Fee-Based Libraries Were Like Netflix for Books, 200 Years Ago

Not a very great article at all, imho. There are a few glaring issues, first and foremost, there are tons of libraries that are available for free. Then even if you restrict yourself to a Kindle, as I do, there are tons of free novels purely on Amazon.com alone for free download and reading, zero monthly fee. Then there are tons of authors in their program who, like me, regularly give away ebooks which they had previously offered for free in the hopes of encouraging people to enjoy the brand and buy more later.

When I review a site like Author Earnings dot com (no affiliation, other than being a huge fan of such an amazing amount of free and open data) it shows pretty clearly that, "An Indie author can make it." In fact, the bulk of the data shows Indies have as good a chance, or better, at cracking the best seller list on the site.

For free, on both sides of the interest pool for authors and readers, there is a ton of value and a growing amount of it. Then if you start looking at other models like Issuu (recently on the app store, after long absence) and Wattpad, it really makes you scratch your head at the tone of the article.

Without the preface, "For newbies to the publishing category," it reads like a poorly articulated puff piece. Sorry.

> "Today’s circulating libraries are hardly perfect. Not all publishers participate, and you won’t find many of the newest books. As with all e-books, privacy is a concern because someone will always know what you’re reading. On the other hand, all-you-can eat pricing certainly promotes feasting."

Feasting .. without newest books and only a few publishers?

No mention of Archive.org, the web and CC-licensed content, none of which existed 200 years ago, all of which compete with Oyster et al.

Or the difference between ownership (purchase and First Sale doctrine, including the ability for descendants to inherit ownership), renting (Oyster), licensing (Kindle) and shared access to a city-funded-and-owned resource (public library).