Thing 18: Audiobooks.

I am not entirely new to downloading audiobooks. My local public library has had Overdrive available for its patrons for several years now and I have downloaded several books both on my computer and onto my iPod. And I completely agree with most of Farrell's article on the pluses and minuses of this technology. Although it is extremely handy to have the audiobooks on my iPod that I can directly play through my car stereo, it can be very tedious loading the Overdrive Console onto your computer, downloading the audiobook, and then transferring all the chapters onto the iPod. Also, I did not realize the heavy cost of each title to libraries; however, I understand the reasoning that each title is available to multiple users. Still, unless the library is part of a consortium or has a great fundraising capability, the cost is nearly prohibitive on a large scale.

I really have not noticed that many ratings from people on the audiobooks I have downloaded. Reader ratings I always take with a grain of salt anyway, because I have found that I will enjoy books that others have panned. It depends on the makeup of who is doing the rating, I guess.

I know you can download books through http://audible.com/ - in fact, my GPS has a feature that lets you download audible.com books to it so you can take it on the road. And I have downloaded a couple audiobooks to iTunes so I can download them onto my iPod. But to me, the expense of purchasing the audiobooks does not often justify the cost. If it is something I would listen to more than once, I would probably be better off with the print version.


We have not had much success in interesting our patrons in using Overdrive. Most of the ones who inquire about it are community patrons who cannot have access since they are not affiliated directly with the college. Most of the ones I have heard talk about downloading the books are the students themselves who are in their late teens to early 20s. They are the ones most comfortable with the technology and who are used to downloading and exporting files to audio players. When Overdrive first came to VCCS, I tried explaining and demonstrating it to several of our older staff members and they still could not fathom how to help anyone with questions. Our own library has not done much with publicizing the availability either other than with posters in the library and brief notes on the library homepage. I think if more of our students and faculty knew about it, they would use it more heavily than they do now.