Sure, Netflix and Redbox may rule the U.S. DVD rental market, but it turns out that the nation’s public libraries are loaning more DVDs each day than Netflix rents to its by-mail subscribers.
So says a new survey from the OCLC Online Computer Library Center, a nonprofit national library cooperative, which found that public library branches in the U.S. lend out a whopping 2.1 million DVDs a day, topping the two million discs rented daily by Netflix and the 1.4 million DVD rented each day by Redbox, according to Courant.com (by way of the bloggers at Inside Redbox).
Pretty impressive, and it also turns out (according to a separate survey noted in the Courant.com piece) that the video catalog of your average library has more than doubled over the past decade or so, with 166.7 video "materials" (including DVDs and old VHS cassette tapes) available per 1,000 people as of 2008, compared with 73.5 materials per thousand foiks back in 1999.
Of course, the DVD collections at local library branches typically pale in comparison to the tens of thousands of titles available for rent to Netflix and Redbox customers — for example, you’ve got a better shot at finding old episodes of "Nova" than you do a copy of "Airplane!" — and as librarians quoted in the Courant article note, the competition for the limited supply of new DVD releases can be fierce on, say, a Friday night.
Then again, your humble neighborhood branch has one big advantage over Netflix and Redbox: You can borrow DVDs for free, no subscription fee required. And while you may have to scrounge to find that exact John Hughes movie you’ve been pining to see again, you might find some gems hidden in your local branch’s curated collection, not to mention a decent selection of current titles; even better, some local libraries will take reservations.
One thing local libraries and Redbox kiosks have in common, though, are late fees. Here in Brooklyn, for example, you’ll have to cough up a $2 fee for every day a DVD is overdue, up to $12 a disc. Some libraries also put a limit on how many DVDs you can rent over a given period.
I have to say, I was surprised to learn how many people are borrowing DVDs from the library each day, and while I’ve had occasion to admire the sizable, diverse DVD collection at my local library in the past, for some reason I’ve never thought to go ahead and borrow one. Maybe it’s time to get a library card.
(Side note: About a year ago, I tried to give my local library a stack of promotional Blu-ray movies I’d received from movie studios, figuring they'd make great loaners for library patrons. However, the friendly but puzzled library clerks — who weren’t quite clear on what a "Blu-ray" was — turned me down. I ended up putting them on the library’s "free stuff" shelf instead. Oh well.)
So, how many of you out there are borrowing DVDs from the library? What are your local library DVD rental policies, and can you tell us how the DVD selection at your branch compares to, say, that of your neighborhood Redbox kiosk?
Courant.com: Study: Libraries Top The Competition In Lending Movies [via Inside Redbox]
— Ben Patterson is a technology writer for Yahoo! News.
