The Publisher's Play

Pre-2010: Publishers' Fear of Digital Piracy

In the early 2000s, publishers panicked. Napster had decimated the music industry. Torrents were proliferating. Digital Rights Management (DRM) became the obsession: how to make ebooks impossible to copy, impossible to share, impossible to preserve without permission.

Publishers saw libraries as potential piracy vectors. Free library lending, they feared, would substitute for consumer purchases. A single digital copy borrowed by thousands could cannibalize millions in sales. The solution: restrict library access through licensing terms and DRM enforcement. This wasn't about protecting readers; it was about protecting unit economics.

Copyright law gave publishers the legal tools. They could claim exclusive distribution rights. They could refuse to license to libraries on reasonable terms. They could impose restrictions that would never have passed in the print world because, under copyright law, they had absolute rights to the digital format. There was no First Sale Doctrine to stop them.

2010–2019: Building Walls

HarperCollins" 26-checkout limit (2011) was strategic brilliance dressed as policy. Librarians couldn\'t legally challenge it because copyright law gave publishers absolute control. When librarians boycotted, HarperCollins simply waited. Within two years, the majority returned and accepted the terms. Publishers learned: they held all the leverage.

The embargo strategy came next. Macmillan\'s 8-week new title embargo (2019) proved that publishers could manufacture artificial scarcity. Libraries couldn\'t get new books on day one. Readers would see the titles in bookstores but not in libraries. Over time, some readers would give up on libraries and buy the books instead. Mission accomplished.

Time-limited licenses were another control mechanism. Print books last decades. An ebook license expired after two years, forcing libraries to repurchase the same titles repeatedly. Publishers transformed libraries from one-time customers into recurring revenue streams. Simultaneously, they weakened libraries" negotiating position: budget-strapped libraries couldn\'t afford to maintain growing digital collections under perpetually rising costs.

The Big Five publishers (Penguin Random House, Hachette, HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, and Macmillan) coordinated informally on these restrictions. Agency pricing agreements (later challenged in court) allowed them to control ebook prices and licensing terms together. Smaller publishers watched and copied the model. Libraries faced a united front.

2019–2025: Consolidation Payoff

KKR's acquisition of Simon & Schuster (2022) signaled that publishing had become a financial asset class. Private equity firms saw library restrictions as profit-maximizing features, not customer relationship problems. S&S, the smallest Big Five publisher, became tighter-fisted on licensing terms and more aggressive on pricing.

Simultaneously, Rakuten\'s acquisition of OverDrive (2015) created a vertical integration opportunity that publishers exploited. OverDrive, the dominant library platform, was now owned by a Japanese e-commerce giant focused on expansion and profitability. Publishers negotiated directly with OverDrive\'s management about which titles got recommended, how prominent indie titles appeared in search results, and what licensing terms would be "standard."

By 2022-2025, the standard library ebook license looked like this: 2-year expiration, 26-checkout limit, $60-80 price tag for a $15 consumer purchase, no simultaneous readers beyond 1-2, and new titles restricted to metered access during the embargo period. Libraries had no choice but to accept because alternatives had vanished. OverDrive, the only platform left standing, had become the rent-collector for the publishing industry.

Publishers watched their unit economics improve. Libraries spent more per title. Fewer libraries could afford comprehensive collections. Reader access declined. And libraries blamed OverDrive while OverDrive blamed publishers. Publishers got exactly what they wanted: profitable, controlled, restricted access that maximized revenue while minimizing threat to their retail bookstore business models.

Indie Authors: Different Incentives

Indie authors operate under fundamentally different market incentives than Big Five publishers. An indie author\'s revenue comes directly from reader sales (Amazon KDP, Draft2Digital, Smashwords) and library lending (Scribd, Standard Ebook, Project Gutenberg). They don\'t have a print bookstore business to protect. They don't fear library cannibalization because libraries expand their reach and generate reader interest.

Many indie authors explicitly opt into library lending programs because it drives consumer discovery. They price ebooks competitively. They allow unlimited simultaneous lending. They don't impose time limits or checkout restrictions. Why? Because their business model depends on reader engagement, not scarcity control.

This creates an interesting market dynamic: readers increasingly find that indie-published ebooks have better terms, broader availability, and lower prices than Big Five titles. Libraries can offer indie authors' work without the licensing restrictions strangling their collections. Some readers are migrating toward indie authors precisely because Big Five restrictions reduce access.

The Big Five could adopt indie-style licensing. They choose not to because their business model (controlling distribution through bookstores, pricing ebooks near-physical book levels, and extracting maximum revenue per title) depends on restricting access. That strategic choice has consequences: readers, libraries, and society lose. Indie authors gain market share. The market is slowly optimizing against Big Five control, not through regulation or legislation, but through competition.