Use this search box to find articles that have run in our newspapers over the last several years.

Storrs Library offers free online streaming service

Date: 8/27/2015

LONGMEADOW – Storrs Library is now offering a free online film, music, audio book and e-book streaming service for its patrons called hoopla digital as a way to provide 24/7 access to media for library users.  

Storrs Adult Services Librarian Barbara Fitzgerald said hoopla digital is being used to expand the library’s offerings across multiple media platforms.

“A number of libraries are taking advantage of these services,” she added.

Fitzgerald said the library is paying an annual subscription for hoopla and it would likely continue to offer the product as long as patrons show interest.

“If we get the amount of use to warrant the expense [we would continue using hoopla],” she added.

Storrs began offering the streaming service on Aug. 10.

Michael Manon, chief brand manager for hoopla digital, told Reminder Publications hoopla began almost two years ago and it was started by 25-year-old company Midwest Tape, which specializes in distributing media to 800 public libraries in the United States and Canada.

“[hoopla] has one lone customer – that customer is public libraries,” he added. “We service public libraries by partnering with them, by having well over 350,000 entertainment titles available to borrow.”

The digital streaming company offers other media content such as comic books and television shows as well, he noted.

Manon said what’s different about hoopla is it’s instantaneous and does not require holds or waiting periods.

“If you’re a library card holder at a partnering hoopla library you can have access to that brand new album right now on hoopla,” he added. “Three hundred and fifty thousand people could be downloading and listening to that same album on hoopla at the very same time.”

Hoopla features content from major Hollywood studios such as “Batman: The Dark Knight Returns” as well as albums such as the soundtrack to “Southpaw,” Ed Sheeran’s “X,” and Mumford & Son’s “Wilder One” album, according to the company.

Libraries that subscribe to hoopla are not charged until a patron begins streaming content, Manon said.

He added that hoopla is available through the Google Play store, on Apple devices as well as kindle. For more information about the streaming service visit www.hoopladigital.com.

Fitzgerald said Storrs also offers Overdrive, a digital offering of the Central/Western Massachusetts Automated Resource Sharing (C/W Mars) catalogue.

She added that C/W Mars offers thousands of e-book and audio book offerings as well as video content.

Storrs Library also offers demonstrations of how to use hoopla digital or Overdrive during its Tech Tuesdays, which take place 12:30 to 2 p.m., she noted.