2023 Reading & Lending Survey:

What are patrons’ reading preferences?

@mekarpeles 2023-02-24

Survey Purpose: We wanted to know…

1. If, how, & why Open Library patrons download books

2. How patron reading preferences align with our offerings.

2,121 participants �told us their reading preferences

Survey Setup

1. Sourced Research Questions
2. Ran Form, 1 week: Tues 2022-02-07 to Mon 2023–02-13
• 7 Questions: 1 screener, 6 follow-up
3. 2,121 participants in total
• 1,126 participants have read our books
• 1,118 participants submitted valid data
4. Produced Synthesis doc
5. Presentation 🎉 ← You are here

Here’s what we learned…

1. Around half of participants download books

Download 48% (540)

52%

1118

48% (540)

2. Most participants download for offline access

Offline access 54% (292)

App features 20% (108)�e.g. annotations, highlights

EPUB format 26% (140)

i.e. reflowable text,

Changeable fonts & size

48% (540)

1118

52%

3. 42% of participants report difficulty downloading

Unable to find option 69% (330)

Download failures 31% (145)

1. Not all books available for download
2. Not all patrons know how to download*�*Open Library only give patrons a Browse option

42.5% (475)

1118

57.5%

4. Around half of participants opt for BookReader

� Why?�

• Simplicity & convenience
• Teachers can’t download
• Don’t trust downloads
• Limited storage space
• Dislike DRM
• Reader Privacy
• Unsatisfied with apps

51% (575)

1118

Default BookReader 44% (491)

AudioReader 8% (84)

49%

Top feedback* from participants

• 30%+ of feedback (150+ comments) praise & thanks�
• 15%+ of feedback (75+ comments) critique for bookreader
• Opportunities chrome, zoom, scrolling, & reading experience�
• 12%+ of feedback (55+ comments) lending duration concerns
• Appeals 1+ day borrow options to enable offline, remember settings across borrows, renews shouldn’t interrupt reading�
• ?% Search is difficult, missing books, OCR mistakes, bad mobile UX, …

41% (458)

1118

59%

* count aggregates are heuristic, not exact

4 Key Insights – view the report

1. ❤️‍🩹 Opportunity: improve download experience for 42% of participants�
2. 🤔 Q: How to do auto-renew for ~¼ of participants who download to go offline?
1. ~50% of this audience identifies as self-learners, researchers, students, or teachers.�
3. 💡 TIL: ~½ of participants read for educational purposes, the rest for pleasure�
4. ⚖️ Participants report valuing epub affordances slightly over advanced features
• This paired with volume of bookreader feedback may support emphasizing core reading experience improvements v. new features.

3 (Meta) Survey Tips & Learnings: Mistakes were made

1. 👍 Screening participants is essential�Successfully eliminated 1k participants:
• “Have you borrowed/read a book from Open Library before?”��
2. 🤦 Try questions with a test group before launching�Re: Q: “What is your reason for preferring [selected] method to read ebooks?”
1. unintentionally resulted in general feedback about why participants used Open Library rather than justifying their preferred reading experience.��
3. 😵 Give participants an N/A option.�Re: Q: “When you DON'T DOWNLOAD the books you've borrowed from Open Library, what is your primary reason?”
• I originally didn’t provide an option for “I typically don’t download” until we noticed this was being frequently written in as an option. This was fixed on the first day of the survey.

Critical Acclaim from Participants

“The survey questions were written with a very specific use case bias built in to them. The ugly banner should go away after I take the survey. The banner shouldn't be so ugly and intrusive to start with.”

👏 Select praise

🇲🇽I live in Mexico and do not have much access to current books.

🇪🇸“Although the libraries at home (Spain) are adequate, there are almost no books in English. You provide the library I lack. Thanks for being there.”

🇪🇬“many thanks from Egypt ♥️♥️🌻”

🇧🇷“I am a Brazilian who prefers reading books in their original language, and I can't afford a service like Scribd at the moment.”

🌏 “Archive & OpenLibrary are an amazing resource. My students in SE Asia wouldn't have access to these books without you. Not only can I teach language naturally with these books, but I can also teach them about American culture and make it fun.”

🇦🇷I live in mid Argentina in the pampas with no easy access to books in english

🌍 “For someone living in a country where there is no English lending library, this has been a saviour.”

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“[...] if I could kiss every single one of you I would”

“i live in a rural area, so i’m not always able to get to the physical library [...] you have books available that my small local library doesn’t”

“I would not have survived my degree without it. Thank you.”

Select praise (cont’d)

• “Open library has saved my sanity. I have mobility issues but now I have an online world full of books!!!”

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• “Thank you for making all these books available. I’m disabled, and can’t get to a library often”

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• “Impaired vision makes reading hard copy books other than large print increasingly difficult. Your service enables me to continue enjoying books, for which I am truly grateful beyond measure”

Thank you! Questions?

Thank you to Abbey Ripstra, Krystal Tung, Jim Shelton, Brenton Cheng, Scott Barnes, et al for the amazing advice & help conducting this research.

What’s coming soon?

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🚪Goodbye anxiety-inducing 1 hour limits?

👋 Hello seamless auto-renews

Et al

every 15 min 🕒 of 🖱️📖 activity