Hoopla lets you digitally borrow almost anything from your library
Today the Hoopla service and apps added e-books and comic to its media library of audiobooks, movies, TV shows and albums. While the app has always synced with local libraries, it wasn't until today that the app was meant for reading. The new offerings will be from IDW Publishing, RosettaBooks, Chicago Review Press and others with more publishers being announced in the coming months. The reading feature includes options similar to Amazon's Whispersync with the ability to read a book across multiple devices and the options to adjust fonts, line spacing, columns and background. For comic book fans, a feature called "Action View" enlarges individual panels with a double tap for easier reading on mobile devices. "One of our main objectives for libraries is to be mobile centric," said owner and founder Jeff Jankowski.
Developer Midwest Tape has been supplying books and other media to libraries for 25 years. The Hoopla app is the evolution of that relationship. When you attach your library card to the app, you're allotted a certain amount of "check outs" per month (for example, San Francisco allows 10). The 6,000 e-books and comic books added today join the 300,000 movies, TV shows, audiobooks and albums currently on the service.
