Every year we have to make choices about which resources we will keep and which we will discontinue, and this year we will be saying goodbye to Freegal and Guidestar.
These choices are never easy as any resource has its fans and power users. This is never a personal choice, one that we make with the intention of hurting our users. It’s always a choice where we have to weigh the dissapointment against some other factors.
When we evaluate something like Freegal or Guidestar, we primarily look at how many individuals are using the resource, how much it costs, and then we can combine those two things to find a cost per user.
There are also cases where we provide an important educational resource that may or may not be heavily used, but it’s the only way someone can access certain material, and we want to make sure we leave that door open whenever possible.
The loss of Freegal is not one we’re excited about. It provides significant benefits, especially to those of us who prefer to listen to music without streaming or being connected to a smart device all the time. It was also a great way to maintain a level of service during shutdowns in 2020 and early 2021.
For now, the best ways to get music are to stream it on Hoopla, or to check out CD’s from your library. You can also use our Prospector and Interlibrary Loan services to get music that HPLD doesn’t currently own, and most libraries will happily lend CD’s that you can check out the same way you would check out an item from HPLD’s collection. It’s quick and easy, and the turnaround on Prospector especially tends to be fast.
We wish we could provide everything, but with the likelihood of a few lean budget years due to COVID effects, we’ve had to make some difficult choices. We’re hoping that by making some tough decisions early on, we can save some money at the start and avoid some of the harsher effects of tough economic times.
Thanks for sticking with us, and while we can’t promise all the choices in the coming years will be pain-free, we’re going to do our best to make smart financial decisions that make good use of taxpayer dollars.