E-Reading

As you may know, we recently published a big report about e-book lending at libraries. We’ll have some posts exploring different aspects of the report in the coming weeks, but you can also read the entire report online (or download the PDF, if you prefer). And if you want to jump to a specific section, here’s a brief outline of the findings.

Director Lee Rainie shared recent survey findings and other research about the rise of e-books, their impact on people’s reading habits, and the way that library patrons are hoping to avail themselves of e-book borrowing. He also explored general ...

12% of e-book readers have borrowed an e-book from a library. Those who use libraries are pretty heavy readers, but most are not aware they can borrow e-books.

Kristen Purcell spoke about Americans' use of the internet and other digital technologies, and shared highlights from our report on the rise of e-reading.

Lee Rainie will give the keynote presentation titled "Learning in the Digital Age: Where Libraries Fit In" at the 21st Annual Minitex ILL Conference in Minnesota.

Mary Madden and Kathryn Zickuhr presented findings on the rise of e-reading, including reading-device ownership and the general reading habits/preferences of Americans.

While there is a tendency to associate e-books with dedicated e-reading devices, we found that among people who read e-books, just as many read their e-books on a desktop or laptop computer as on an e-book reader like a Kindle or Nook—and more people read e-books on their cell phones than on tablet computers.

If you check out or download e-books from your local public library, please take our qualitative online survey and tell us about your experiences!

Our recent e-reading report has received a lot of attention over the past week, and one section in particular that seemed to spark conversation was our “print vs. e-books” showdown. When does print win out over e-books (and vice versa?)

Asked to tell us what they like most about book reading, those who had read a book in the past 12 months gave a host of reasons that ranged from the highly practical to the sublime.