“But there is one thing I currently cannot do with my Kindle despite all the sizzle in the commercials–read public library books. Local libraries do not use the Kindle format for their electronic collections, relying instead on rival standards used by Sony Readers and certain other devices. Amazon undoubtedly would love to fix this under terms favorable to CEO Jeff Bezos and friends. But then other issues will remain. How many Kindle books–or those readable on Sony Readers, iPads, and others–will cash-strapped libraries in poorer cities be able to lend? What range of titles will be available? And shouldn’t we look beyond books and consider the needs of researchers who, for example, could benefit from reliably preserved electronic discussions linked to individual books.”
From David Rothman’s article in The Atlantic, “Why We Can’t Afford Not to Create a Well-Stocked National Digital Library System”