Library audiobooks now just a few mouse clicks away

The audiobook sections of public libraries are popular with people who'd rather listen to a good book than read it. Now thanks to the Internet, audiobook lovers don't even have to leave home.

Libraries throughout Greater Boston and across the nation have launched services that allow patrons to download recorded books onto their home computers and listen to them over portable media players.

The service is available through Old Colony Library Network south of Boston and the SAILS Library Network, which link libraries in Southeastern Massachusetts communities from Foxborough to New Bedford. The Boston Public Library also began offering more than 2,000 downloadable audiobooks in September. The service is seen as a great help to commuters, long-distance drivers, and readers with limited mobility.

''Boy, am I happy with them," said Pamela Bannerman, a former administrative assistant in Carver. Bannerman lives with her sister, and both are disabled. ''Neither of us go out very often, so this has been such a boon," Bannerman said.

The two have enjoyed listening to thrillers such as ''Day of the Dead" by J.A. Jance and ''Brimstone" by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. They play the books over the speakers of their home computer, or by burning them onto audio CDs.

Other Internet audiobook fans download them onto portable digital audio players. But the millions who own Apple Computer Inc.'s popular iPod players have been frozen out because of a simmering conflict that has divided the world of digital audio into two warring camps.

The audiobooks are available only in a digital file format created by Microsoft Corp. But Apple's iPod, the most popular digital player with some 30 million units sold, uses a different format that's incompatible with the library downloads. Apple has refused to let audiobook vendors produce iPod-compatible editions.

''It's probably something that makes fewer libraries want to get it," said Jonathan Zittrain, visiting professor at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School. Zittrain predicted that because iPods are so popular, some librarians may resist an audiobook service that many of their patrons can't use.

But OverDrive Inc. of Cleveland already delivers the audiobook service to about 2,000 libraries nationwide, including Boston and many other Massachusetts communities. The Navy provides OverDrive audiobooks for studious sailors; the company has also launched in Great Britain, Singapore, and Mexico. Since OverDrive's birth in November 2004, library users worldwide have downloaded about half a million copies of the company's audiobooks, making OverDrive the biggest supplier for libraries. Self-help titles like ''Work Less, Make More" are the most popular audiobooks, but the novels ''1984" and ''Master and Commander" are also on OverDrive's top-10 list.

The fees OverDrive charges libraries for access to its server are based on the number of titles a library wants to be able to access and the number of patrons it wants to let ''borrow" an audiobook at any given time.

The company digitizes the books and stores them on server computers attached to the Internet. A user visits the library's website and types in the number on his or her library card. First-time users must install a program that downloads the audiobooks, which can then be played back over the computer's speakers or loaded onto a portable audio player. In many cases, a user can even ''burn" a copy onto a standard audio CD to take along in a portable CD player.

''It's really a fantastic service," said Kerry Cronin, collection development manager for the Boston Public Library. Even though the library has yet to promote the service, about 1,100 patrons have used it. ''We're very enthusiastic to be able to offer it."

The downloadable books are not distributed in the popular MP3 format, to protect against people making illicit copies and distributing them over the Internet. OverDrive uses Microsoft's Windows Media file format, which compresses audio files into compact bundles that can easily be downloaded over the Internet. It also contains copy-protection features to ensure that the library's audiobooks aren't copied. The software also lets the library set a two- or three-week time limit for listening. After that, the audiobook is digitally locked and can't be played again unless the user goes online to renew it.

In a bid to establish Windows Media as a worldwide digital media standard, Microsoft licenses the technology to any producer of digital audio hardware or software. Indeed, nearly every brand of digital audio player -- from Dell's Digital Jukebox to Creative's Zen -- can use Windows Media files, with one major exception--the iPod.

Apple has refused to adopt Windows Media, relying instead on Fairplay, Apple's own copy protection technology. Apple uses Fairplay on the audio files it sells at its wildly popular iTunes Music Store. But Apple won't license Fairplay to makers of other digital audio players, or to digital audio producers who don't distribute their files through the iTunes Music Store.

Apple executives did not return phone calls seeking comment.

Library websites aren't the only Internet neighborhoods with an iPod problem. Many online subscription music services, such as Napster.com, are also incompatible with the Apple players. But Michael Gartenberg, vice president of Jupiter Research in New York, said, ''What we've seen so far is consumers saying that they're willing to forgo content that you can't get on the iPod." He said this is partly because consumers don't realize how much worthwhile content is denied to them because of incompatibility.

Hiawatha Bray can be reached at bray@globe.com.Have you ever downloaded an audiobook? Share your experiences at boston.com/business