Former Vancouver City Librarian Paul Whitney has been engaged by the Canada Council on behalf of the Public Lending Right Commission to carry out a study on eBooks and their potential impacts on PLR in Canada. Paul will be assisted by Olivier Charbonneau of Concordia University Library who will be liasing with Quebec publishers and public libraries. Both Paul and Olivier have both served on the PLR Commission and Commission Executive.
“With the assistance of the CULC Executive Director, Jefferson Gilbert, Paul will be surveying and in discussions with PLR sampled CULC/CBUC libraries to assess the present state of eBook collections and emerging trends in Canadian public libraries. Interviews ware being undertaken with representatives of the key publishing stakeholders on the rapid changes taking place with Canadian eBook production and distribution to libraries.”