Product News

National Book Festival Welcomes E-Book and Audiobook Downloads on the Digital Bookmobile

On the tenth anniversary of the National Book Festival, organized and sponsored by the Library of Congress, e-books have gained a foothold with the reading public. A majority of American public libraries now offer free e-book downloads, and circulation is skyrocketing.

OverDrive’s Digital Bookmobile demonstrated digital book downloads available from America’s public libraries at the 2010 National Book Festival in September 2010 on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. The Digital Bookmobile, developed inside a seventy-four-foot, eighteen-wheel tractor-trailer, is a high-tech update of the traditional bookmobile that has served communities for decades. The one-of-a-kind community outreach vehicle creates an engaging download experience with the host library’s “virtual branch” download website and digital collection of e-books, audiobooks, and more. The vehicle is equipped with broadband Internetconnected PCs, high-definition monitors, premium sound systems, and a variety of portable media players.

The Digital Bookmobile has traveled 50,000 miles and hosted nearly three hundred events with 61,000 library patrons and staff in forty-seven states and Canadian provinces since launching its national tour in New York City in August 2008.