However, this model could lead to some trouble. Georgia State University recently found itself the target of lawsuits from publishers, including Oxford University Press and SAGE Publications, after offering e-books and other digital content via an online reserve system. The system was offering copyrighted materials to students free of charge. Brantley notes, “This is why trade publishers don’t trust libraries with their digital content for acquisition to support digital lending, and frankly, I can’t say that I blame them. … Everybody is going to want to do the right thing for their own communities; it’s going to take a while for understandings to shift around to accommodate wholly new models for monetization and income.”
Laura Dawson is CEO of Numerical Gurus, LLC, consulting company providing services to the information, librarym and book industries. Dawson has consulted to numerous organizations in these verticals, primarily focusing on solving problems related to metadata, identifiers, Linked Data, semantic web applications, and structured content.