Many people in the world has realized the ease and convenience of reading books using their tablets or smart phones. These books are acquired with ease by many suppliers, whether it is from Google Play, Amazon or even Takealot. These individual, electronic books are usually acquired with a personal use license. When these e-books are acquired it comes with a personal use license that will tell the user what rights the license holder of the content can do and can't do with the content. Most people choose to ignore these statements, as no one want to read through a lot of legal jargon nor about terms of use, copyright nor licensing.
E-Books, acquired on institutional licenses, are unfortunately not so easy, as there are many business and access models to consider and understand, as all of then comes with its own advantages and disadvantages, where the Library and Information Services must make sometimes difficult decisions, as these decisions will influence the budget, number of users that can read the book simultaneously and what users can or cannot do with the content, once licensed. In some cases the publisher refuse to make the book available in an electronic format as they believe it will influence their stream of revenue and sometimes electronic books are only made available on personal use licenses, which libraries cannot obtain as it infringes on making access available to the community they serve.
eBooks for any institutional libraries are difficult to manage but more difficult to tell their users why a book is not available when a Google search might indicate just the opposite. This Libguide will hopefully clarify some of these misconceptions, but also enable users to access the eBooks already licensed by the TUT LIS: