Page 166 - AC/E Digital Culture Annual Report

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PLACES AND GOOD PRACTICE
Examples of good practice in fostering digital reading in libraries
Libraries are undergoing changes designed to adapt their offering of documents and services, their procedures and their communication strategies to the digital context. Programmes and activities for improving users’ digital and information literacy have also become extremely important. One of the most evident aspects is the establishment of digital lending platforms that make digital reading materials available to users.
eBiblio189 is, as we have seen, Spanish public libraries’ free online lending service for digital books and audiobooks. It started out in 2014, at the initiative of the Ministry of Education, Cul- ture and Sport through the Deputy Directorate General for Library Coordination. It is run in coordination with the autonomous communi- ties and cities and aims to make available to users a service for borrowing electronic books through the respective public library networks.
Applications have also been developed in the related geographical areas to bring the platform closer to users and make it accessible through mobile devices.
As of 31 December 2016, eBiblio had a collection of 8,233 different items and 321,452 licences for using them; these figures represent an increase of 4,135 items (100%) and 81,295 licences (33.8%) with respect to the previous year. As for the
use of the service, during 2016 a total of 45,227 different users borrowed or reserved at least one item through eBiblio. That year its 45,227 active users carried out a total of 353,439 borrowing transactions, marking a 43.6% increase with respect to the 107,324 recorded in 2015.
eLiburutegia190 is, as we have also seen, the loan service of the Basque Country public reading network, which encourages the reading of digital content on the Internet, in streaming, on com- puters and on mobile devices. The initiative was started up in 2014 by the Culture Department of the Basque Government to facilitate the lending
PLACES AND GOOD PRACTICE
Readers in the digital age