Molly Raphael

The American Library Association (ALA) today released a new report examining critical issues underlying equitable access to digital content through our nation’s libraries. In the report, titled “E-content: The Digital Dialogue,”authors explore an unprecedented and splintered landscape in which several major publishers refuse to sell ebooks to libraries; proprietary platforms fragment our cultural record; and reader privacy is endangered.

American Libraries Magazine has an article by ALA President Molly Raphael, who last week led a 4-person delegation to meet with Hachette Book Group and four national organizations representing authors. Raphael calls the meeting “very promising” with regard to convincing Hachette to resume providing libraries access to its newer e-book titles. (Hachette stopped providing its [...]

From American Libraries: ALA President Molly Raphael prepared this summary of the meetings of members of the ALA Digital Content and Libraries Working Group with ebook distributors at the Public Library Association Conference in Philadelphia, as well as a panel she moderated at the Association of American Publishers meeting: At last week’s Public Library Association [...]

It's been an upbeat Public Library Association 2012 meeting in Philadelphia so far, with strong attendance, and a slate of great authors, speakers, and programs. But the issue of e-book lending has loomed large over the meeting. On Wednesday, March 14, prior to the opening general session at PLA, ALA president Molly Raphael was in New York, participating on a panel on library e-book lending at the Association of American Publishers annual meeting, a session that was reported to librarians to have been quite positive. PW caught up with a busy Raphael in Philadelphia yesterday following an afternoon session,

Full Text of ALA’s Statement: The American Library Association (ALA) is calling on publisher Random House to reconsider its decision to raise the price of ebooks to the library market starting March 1. ALA President Molly Raphael issued the following statement: “While I appreciate Random House’s engagement with libraries and its commitment to perpetual access,” [...]

Is the library e-book question about to heat up? At the recent Midwinter Meeting in Dallas, TX, ALA executive director Keith Fiels and president Molly Raphael informed a meeting of ALA’s Working Group on Digital Content and Libraries that ALA officials had arranged meetings from January 30 to Feb. 1 in New York with publishers currently restricting e-book lending, including Macmillan, Simon & Schuster, and Penguin. The announcement suggests that at a time when demand is exploding, librarians are determined to push the issue of e-book lending with publishers.