The Monday Muse is a back after a hiatus and this week we’re doing something slightly different. A few weeks ago, several of us had an email conversation about the parallel importation of books in Australia. What follows is a slightly edited and tidied up version of that conversation.

But first, what is parallel importation? There is a lot of information on the Productivity Commission’s website, but here’s a good basic summary of the issues:

When a bookshop imports copies of a book published overseas that are also available from an Australian publisher, this is parallel importing. Parallel importing (in theory if not always in practice) gives customers cheaper books and a greater range of titles. On the other hand, parallel imports make it much harder for local publishers to survive and this reduces the support available to local authors in the early stages of their careers. Australia has a fascinating (and in my opinion eminently practical) compromise: parallel imports are allowed if a book is published overseas and no Australian publisher issues a local edition within 30 days. This may be about to change. [Garth Nix, Nick Earls against parallel imports, Talking Squid]

It seems that there is no consensus amongst Australian librarians about this issue. On the one hand, peak bodies such as ALIA, CAUL and National and State Libraries Australasia support lifting the restrictions. On the other hand, other bodies such as the Australian School Library Association and Public Libraries, New South Wales – Country Association wrote submissions against lifting the parallel importation restrictions

Onto the conversation about this…

Morgan: I’ve been aware of the debate about the parallel importation provisions concerning books in the Australian Copyright Act for only a little while. Several weeks ago, there was some interesting discussion in the WAIN list about this. ALIA has made a submission for lifting the restrictions on the parallel importation of books, which should reduce increase competition and reduce the price of books in Australia.

It seems that on this issue, ALIA has the same bottom line position as the big retailers, including Coles, Woolworths, K-Mart and Dymocks and is on the other side of the fence from Australian authors and publishers.

Maybe it makes no sense for these cultural protections to be in the Copyright Act, as ALIA mentions. Under most circumstances, I’d be happy to see any scaling back of the Copyright Act. But this isn’t really a debate about IP. ALIA tries to respond to the argument that these changes will hurt the Australian publishing industry by stating that the New Zealand publishing industry had not been hurt by similar changes in NZ. But that didn’t sound too convincing, especially after I read the submissions from the NZ publishers and authors, stating that the changes there had hurt the NZ industry.

I think it’s an interesting topic because both sides have validity. Why should Australians pay significantly more for books – how does this impact libraries and readers? On the other hand, if these changes hurt the Australian publishing industry, who will identify and support Australian voices?

Con: This would be an interesting topic! Can I admit now that I haven’t made up my mind on this yet??

Morgan: My mind isn’t totally made up on this either. I am leaning towards the “no” side, but I’m willing to be convinced.
Looking at ALIA’s full submission, this point does seem reasonable:

International publishers continue to be significant beneficiaries of the current restrictions, as the subsidiaries or branch offices of international publishers in Australia can take advantage of a distribution monopoly that prevents retailers from sourcing cheaper books from overseas.

Protectionist policy is a blunt tool for providing incentives for local publishers, and we strongly agree with the position outlined in the Issues Paper:

[I]f the government has the objective of assisting Australian book producers (whether authors, publishers or printers), direct subsidies or other policy instruments could achieve this objective at less cost to the community than is associated with parallel importation provisions.

So the debate isn’t so clear cut as small independent Aussie publishers versus those money grubbing multinationals.

On the other hand, if they did ease the restrictions on parallel importation, I am extremely skeptical that any government would ever introduce direct subsidies to independent Australian publishers which they contemplate in the last paragraph.

Kathryn: If it is the PI rights that restrict other media of the work from being distributed in a market, then I am totally against. It is impossible to legally obtain electronic copies of many books, and people who want to read them are forced to resort to Other Methods.

snail: I have so far written a 3-4 paragraph post for my blog on related matters. ie how I’m buying more and more books via amazon, etc because I can get them for half of what I can locally.

Richard Flanagan wrote a good article in the weekend SMH [link, also published here - the remarks on PI start on page 3 of the pdf], arguing against the changes in terms of what they mean for local authors. I see his point but feel the argument is somewhat lost already by the reality of the net especially when we now have things such as:

http://www.booko.com.au
which makes it way easy to do all the cross country comparisons I was doing manually prior. Have ISBN, will find

I recently read an interview with a Spanish writer, Zafon, which rather impressed me. The local shops only had the paperback of his previous novel, The Shadow of the Wind. I hooked into booko and found a limited edition (1000 copies, nicely bound (fine paper, deluxe cloth, sewn binding), and signed) via Amazon US which was 40% off (now 37% off) and will cost me about AUD$71 including delivery.

I can’t source that locally. There’s a bunch of stuff that I can get for half of what it costs locally and don’t get me started on the OED pricing.

The Australian bookbuying market is being gouged royally, and mostly by the English publishers. The proposed changes seem to be swinging the pendulum from the English publishers to the US publishers.

Michelle: Very good topic and as I am also sitting on the fence, I would love to see the arguments and hopefully the comments that will come with it, before I decide for myself.

Corey: Here’s an article which outlines another facet of the issue:

Damn Publishers
By Melissa Gregg
The Excellence in Research for Australia initiative will make publishing outcomes more important than ever. But present indicators of academic merit appear poised to punish Australian research for its very Australian-ness.

Essentially it is arguing that:
- The research is Australian focused and yet the Australian publishers won’t publish it as they focus on text books
- The international publishers won’t publish it because it has an Australian focus.

It occured to me that perhaps this is a sign of a monopolistic market in that the Australian publishers can afford to be picky about this because they’ve all got the same sorts of policies.

Fiona: Good point Corey!

It’s been a long time since I thought about this issue and I can’t remember the main points, but it struck me as being similar to the dual importation of CDs argument which ended up being a non-starter because people didn’t like buying inferior, cheap CDs in the end so they weren’t widely sold.

I’d be interested in the quality viewpoint of this – is it better to have books produced more cheaply in a country that can, for example, ramp up green printing facilities, or maintain Australian employment? I know that when I buy books I like to check and see where they were printed and I won’t buy expensive paperbacks if they were printed overseas or the binding is flimsy.

For something a little light-hearted check out the Amazon Kindling..

It may be weird but its not wired

Image by Oskay reproduced under a Creative Commons License. More images on Flickr.

 - Posted on behalf of Michael Stephens -

Dear Australian library colleagues,

You may have seen the announcement earlier this year where I was appointed as the 2009 CAVAL Visiting Scholar. My research, “Measuring the Value and Effect of Learning 2.0 Programs in Libraries” will evaluate the impact of Learning 2.0 programs in Australia and the perceived levels of openness, transparency and trust by staff in organizations that have completed the course.

Now it’s time for me to ask for your help!

If you have completed a 23 Things / Learning 2.0 program, I’d like to invite you to participate in an online survey.

Please take 10 to 15 minutes to complete this online survey.

If you have any questions or concerns about the survey, please contact me (email is on front of survey).

If have been the person responsible for developing and/or implementing a 23 Things / Learning 2.0 program for your library (single library service or a consortia program), please email your contact details to Warren Cheetham at CityLibraries Townsville (warren.cheetham@townsville.qld.gov.au). I have a special survey which Warren will send to you, just for people who have lead a learning 2.0 program.

Thank you for your participation in my research. I am looking forward to my trip to Australia in October!

Best wishes,

Michael Stephens ~

Assistant Professor, Dominican University GSLIS
Tame the Web: Libraries & Technology: http://www.tametheweb.com

According to a recent study from Harvard, file sharing and copyright as they stand at present, are beneficial to society.

The working paper “File sharing and Copyright” from economists at the Harvard Business School,  raised important issues including:

• File sharing has not discouraged creative production. Although album sales have fallen, the number of albums being created has grown dramatically. This trend can be seen across all creative industries.
• Downloaded songs can increase sales, with mashups potentially leading to increased sales and any such works leading to increased attention for an artist and therefore increased sales
• File sharing may not result in decreased creativity, as there may be increased sales on complementary services such as concerts/speaking tours etc.

Very interesting to see that its not all bad news for the publishers etc, who try so hard to increase copyright protections.  To do so in light of the data this study brings out, could seriously affect their bottom line and would seriously impact future creative production.

If you don’t want to read the full paper, Michael Geist has a good summary.

Some of the work that the THALI has put into the Libraries Interact blog is featured in a chapter in the just released Library Mashups: Exploring New Ways to Deliver Library Data published by Information Today, Inc.

The chapter focuses on the three plugins that we have developed to extend the Libraries Interact blog and have released to the WordPress community. WordPress is the software that runs our blog.

The three plugins were developed by me working closely with the THALI. The plugins are:

1. Blogroll to Google CSE plugin
   A plugin that allows users of the WordPress system to manage links to websites that are automatically used to construct a Google Custom Search Engine. We use the plugin here for the Aussie Library Blogs page.
2. Citation Aggregator
   A plugin that aggregates links (citations) from various social bookmarking websites. The links can then be used to construct a post that list the links automatically. We’ll be using this plugin shortly for a series of Reading Room posts.
3. Diverse Group Tag Cloud
   A plugin that aggregates posts from a specified list of blogs and uses content analysis to construct a tag cloud. We use this plugin for the THALI Tags page.

The book is supported by the Library Mashups website managed by the editor of the book Nicole C. Engard. The site has a list of chapters and lists of links relevant to the topics covered in the book.

The University of Technology Sydney (UTS) Library recently gave students the chance to win $1,000 in the UTS LIB:Flicks 2009 competition.

Students submitted short videos (less than 2min) to promote UTS Library services and resources to new undergraduate students

The winners were announced the other day at a premier event held in the Library and the prizes were: 1st $(1000), 2nd ($600) and 3rd ($200).

Their videos can be seen at http://www.youtube.com/utslibrary or below.

Which video did you like the best?

In news just to hand, the lawsuit filed by Thomson Reuters (EndNote) against Zotero has been dismissed.

I have three thoughts on this:

1. Thank goodness
2. How many libraries actively promote Zotero for their users?
3. I got this news via Twitter – it’s becoming a really good source for news.

ALIA today launched its Twitter presence using the name @ALIANational. I’m looking forward to seeing how this works out. There are different challenges for an association as opposed to a personal Tweeter. Follow and take part in this new way of conversing with your professional association.

Australian Library & Information Association (ALIANational) on Twitter

I wish that the iPhone didn’t have the word “phone” in its name. I understand *why* Apple decided on that name, but I don’t think of it as a phone. To me it’s a hand-held computer that I use to connect to other people and to run small applications that make my life easier.

It has limitations – not being able to cut and paste text, run more than one application at a time or use the camera to shoot video are problems.

When I travelled overseas, I used downloaded applications on my  iPhone to:

• get real time updates on my flight times and gates
• show me on a map how to get from where I was to where I needed to be
• record interviews for research
• calculate the tip I should give on a bill
• record expenses on the go (including a facility to photograph receipts and add them to my database)
• play movies on the plane
• read several ebooks whenever and wherever I was
• find the nearest wifi
• wake me up in the morning
• show me how long I had during conference presentations
• suggest a place to eat in the local area with the cuisine and price I wanted
• photograph books and see online what they were and how much they cost
• edit photographs and upload them instantly to Flickr
• keep me in touch with friends via Twitter when I was walking in the dark back to a rather seedy motel

The iPhone and phones that use the Android Operating System (which is *mainly* Open Source) allow users to download and install a plethora of programs to take advantage of not only the phone and internet connection, but the camera, microphone and accelerometer in the devices.

How do you think these may affect librarianship? How can library staff use them? How can we offer our services to our users with next gen mobiles? Do you have a favourite app that you use and would recommend to others?

Here are a few ideas to get you started.

• In February, Kenley Neufeld listed his Top 10 iPhone Apps for Librarians .
• Aaron Schmidt from the DC Public Libraries has released the code for an iPhone App that allows library users to search the catalogue, place holds and find opening hours ,DCPL iPhone application ready for download
• The University of Bath Library has added QR codes to records in the catalogue so that users can scan them using free software that will then show them the author, title and location of the item, QR Codes in the Library .
• The Abilene Christian University in Texas has produced a video showing a fictional account of what could happen if the entire campus of students and academics were connected using a next gen mobile, Connected

This week our focus comes from The vulgar modernisaton of libraries – a piece from Chris Saliba on the ABC’s Unleashed, which bemoans the changes in libraries (his focus being mainly public and the State Library of Queensland).  “Libraries were for reading and contemplation. But all of that is out the window as libraries now offer a multi-media extravaganza.”  It is well worth reading the article, if you haven’t done so already and the 25 pages of comments that go with it.

From my experiences working in a public library, this is a regular reaction we get to new things we introduce. Most recently, we got this reaction when we introduced gaming consoles into the library.   Before that, it was DVDs, and then going back further, the Internet and even further back, paperback romances of all things.

However, there have been things happening in public libraries too that have not always been for the best or for which great debate has raged for ages.  Overdue fines is one of the more controversial.  So despite trends and public opinion, libraries don’t always get it right.

How do you see whats happening in libraries?  Is reading “out the window” as Saliba puts it? Should CDs and DVDs …”representation on library shelves.. be kept to a minimum”? Where do libraries “stand in relation to the technology”? “Does access to Facebook really belong inside a library”?  Not according to Saliba.

I would love to hear your thoughts on these questions and others that are raised through this article and the many comments on it. I know not everything introduced into libraries is supported by all library staff, from both personal and professional experience. Is there something appearing in libraries that you don’t agree with?  If so, what and why?

Is this the way that libraries should be heading – yes or no – why?  And if not, which way should libraries be heading?  The future of libraries is uncertain and should be in all our thoughts. If you’re not thinking about that yet, its best to start doing so now.

Michelle