Oct 17, 2019
Macmillan Publishers is restricting sales as of Nov. 1 to protect author profits
CBC News · Posted: Oct 15, 2019 12:43 PM PT | Last Updated: October 15
Beginning in November, Macmillan Publishing will only allow libraries to purchase one copy of a new e-book during the first eight weeks it is on the market.
Librarians are upset and banding together following a recent decision by a major publishing house to limit their access to e-books.
Beginning Nov. 1, Macmillan Publishers, one of the so-called Big Five publishing companies in North America, will only allow libraries to purchase one copy of each new e-book for the first eight weeks after it has been released.
Librarians who say the decision is unfair to readers are campaigning against it.
"Don't treat us like an adversary, we're a stakeholder," said Ignacio Albarracin, public service manager of the Prince George Library, in an interview on CBC's Daybreak North.
Albarracin said the company is restricting sales because it thinks it will be good for their bottom line, but libraries are a primary customer for publishing houses and would buy more e-books if pricing and licensing terms were better, he said.
We nurture a culture of readers, so I think we definitely put back into the marketplace more than we put out," said Albarracin.
In a letter from Macmillan Publishers CEO John Sargent to Macmillan authors, illustrators and agents, Sargent says the company is responding to growing fears that library lending was "cannibalizing sales." He writes the new terms are designed to protect the value of the author's work.
