have more than 10 copies available? There should be a standard number of copies for all books for equality and besides that, popular authors don't even need their books in the library as much as much as less popular authors but I guess popularity wins out.

05 - Reading on a kobo and sometimes on a kindle - Even though I use mainly my kobo, I sometimes have to use my kindle because not all books available from the library can be read on a kobo since if a book is not listed on the kobo store, you can't get it onto your ereaders unless you sideload them. (Note: Sideload books means you plug your ereader into your computer and download books (from the library's website) and load them into your ereader like you would a file but there are things you have to do before you can even do that because you cannot just load a library book onto your ereader and read it - there are permission issues which I have not been successful in solving so I cannot tell you how to do it.)
    So my option when a book is not available through kobo but is available for kindle, then I read that on my kindle ereader. 
    But if I can't get that book on either devices, then I don't read that book at all which happens a lot but I don't mind it. I guess if I'm desperate to read a certain book, I might purchase it but it's unlikely.

06 - Please don't monopolize books - Having more than one library cards (which is legal somewhat) so you can borrow more books and have more holds is just dumb and disrespecting other library patrons. Since you can borrow more books from so many libraries and have so many holds, you will probably end up borrowing a lot of books at once and probably won't get to read many of them unless you're a speed reader. I just think respecting others by not monopolizing book is the proper thing to do.

07 - No back cover for ebooks - Some ebooks just ends where the story ends, there's not even an The End - it just stops. Then there are books ending with list of books that author had written or some copyright info or even the content list (which is just odd being at the end) but no back cover like paperbacks or hardcovers. I've only seen maybe two back covers of two ebooks and not have encountered another one since.
    You know how there's these notices that tells you not to purchase books without covers (front and back) because they might be stolen goods – ebooks without back covers is like stolen goods because the back cover is not there. How hard it is to put a back cover to the end an ebook? I know this isn't much an issue because most people wouldn't care about it but I think a back cover makes a book more complete and it gives you a feeling of having  finished reading the book when you see the back cover or am I mad to think this way?

Do you read library books? How is your experience on reading books from your library (digital or otherwise)?

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Some useful links:
• Find your library at Overdrive's website 
• Overdrive help 
• How to borrow kindle books from your library
• How to borrow kobo books from your library

Seven Things

01 - Why are phones so huge? Recently, the battery in my old phone (old model that is quite small) is having a slow death so I had to get a replacement and the choices are large phones. Why? Why do we need such large screens on a phone? I'm a simple person. I don't use a phone for anything but calls and texting. I also don't need a 1,000 options and apps to customize it to the point of extreme personalizing. And it's so damm heavy. I guess I can use it as a weapon when necessary.

A few rants about ereaders & ebooks

These are some recent thoughts and rants about ereaders and ebooks. I may be wrong on some things but you can correct me if I'm wrong. These are from the point of view of a kindle paperwhite reader. (The correct term should be e-reader but I don't like that plus I had been using ereader so why change?)

01 - Ereaders are expensive. I waited to buy my kindle ereader during a holiday so I can save some money but I didn't really save anything because amazon makes you pay to remove advertising from their kindles (at least the regular and paperwhite models) which is the dumbest thing in the world. A product that comes with advertising should have made me not want to buy it, right? I guess I'm one of those dumb consumers because I brought it and paid more to remove advertising because who wants advertising on their device? But at least, I didn't pay the full price.

02 - The problems with ereaders, once you choose one, you are sort of stuck within their eco-system which means you mostly use just one format of ebooks. I chose to get a kindle ereader (over nook and kobo) because I had the strange idea that the kindle format is more widely used and it was probably true when I brought it a few years ago but I guess it's changing a bit.
    Just because a device accepts this or that format, didn't mean it's easy to get them onto your device. Amazon did add support for epub books. The whole DRM (Digital Rights Management) issue does make it harder to get epub books onto a kindle. Some people remove the DRM to get books onto their kindle which legally is not legal, at least, not in the U.S. Lots of books comes DRM-free but most are not so it's sort of a headache if you don't know how to get epubs on your device. I was never able to get epub public library books onto my kindle but I can do it with regular DRM-free epub books. Books that are not kindle format aren't even labeled books, they are labeled documents.

Thoughts on using the kindle after 4 years

I had my kindle paperwhite for about 4 years so here's an update on using it.  (My previous post about about using the kindle is here.)
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The Bad
01 - Still didn't like how they changed the home screen to two separate sections — The Home page is basically advertising because it's the kindle home store in a smaller format. You can check out recommendations but that's it. Plus I see the same cover with what's-his-face (some guy who messed up twitter) and it annoys the heck out of me. The Library is where your books are. I only visit the Home section when I don't feel like reading what I have.

My kindle experience so far

I had my kindle for a little over two and half years. I brought the Paperwhite, the second least expensive version and without the ads but I did brought it on sale so basically I paid full price because the discount barely covered the amount to remove the ads. I think it's ridiculous people have to pay to keep advertisement off a device they are already paying for. Overall, I like reading on the kindle for most of the time but as with most devices, they have their pros and cons. Here's what I like and dislike about my kindle so far. (I know I should probably capitalize kindle but I don't care.)

The Sadness of Missing Back Covers for Ebooks

(Left) What I usually see at the end of an ebook. (Right) Popup notice to rate the book. Both are for Premeditated Myrtle by Elizabeth C. Bunce.

I now mostly read ebooks and I like it enough to keep on reading them. One thing that I miss is the back covers. Sometimes when I'm at the end of an ebook, I just keep tapping forward hoping to see something but there's nothing. Not to say there aren't any ebooks with back covers, it's just that, they are rare. Of all the ebooks I had read (less than 50), I only saw one back cover.
    Usually a paperback and hardcover have a back cover that had a blurb about the book and a UPC code. The back cover is usually used as a promotion/advertisement space to entice readers to buy the book. With ebooks, readers won't see the back cover unless they had already brought the book (or borrowed from the library) so I suppose this is why the back cover is no longer used

The rare back cover of an ebook. This is for the book, The Mystery of Black Hollow Lane by Julia Nobel.

For ebooks, the last page is either credits (such as publishers' info), acknowledgements, the book content list or the occasional book excerpt of another book followed by some popup box about rating the book or something else depending on which e-reader you're using.
    For me, the back cover of a book is a sign that the book has ended. Credits or acknowledgment to a pop-up box to rate the book does not do that. I guess this is another reason why ebooks will never be like paper books.