Today, nearly everything is available on subscription. The subscription model entails selling a product or service for a recurring price. Depending on the company and product, the bill can be paid every month, every year, or some other interval. The book industry used a somewhat different subscription model beginning in the 17th century, where authors could raise the money to print their books before publication. It amounted to an early version of crowdsourcing. Selling e-books requires a different business model than selling printed books. The publisher has one master copy of the book, which it makes available to customers’ e-readers. When they sell to libraries, they have imposed a new subscription model that essentially rips off libraries and, in the case of public libraries, tax payers. Where did it come from and what are libraries doing about it?