Thing 22 - Overdrive and Company

The links to access the Net Library and Overdrive tutorials did not work anymore. Since we have access to them in MCPL, I just went through our link to get to Overdrive. I explored some of their tutorials and explanations on how to download materials which I did not use last week when a customer tried download a book to his laptop. We tried to follow the instructions on the screen versus using the Overdrive Help. If I only had known a little more then, although my experience as described in the next paragraph reveals that it is not a simple and straightforward task. In addition, assisting someone with their laptop is different than doing it yourself on a computer you use daily.

Working on a secure network delayed my book audio and digital book downloading experience. Technology Management had to log on as an Administrator to authorize Overdrive Security software to be put on my machine. Once it was on my computer, I still had trouble getting the chosen book to download. I carefully followed the instructions and got the book downloaded but it would play but no sound. Playing around, I learned that by clicking on the play button on the Media Console, I could listen to the book but the popup window that displayed controlled stopping and starting. However, the play button available in the popup window was not the one to use which is why initially I did not have any sound, although plugging in the headphones could have been one reason (duh) but did not make any difference at that point.

I will be better prepared if the man mentioned above returns but the difficulty he faced and then my difficulties, made me realize the barriers that are created in accessing this material. I got frustrated with it all. When I downloaded McCullough's1776 several years ago, it was not this difficult nor do I remember any real barriers. I have downloaded pdf books at home (manybooks.net) and read books through Google Books without any trouble so I am wondering if we are setting up some people to fail. If they do not persevere or they do not ask for help from "experienced" library staff/friends than they just may give up on this possible technological aid, thinking it is their ineptness and not because of the hoops that the provider company makes them go through to get materials.

And to complicate the whole process, depending on what type of book you download you may need another type of software to be installed on your computer. One book I downloaded uses the Overdrive software referred to above but the second book I chose uses Adobe Digital Editions which meant another piece of software was needed to listen to that book. If it was my home computer I was going to download to; I might consider doing so if I really wanted to "read" that book; but listening to an audio book does not appeal to me since I do other things when using my home computer. Burning the book onto a CD is not my thing either since my commute is only 23 minutes. So I did not bother to arrange for an Administrator to set up that software on my work computer and I will cancel the book request.

This predicament/situation creates one more barrier to the end product user. What were they thinking? A company runs the risk of losing business since people will look elsewhere for a product which is easier to obtain. Not only that because I did not listen to that particular mystery, I may or may not discover a great author or book that I could share with a customer (reducing potential profits). Reviewing the unintended consequences - I did not listen to the book so I will not be sharing that title with a customer, my experience and who I tell, might mean other people will not use Overdrive (I will not, for one) because of all of the problems described above and fewer people are going to use the service that MCPL leases all because of the Overdrive software. These are the kinds of hassles which get in the way of good customer service.

Does Overdrive and Maryland's Digital eLibrary Consortium know how complicated this is? Has anyone bothered to let them? Whose responsibility is it to do so? Is it mine as the librarian/customer/marketer of their product? How can I promote a product which I do not use or have serious problems with? How can I convey to a customer how "wonderful" listening to downloable audio books is; when my experience is so negative? Before a company sells/provides a product, they must eliminate or resolve every barrier that slows down their connection to a customer. Obviously, this company has not done so but there are other companies who have. So maybe they need to learn how to do it better or else they will not be around long.