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The aim of this study is to compare print and e-book use for identical titles in the e-Duke Scholarly Collection (e-DSC) from 2011 to 2013 to determine format preference for a discrete collection of titles in humanities and social sciences.

Use statistics for the e-DSC were downloaded from the e-book platform by title and call number to determine use by title and subject. Circulation statistics were culled from the library’s integrated library system for the same titles to compare e-book use to that of the same print title.

Although e-books had a high number of titles with use as a per cent of the collection, examination of substantive use shows a slight preference for print. While 73 per cent of the e-books garnered enough interest to click on them, only 12 per cent had substantive use.

The e-DSC changed platforms in December 2013. The new platform does not require users to create an account to download e-book sections and digital rights management limitations have been removed. The same examination of collection use in 2.5 years on the new platform will provide an interesting comparison on the function of platform on e-book use.

The comparison of identical print and e-titles is less studied and includes the examination of “substantive use” in comparing print to e-book use.

This paper aims to propose criteria and indicators for the adoption of e-books in libraries in the context of the cloud computing paradigm.

This paper carried out bibliographical and documentary research and the application of a questionnaire. Sampling focused on five library managers and five e-book vendor managers.

A proposal is presented containing a set of three criteria and their respective indicators. The technology platform criterion consists of seven indicators: patron data privacy, patron data security, availability of services, accessibility of information in e-books, interoperability of the technology platform, digital preservation and portability of e-books. The criterion for the acquisition of e-books involves three indicators: forms of commercialization, acquisition models and selection of e-book titles. The criterion for the circulation of e-books is divided into two indicators: unlimited and limited use. In the unlimited use mode, there are no limits on the use of e-books. In limited use, there are 11 levels of permissions: available copies, number of loans under each license, duration of the license, interlibrary loan, reading only in digital format, reading online via streaming only, download on the patron’s device, content printing, loan according to the patron’s identity, reservation services and renewal services.

This paper provides a set of criteria and indicators that can aid in the construction of policies and the development of collections, programs and projects directed toward the use of e-books in libraries.

This paper contributes socially by presenting a proposal that can support policies of evaluation and development of collections, projects, programs and actions around the adoption of e-books in different types of libraries.

Although the functional benefits of e-books have been discussed in the emerging literature on the e-reader platform, the hedonic/emotional aspects of e-book usage have not been explored. This study aims to explore the impact that e-readers have on consumers’ connections with books. Relying on self-concept theory and possessions as the extended self, the authors address the following two questions: What are the hedonic differences between e-books and printed books, and, if the functional benefits of e-books are so compelling, then why do some people still use printed books?

The researchers pursue a qualitative design through the use of semi-structured interviews, with a combination of base questions and follow-up questions tailored to the individual respondent.

The results reveal six primary themes: convenience, change, community, collection, connection and children. Within each, functional benefits are identified, confirming prior literature on these benefits, and hedonic/emotional themes emerge, revealing that e-readers are capable of changing consumers’ connections with books. Namely, while e-books offer functional benefits over printed books, consumers feel less connected to books read using an e-reader platform and prefer to purchase the printed versions of books that hold special meanings for them. These findings align with self-concept theory and indicate that printed books are an extension of the self, one that cannot be completely replaced by e-books.

This research adds to the emerging literature on e-books by demonstrating that e-readers have emotional implications for consumers as components of the self-concept/extended self. Prior literature has focused solely on the functional benefits associated with e-books but has not directly addressed the role of books in the self-concept.

Property websites have been widely used to simplify the complicated conventional booking system nowadays. However, the services provided by the property websites are limited to information searching and registration. The uptake of the e-booking system in the property industry is still sluggish. The purpose of this paper is to examine the potential of the e-booking system as the blue ocean in enhancing property developers’ competitive advantage, and also investigates the benefits and key features of the e-booking system in the Malaysian property industry.

A mixed method of questionnaire and interviews is used to investigate the acuities of potential purchasers on the concept and potential of the e-booking system in the Malaysian property industry.

The findings of the study revealed that the perception towards the application of the e-booking system is positive. The benefits and prominent features are identified. There are no significant differences in perceptions among the three generation cohorts comprising of Generation Y, Generation X, and Baby Boomers.

The sampling of this study is limited to the Klang Valley area only with the respondents mainly from Selangor and Kuala Lumpur. The small sample size may restrict the generalisation of the findings to represent the whole population of Malaysia.

These findings provide insights and guidelines for property developers in developing a strategic plan to introduce the e-booking system which can lead to a more efficient way of property purchasing process and praiseworthy users’ experience.

To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first paper that seeks to explore the potential of the online property transactions as a blue ocean strategy that will enhance property developers’ competitive advantage. As such, the key features identified in this study will be used in designing the e-booking system in the real estate market.

The purpose of the study is to review the e-books collection, namely, Ebrary Academic Complete, by understanding its features, cost and usage at Vikram Sarabhai Library, Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad (IIMA). The study attempts to understand the usefulness of Ebrary in terms of its currency of titles, publishers, subjects and cost.

The paper is based on five-year usage data of Ebrary Academic Complete at Vikram Sarabhai Library, IIMA. The data on usage of Ebrary was downloaded and analyzed on different parameters to find out the overall value or use of Ebrary Academic Complete package from the perspective of a management library.

The research concluded that there was an increase in usage of Ebrary Academic Complete over time. The subject analysis revealed that titles from “Business and Economics”, “Computers” and “Social Science” were the highest used. The publisher analysis indicated that John Wiley & Sons topped in both the highest number of titles in the package and highest used titles. The annual subscription fee model of Ebrary Academic Complete adopted by Vikram Sarabhai Library was working well with a gradual increase in usage bringing down the per title access costs.

The study helps in understanding the approach to evaluating e-book collections in terms of currency of content, subjects covered, publishers included and costs involved. The detailed analysis would assist libraries in decision-making with regard to e-book collection development.

This paper aims to understand e-books’ popularity in India and the potential of mobile devices to reach huge number of readers because of content absorption through mobile phones and iPods.

To accomplish the goal of this study, the author used a mixed method of study: an analysis of the academic literature, data collection through personal interaction, questionnaire survey and library website to understand users’ perceptions on potential of mobile devices on access to content, and appraised on mobile-friendly services in libraries and strategies for promoting mobile content and best practices.

The mobile age has brought tremendous scope for reading on low-cost mobile devices that are within the reach of almost every Indian and has incorporated optimism in a highly populated country like India. The technology and expertise for digitisation in India correlate with not only digital-savvy but also multimedia- and animation-skilled workforce, which altogether developed an ecosystem favourable for e-book production.

The literature on e-books in India is scanty, although there are a handful of case studies on academic libraries conducted by librarians but no systematic large-scale research on initiatives, advocacy programs and promotional processes to improve the overall scenario; this paper is an attempt to fill the gap.

This paper aims to explore current trends in e‐book lending in US academic libraries and describes the Kindle pilot for interlibrary loan at Eastern Washington University. It also seeks to examine previous e‐reader pilots at the University of Nebraska‐Omaha, and the Douglas County Library e‐book purchasing program.

The author surveys US libraries on e‐book lending practices and conducts a Kindle pilot program.

E‐book licensing agreements need to be re‐evaluated and interlibrary loan staff should be included in those negotiations.

This paper offers practical solutions for library e‐book lending.

The purpose of this paper is to describe a case study of developing a web service that will act as an intermediary between the Audio Library system for the visually impaired and the library management systems. The Audio Library is based on speech recognition and text-to-speech engines and it produces synthesized speech from various electronic materials. It has its own database with a limited number of books and textual materials. Web services described in this paper should enable access to a larger number of electronic resources provided by libraries.

In this paper, the author specified software architecture of a web service analyzing different approaches for search and retrieval.

Web service described in this paper is the first software solution addressing the problem of lending e-books in Serbia. It aggregates collections of different libraries in a single access point for the Audio Library system. In this way, users of the Audio Library system are provided with larger number of electronic resources.

Communication between the Audio Library and this web service is achieved by using standardized protocols for exchanging library data. However, those protocols did not fulfill all necessary requirements, so the authors propose some extensions to overcome those issues.

Due to the rapid pace of development and innovation in information technology, the dedicated electronic book (e‐book) reader has become a new trend in reading. However, at present there is only a limited understanding of what factors drive user attitudes/willingness to use this new device for reading. Hence, this paper aims to explore what factors drive users to use dedicated e‐book readers for reading.

The study proposes a causal model that explores how convenience, compatibility, and media richness affect users' attitudes towards the dedicated e‐book readers for reading.

The results of this study suggest that convenience, compatibility, and media richness all significantly contribute to dedicated e‐book reader acceptance.

The study extends previous theories: the Technology Acceptance Model, Innovation Diffusion Theory, media richness theory and convenience. This helps one to better understand what factors affect usage of the dedicated e‐book readers, an important topic for current and future research.

The findings outline and describe how the dominant factors affect users' attitudes towards adoption of the dedicated e‐book readers for reading. By considering factors such as ease‐of‐use, usefulness, convenience, compatibility, media richness, etc., in the stage of product development, practitioners can provide dedicated e‐book readers that customers will readily accept.

These findings will enable development of a more robust understanding of attitudes toward dedicated e‐book readers and will be helpful to developers researching e‐book hardware and software as well as to researchers interested in testing related theories.

The purpose of this study was to explore the level of awareness, use and attitudes of students regarding e-books.

This study used a quantitative research design based on the survey method. A structured questionnaire was designed and used for data collection from four different universities of Pakistan. A total of 305 responses were collected from a sample of 400, and 303 of those responses were used for data analysis.

The results of this study indicated that students were aware of e-books and used them in their daily lives. Most of the respondents had a positive attitude towards e-books and indicated that they considered e-books are easy to find and support them in their assignments. Online features of e-books were important to them. There was a significant difference of opinion found among students of different disciplines regarding the use of e-books.

This study was limited to four disciplines in four universities, one discipline per university. Therefore, its findings may not be applied to other universities or other disciplines.

This paper offers a new idea to academic libraries related to purchasing e-books. This study will provide guidelines to information professionals for development of their e-book collection and implementation of innovative approaches in library services or e-books services to facilitate their users according to their need.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study on the level of awareness, use and attitudes of university students towards e-books in Pakistan.