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Found out my local library's digital checkout is 5x more popular than physical books

I was poking around on the library website in Portland last week and stumbled on their annual report. Turns out they did 1.2 million ebook and audiobook checkouts last year compared to only 240,000 physical books. I guess I shouldn't be surprised since I'm guilty of just downloading stuff from bed myself. Has anyone else noticed their library sharing stats like this?
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2 Comments
grant.margaret
Bet those digital checkouts still beat physical books even during the pandemic.
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grant130
grant13018h ago
Margaret they actually shot up during the pandemic. I remember seeing my library's stats for 2020 and 2021 and the digital checkouts nearly doubled while physical stayed flat. Not surprising since nobody wanted to touch shared stuff back then. But the weird thing is the digital numbers never dropped back down after things reopened, they just kept climbing. Kinda makes you wonder if physical books are gonna go the way of DVD rentals at this rate.
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