NAR Receives Award For Virtual Library eBooks Program

Award presented by digital media vendor OverDrive Inc.
Award presented by digital media vendor OverDrive Inc.

RISMEDIA, August 21, 2006–The National Association of Realtors® has been honored with a Digital Pioneer Award for excellence and leadership for advancing digital media in the NAR library.

The award was presented by digital media vendor, OverDrive Inc., at Digipalooza 2006, the group?s first national user group meeting for librarians. The Cleveland meeting featured the successes of libraries that lend downloadable eBooks and digital audio books to members through OverDrive?s Digital Library Reserve.

?This award acknowledges the hard work and ingenuity of NAR staff to provide effective and beneficial services to our members. To be recognized like this for a program that is so new is a great honor for NAR,? said Thomas M. Stevens, NAR president and senior vice president of NRT Inc. from Vienna, Va. The service allows busy members to access our excellent library from their office or home, or while on the road or abroad,? said Stevens.

The award was accepted by Mary Martinez, manager of NAR’s library. NAR launched its Virtual Library eBooks Collection last April as a quality resource for Realtors? that allows them to use their PDAs, laptops and SmartPhones to access real estate information, sales techniques and personal growth tips. Realtors? can borrow top quality business and real estate books, reports and studies, produced by NAR and top publishers, in several digital formats. NAR’s eBooks Collection offers nearly 600 titles, and the list is growing. So far, Realtors? have borrowed more than 5,000 eBooks and digital audio books.

Titles are from best-selling authors on topics ranging from popular real estate and business management to personal development; for example, Advanced Selling Strategies by Brian Tracy; Blink by Malcolm Gladwell; Every Landlord?s Legal Guide by Marcia Stewart, Ralph Warner and Janet Portman; How to Become a Power Agent in Real Estate by Darryl Davis; The Tax-Free Exchange Loopholeby Jack Cummings; and Rich Dad, Poor Dad by Robert T. Kiyosaki.

As many as three eBooks can be borrowed at no charge for up to 21 days, depending on the format, after which they are deactivated and ?returned? to the library collection. Like in a public library, if a title is currently on loan, the requester can opt to be added to a wait list and will be notified automatically by e-mail when the title becomes available.

Once a title is selected and placed in an ?eBookBag,? the user may check out titles directly to a PC, PDA or SmartPhone; a select number of titles may also be downloaded to an MP3 player or burned to a CD. Titles are available in one of three formats: Adobe?, Mobipocket ? and audio book format. NAR members and staff will be able to get free downloads for Adobe Reader?, Mobipocket? Reader and OverDrive Media ConsoleTM at the virtual library Web site, http://eBooks.realtor.org.

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