12. Ebook Apps + Zinio

Part I -Overdrive

 

What did you think about the setup experience?

Initially, fine. Downloading it, no problem. But when I went to log into my account for the first time, it sent an error message about needing to change my 'cookie' setting. So I followed their link to the 'how to change the settings on iPhone' and the photos displayed in their instructions were
A) not ones that matched the layout of my phone
B) not easily figured out.

SO... I gave up. If it doesn't work pretty easily the first time I upload it, I can't be bothered. I'll try it on my tablet and let you know later.

Part II- 3M Cloud Library

What did you think about the setup experience?

Great! Super easy.

How easy was it to download content?

Very easy. No problems. I specifically chose a really large book - "How to Cook Everything" that has over 1000 pages and it downloaded in maybe 8 to 10 seconds on the FVRL public wifi. I was impressed.

What do you think about the options for changing views, fonts, narration speed, and navigating within the books?

I liked it. I thought it was fairly intuitive and simple to navigate. The buttons were easy to find

Do you think library customers would find this app intuitive? Useful? Fun to use?

Yes, Yes, and Yes. I thought it was well designed for a smartphone app and could imagine it would be quite nice on an iPad. I liked the ability of downloading a 1000+ page book on to my handheld device.

If you ran into challenges using the app, do you think that the freely available library content is enough of a trade-off to make it worth persevering to use the app?

In my opinion, yes. Once you get it to work, the whole world of library material becomes available to you in the palm of your hand, for free. It seems too good to be true. So that's when you realize you have to place holds on new books, etc and you can't get everything you want right away, but hey, it's still worth it.

Part III - Zinio

I like Zinio but to be honest, I still like leafing through a physical magazine. I enjoy flipping the pages manually.
However, I appreciate it for specific articles that I see in the newstands at the grocery store that I'd like to read but I can't be bothered to read the whole magazine.
For example, this month's Esquire magazine had a fantastic article about space travel and I could easily download the issue and flip directly to the article.
Worth it for that feature alone.