Oceanside library Web site to offer downloadable audiobooks

OCEANSIDE —— The Oceanside Public Library is now ironing out a few wrinkles in a new Internet program that will allow people to download and listen to recordings of books from their home computers and portable MP3 players.

Brad Penner, adult library services manager, said the library has contracted with the online site NetLibrary to offer more than 850 audiobook titles to library patrons. The new program, which is already available through the San Diego County Public Library system, will cost the library $6,000 and will be free to Oceanside library cardholders who sign up.

Penner said the new program, which will be available in the next week, is likely to be a big hit with the public since audiobooks are already popular at the city's two library branches.

"They get checked out an awful lot," he said of the library's collection of several hundred voice-recorded books.

The new program could also reel in more library patrons, he said.

"We can reach out to more of our local community this way," he said. "The one thing I like is the flexibility of it all."

Another pro, he said, is that there will be no such thing as books being checked out because there is no limit on the number of times a book can be downloaded at any given time. One con? It's not the simplest program to tackle, he said.

As of Friday the system was still being "tweaked." As with any Internet-based program, he said he anticipates some users may have trouble initially.

Once everything runs smoothly, users will be able to peruse, select, and download the audio files —- with the few clicks of a computer mouse —— on their home computers or MP3 players, which are portable computer audio file players.

That file will be good for three weeks and will then, by internal timer, "re-encrypt" itself so that the file will not be readable, according to Penner. People will be able to renew the book before the three weeks is up, or they may re-check, or re-download, the file, he said.

The selection of audiobooks covers all adult genres and interests, including popular fiction best-sellers, literature classics, history, finance, and science. Penner said there's even an unabridged Bible on the list.

The library is still working on adding a children's book section, he said.

In the next week, the downloadable files will be available using the library catalog at www.library.ci.oceanside.ca.us. Users will need an Oceanside Public Library card to access the NetLibrary.

Contact staff writer Louise Esola at (760)901-4151 or lesola@nctimes.com .

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