E-book Use in South African Academic Libraries: What Patrons Want

In order to investigate the use of e-books at South African university libraries, this study explored patrons’ attitudes to e-books, their current use of e-books, and their expectations of e-books in their academic libraries. Results showed that users were eager to use e-books but that there was a lack of awareness that libraries stocked them, or to what degree. Print was still preferred by many, but e-books were seen as a convenient alternative. Users were ignorant of the limitations that most e-book licensing agreements impose, expecting unlimited access to the content of e-books as they would with print books.