Project Goals
The goal of this project is to allow residents of Washington State access to downloadable audiobooks by negotiating a statewide price that would make the product more affordable for libraries, and by using LSTA (Library Services and Technology Act) funds to partially subsidize the costs.
This is an open-ended project, with no planned end date. However, in an ideal situation, the project will eventually become self-sustaining, without the need for subsidy funding.
News:
OCLC NetLibrary Recorded Books Launch Date Announced!
We are pleased to announce that the contract negotiations with OCLC have been successfully concluded, and that everything is lined up for a March 1, 2010 launch date for the OCLC NetLibrary Recorded Books collections.
Watch this space for further information. An OCLC Order Form will need to be filled out by each participating library, school, or school district, and a Member Audio Books Agreement (license) will need to be signed by each participant as well. Those documents will be posted here as soon as they become available.
Recruitment Deadline Extended
The recruitment deadline for public and academic libraries has been extended through February 17. For K-12 libraries, there are no signup deadlines; K-12 libraries may join the project at any time. We can still accept additional public libraries into the OverDrive consortium until further notice as well.
The recruitment phase of the project was officially launched on Thursday, December 3. The initial deadline for responding was December 21, 2009. Please visit the project recruitment page for more information, and to fill out the "intent to participate" form.
Recruitment Report
We are please to announce a very successful recruitment phase for the project as follows:
OverDrive: 15 public libraries will join the existing 9 library members of the OverDrive consortium, thus almost tripling the membership. These 15 new libraries represent a 64% increase in population served by the consortium.
OCLC NetLibrary Recorded Books: 33 public libraries, 8 academic libraries, and over 300 K-12 school libraries have signed up to purchase one or more of the OCLC NetLibrary Recorded Books collections. This means that there will be an automatic 10% discount off the prices for these collections as listed on the project recruitment web page. 41 libraries (other than K-12) were needed for this discount to apply, and we reached that number exactly! Needless to say, we doubled the 20 libraries required to insure the low K-12 pricing.
Go Live Date Delayed
The actual "go live" date for the OCLC NetLibrary Recorded Books collections is now anticipated to be March 1, 2010. For libraries that choose OverDrive, the launch date will be later, probably May 1, due to OverDrive's existing development schedule. The reason for the delay is additional administrative work that must be completed, including vendor forms which must be filled out by participating libraries. Contract negotiations took longer than expected, which is why posting the vendor forms was delayed.
Project Funding Information
$149,000 in LSTA (Library Services and Technology Act) funding, administered through IMLS (the Institute for Museum and Library Services) is available for subidizing this project through September 30, 2010. $125,000 in LSTA funding is available for the following 12 months, October 1, 2010 through September 20, 2011. LSTA funding allocations for future years have not yet been determined.
It is the goal of this project to gradually become self-sustaining, without long-term subsidies. However, the need for additional subsidy funding will be assessed on an annual basis as the project goes forward. It is the intention of the project to continue indefinitely, so long as Washington libraries are interested in offering downloadable audiobooks to their patrons.
For more information, including pricing, and signup documents, please visit the project recruitment page.
Vendor Links:
OverDrive: http://overdrive.com/
OCLC NetLibrary: http://netlibrary.com/
Ingram Digital: http://www.ingramdigital.com/libraries/
History
The Washington State Library released on an RFP (Request for Proposals) for downloadable audiobook eContent services on June 1, 2009 . The goal of this RFP was to secure one or more contracts for services to expand the reach of downloadable audiobooks content to libraries throughout Washington State, including public, academic, and K-12 libraries.
The RFP was made available online through WEBS (Washington’s Electronic Business Solution) at www.ga.wa.gov/webs and from the Office of the Secretary of State’s “current procurements” page: www.secstate.wa.gov/office/procurements.aspx. All questions about the procurement process and about this project in general, should be directed to RFP Coordinator and Project Manager, Will Stuivenga, who can be reached at will.stuivenga@sos.wa.gov or 360.704.5217.
The deadline for proposals was 4:30 p.m., Pacific Daylight Time, June 30, 2009. The project advisory committee reviewed and scored the proposals that were received and made recommendations for awarding contracts as follows:
- OverDrive was designated an apparent successful vendor for public libraries that currently do not have OverDrive subscriptions.
- OCLC NetLibrary was designated an apparent successful vendor for public, academic, and K-12 libraries in Washington.
Additional Information
A needs assessment survey was completed early on in the process. Staff from all types of Washington libraries participated in the survey. In total, the survey received over 356 responses. A summary of the survey results is available here.
The original proposal for this project was submitted by Eileen Simmons, Everett Public Library. Read the original proposal here.
An e-mail discussion list, Washington Audiobooks (WA-AUDIOBKS) has been created for the purpose of disseminating news and infomation about the project, and to provide a forum for discussing the project. To sign up for the list, visit the state library’s e-mail list page: www.secstate.wa.gov/quicklinks/lists.
An Advisory Committee of librarians representing different types of libraries and the various geographical regions of the state has been appointed to guide the development of the project. Each committee member is expected to represent the library constituency or constiuencies to which he or she belongs.
If you have ideas or suggestions for the project, please feel free to submit them to an advisory committee member or to WSL project staff. Questions about the project may be directed to project staff (below).
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Funded in part by the Institute for Museum and Library Services (IMLS) through the Library Services and Technology Act (LSTA).
