Levine-Clark, Michael, “Diving into eBook Usage: Assessing the Swell of Information,” Electronic Resources & Libraries, Austin, March 17, 2014.

1. Diving Into E-Book Usage: Navigating
the Swell of Information
ER&L
Austin
March 17, 2014
Michael Levine-Clark
Associate Dean for Scholarly Communication and Collections Services
University of Denver Libraries

2. What can we learn by examining usage of
750,000+ e-books?
• Does quality matter?
• Are there general patterns by subject?
• Can we identify disciplinary preferences?
• What are the best ways to measure use?
• Can those patterns and preferences help
shape our collections and guide our services?

3. Coming Soon:
More data, with more solid
conclusions

4. The Data Set
• 2010
– 435,417 titles
– 5,295 libraries
• 2011
– 537,743 titles
– 5,899 libraries
• 2012
– 667,427 titles
– 6,474 libraries
• 2013 (through Sept 4)
– 776,060 titles
– 7,118 libraries
• 2011
– 225,448 titles
– 291 libraries
• 2012
– 320,796 titles
– 411 libraries
• 2013 (through Sept 9)
– 378,530 titles
– 587 libraries

5. Combined Data
• 2010-Sept 2013
• 435,417 titles
• 304,417 with an LC call
number
• 32,988 university press
titles
• 2011-Sept 2013
• 217,457 titles
• 210,539 titles with an LC
call number
• 21,089 university press
titles

6. Usage Definitions
• Session
– Any time that a user interacts with an e-book
• View
– A count of the number of pages examined
• Download
– A download of the entire book

7. Some aspects of usage aren’t
comparable
• ebrary has far more libraries than EBL, and an
extra year of data
– Averages and totals only useful when comparing
within one aggregator
• There may be some platform differences that
drive usage in different ways:
– More downloads on EBL = fewer pages viewed

8. Call Numbers
• Assigned to some books, but not all
• More for EBL than ebrary
• Call numbers may be inconsistently applied
– Will soon have set with combined titles and single
call number

9. Breadth vs Depth
PERCENTAGE OF TITLES USED
AVERAGEAMOUNTOFUSE

10. DO HIGHER-QUALITY E-BOOKS GET
USED MORE?

11. University Press Books
• A proxy for quality
• ebrary – 32,988 titles
• EBL – 21,089 titles
Do better books get used at a higher rate?

12. Overall Usage:
titles with at least one session
69.61%
88.33%91.72% 89.00%
93.76% 93.80%
0.00%
10.00%
20.00%
30.00%
40.00%
50.00%
60.00%
70.00%
80.00%
90.00%
100.00%
ebrary EBL
All Titles Titles with LC Call Number University Press Titles

13. Overall Usage:
average sessions per title
across all libraries
147.43
69.39
208.64
70.99
339.01
76.74
0
50
100
150
200
250
300
350
400
ebrary EBL
All Titles Titles with LC Call Number University Press Titles

14. Overall Usage:
titles viewed at least once
69.15%
87.30%
91.70%
88.01%
93.74% 92.82%
0.00%
10.00%
20.00%
30.00%
40.00%
50.00%
60.00%
70.00%
80.00%
90.00%
100.00%
ebrary EBL
All Titles Titles with LC Call Number University Press Titles

15. Overall Usage:
average page views per title
across all libraries
2245.23
1310.39
3174.31
1341.91
5203.82
1499.78
0
1000
2000
3000
4000
5000
6000
ebrary EBL
All Titles Titles with LC Call Number University Press Titles

16. Overall Usage:
titles with at least one full download
24.35%
59.12%
34.42%
59.83%
40.12%
67.77%
0.00%
10.00%
20.00%
30.00%
40.00%
50.00%
60.00%
70.00%
80.00%
ebrary EBL
All Titles Titles with LC Call Number University Press Titles

17. Overall Usage:
average downloads per title
across all libraries
2.77
9.34
3.95
9.54
5.64
10.41
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
ebrary EBL
All Titles Titles with LC Call Number University Press Titles

18. University Press Summary
• Used at a higher rate across all categories
BUT
• University press books may be available in
more libraries

19. BROAD DISCIPLINARY DIFFERENCES

20. The Disciplines
Humanities
B (Philosophy, Religion)
excluding BF (Psychology)
C, D, E, F (History)
M (Music)
N (Fine Arts)
P (Language & Literature)
Social Sciences
BF (Psychology)
H (Social Sciences)
J (Political Science)
K (Law)
L (Education)
U, V (Military, Naval Sciences)
STEM
Q (Science)
R (Medicine)
S (Agriculture)
T (Technology)

21. Percentage of Titles Used
ebrary
Discipline % Titles with a
Session
% Titles Viewed % Titles
Downloaded
Humanities 92.05% 92.04% 40.87%
Social Sciences 92.70% 92.69% 36.40%
STEM 90.19% 90.17% 27.53%
Baseline (all titles with an LCCN) 91.72% 91.70% 34.42%

22. Percentage of Titles Used
EBL
Discipline % Titles with a
Session
% Titles Viewed % Titles
Downloaded
Humanities 88.44% 87.19% 58.62%
Social Sciences 89.95% 89.12% 62.40%
STEM 88.30% 87.35% 57.68%
Baseline (all titles with an LCCN) 89.00% 88.01% 59.83%

23. Average Usage
ebrary
Discipline Sessions Page Views Full Downloads
Humanities 207.79 3122.16 3.95
Social Sciences 251.21 3766.11 4.74
STEM 162.57 2570.70 3.16
Baseline (all titles with LCCN) 208.64 3174.31 3.95

24. Average Usage
EBL
Discipline Sessions Page Views Full Downloads
Humanities 54.18 999.12 6.76
Social Sciences 91.96 1694.91 12.54
STEM 59.90 1192.46 8.32
Baseline (all titles with LCCN) 70.99 1341.91 9.54

25. Actions Per Session
ebrary
Discipline Views Per Session Downloads Per
Session
Humanities 15.03 0.019
Social Sciences 14.99 0.019
STEM 15.81 0.019
Baseline (all titles with an LCCN) 15.21 0.019

26. Actions Per Session
EBL
Discipline Views Per Session Downloads Per
Session
Humanities 18.44 0.125
Social Sciences 18.43 0.136
STEM 19.91 0.139
Baseline (all titles with an LCCN) 18.90 0.134

27. Disciplinary Summary
• Social sciences far outperform humanities and
STEM in two categories
– Percentage of books used
– Average amount of use
• Humanities stronger than STEM on ebrary
• STEM stronger than humanities on EBL
• STEM outperforms the others in actions per
session

28. MEASURING PREDICTED USE

29. Difference from Predicted Use
LC Class % of eBooks
available
% of titles with
a session
Difference
A – General Works 0.19% 0.19% 0.00%
B – Philos, Psych, Religion 7.03% 6.88% -0.16%
C – Aux Sciences of History 0.40% 0.41% +0.01%
D – World History, etc. 3.70% 3.73% +0.03%
E – History of the Americas 1.65% 1.71% +0.06%
F – History of the Americas 1.96% 1.85% -0.11%
G – Geog, Anthro, Rec 2.94% 3.01% +0.07%
H – Social Sciences 21.98% 22.27% +0.29%
J – Political Science 3.40% 3.50% +0.10%
K – Law 3.33% 3.29% -0.04%

30. Difference from Predicted Use
LC Class % of eBooks
available
% of titles with
a session
Difference
L - Education 4.61% 4.80% +0.19%
M - Music 0.81% 0.85% +0.04%
N – Fine Arts 1.06% 1.10% +0.04%
P – Language & Literature 10.87% 11.00% +0.13%
Q - Science 13.09% 12.51% -0.58%
R - Medicine 10.83% 10.73% -0.10%
S - Agriculture 2.01% 2.08% +0.07%
T - Technology 8.65% 8.69% +0.04%
U – Military Science 0.69% 0.58% -0.11%
V – Naval Science 0.12% 0.12% 0.00%
Z – Bibliography and LIS 0.67% 0.69% -0.02%

31. % of titles used (breadth)

32. % of titles used (breadth)

33. % of overall usage (depth)

34. % of overall usage (depth)

35. Performance Compared to Expected Use
Better than expected (top five)
• H (Social Sciences)
• L (Education)
• G (Geography,
Anthropology, Recreation)
• N (Fine Arts)
• D (World History)
Worse than expected (bottom five)
• Q (Science)
• F (History of the Americas)
• P (Language & Literature)
• K (Law)
• U (Military Science)

36. INTENSIVE / EXTENSIVE USE

37. ebrary Sessions – Avg and %
Narrow (low %) but
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Broad (high %) and
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Narrow (low %) and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)
Broad (high % and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)

38. EBL Sessions – Avg and %
Narrow (low %) but
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Broad (high %) and
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Narrow (low %) and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)
Broad (high % and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)

39. ebrary Page Views – Avg and %
Narrow (low %) but
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Broad (high %) and
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Narrow (low %) and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)
Broad (high % and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)

40. EBL Page Views – Avg and %
Narrow (low %) but
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Broad (high %) and
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Narrow (low %) and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)
Broad (high % and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)

41. ebrary Downloaded – Avg and %
Narrow (low %) but
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Broad (high %) and
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Narrow (low %) and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)
Broad (high % and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)

42. EBL Downloaded – Avg and %
Narrow (low %) but
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Broad (high %) and
Deep (more usage of
each title)
Narrow (low %) and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)
Broad (high % and
Shallow (low usage of
each title)

44. CAN WE DETERMINE LEVEL OF
IMMERSION IN A BOOK?

45. If more pages are viewed per session in
a subject area, does that mean that
users spend more time in those books?

46. Page Views Per Session - ebrary
10.00
11.00
12.00
13.00
14.00
15.00
16.00
17.00
18.00
T F E Q R C G H D N J M P B K L U A S V Z
15.21

47. Page Views Per Session - EBL
10.00
12.00
14.00
16.00
18.00
20.00
22.00
24.00
F N T R M A E Q G C H D S B K P V J L Z U
18.90

48. Average Rank Across Both
Aggregators: Page Views Per Session
1. F – History, Americas
2. T – Technology
3. R – Medicine
4. E – History, Americas
5. N – Fine Arts
6. Q – Science
7. C – Aux Sciences of History
8. G –
Geography, Anthropology, Re
creation
9. M – Music
10. H – Social Sciences
11. D – History, World, etc.
12. A – General Works
13. B – Philos, Psych, Religion
14. J – Political Science
15. P – Language & Literature
16. K – Law
17. S – Agriculture
18. L – Education
19. V – Naval Science
20. U – Military Science
21. Z – Bibliography and LIS

50. CONCLUSIONS

51. There are many ways to measure use
• Difference from predicted use
• Depth vs breadth
– Books used a lot vs a lot of books used
• Type of use (session, view, download)
• Amount of use per session
– Does this measure amount of time spent?

52. Quality matters (maybe)
• University press books used at a higher rate by
all measures
• Users appear to be making some judgment
about quality
• But, UP books may be available in more
libraries

53. There are clear (but nuanced)
differences by subject
• Two examples
– F (History, Americas)
• Low usage as % of available F titles
• Low average usage rate
• Very poor performance relative to availability of F titles
• Highest # of page views by session
– L (Education)
• High usage as % of available L titles
• High average usage rate
• Very strong performance relative to availability of L titles
• Very low # of page views by session

54. How do we use these observations
to build better collections and
better serve our users?

55. White Paper
• Coming soon
• Combined data set across both platforms
• Analysis by
– Date of publication
– Length of time in the book
• More (and better?) call numbers

56. For More Information…
• The white paper will be available on the
ebrary and EBL websites this spring
• This presentation is available on SlideShare:
http://www.slideshare.net/MichaelLevineClark

57. Thank You
Michael Levine-Clark
Associate Dean for Scholarly Communication and
Collections Services
University of Denver Libraries
michael.levine-clark@du.edu