Andrew Carnegie famously called libraries “Palaces for the People”, and a new app is bringing that same insight to the experience of reading eBooks. The Scoville Memorial Library is introducing Palace, the app that makes accessing eBook and eAudio collections through the library easier than ever. Palace brings together several eBook and eAudiobook collections into one simple app, where you can search and browse, check out items, and read, in just a few taps. The Palace app is available now to all Scoville Memorial Library patrons.
The Palace app will be especially useful to those who may not have tried eBooks at the library before because it is designed to make the entire process of borrowing an eBook much simpler. Once a patron downloads the Palace app to their iOS or Android device, they search for their library and enter their library card barcode number. They are immediately able to browse all the titles of eBooks or eAudiobooks from the library’s collection, check out, and begin reading or listening with fewer than five taps on their screen.
Palace was created by a group of library leaders around the country who wanted to create an eBook experience that was focused on patron privacy, and equitable distribution of electronic content to public libraries and patrons. The Palace team received the support of a grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to make the app a reality.
The eBooks and eAudiobooks on Palace are a compilation of several collections from the Connecticut State Library, plus about 15,000 additional titles curated by the Digital Public Library of America.
Visit the Downloadable Libraries page for full instructions on how to use Palace.
