More and more American public libraries are offering audiobook downloads to be “borrowed”. “A patron with a valid library card visits a library Web site to borrow a title for, say, three weeks. When the audiobook is due, the patron must renew it or find it automatically ‘returned’ in a virtual sense: The file still sits on the patron’s computer, but encryption makes it unplayable beyond the borrowing period. The patron doesn’t have to do anything after the lending period. The file expires. It checks itself back into the collection. There’s no parts to lose. It’s never damaged. It can never be late.”