WEEK 9 - LIBRIVOX

I went to the www.Librivox.org site to see what it was about. It was interesting but I did not feel it was well-designed or of use to a library. It might be fun to play with in one's spare time.

Here are the problems I see Librivox:

1. I was unable to listen to any of the recordings. I clicked on a link to download an .mp3 and it seemed like it was downloading something but no message ever came up saying it was completed nor did the application specify where on the hard drive it was downloading the audio file to. I also kept seeing a message saying that "archive.org may be down" and I may not be able to access the files.

2. I read the forum's FAQ about how Librivox works. Based upon this, its seems like its interest to library patrons would be very limited. First, the recordings are done with little or no editorial review process of the quality of the recording itself or the person reading it. Thus, the person reading the book may not have a good speaking voice, misread parts of the books or not recorded it properly. I found this lack of quality control disturbing.

3. The books available had to be in the public domain and published before 1923. This greatly limits the books available for patrons to listen to.

Since there is no quality control of the recordings and the material is limited by the fact that it is in the public domain, I believe this site would not be useful to a public library. Patrons want to listen to recent bestsellers and popular fiction more than literature from the 19th century or earlier. The worst part is that by encouraging patrons to access material which may be inaccurate and of poor quality (anyone can record and post a book), the library would be sending the message that it is not concerned about whether the product/service it is offerring is authoritative or of high quality.