RE: Aggregator Embargoes

["DuBose, Stefanie" <DUBOSES@MAIL.ECU.EDU>]

Donnie,

We are going through a major cancellation project here at ECU and
realized, halfway through the process, that the aggregators we were using
had these embargoes.  Other than EBSCO, the other group was Proquest; we
haven't checked Gale yet.  One of our reference librarians found the
information on the company websites via the title lists for each database;
however, it's not always easy to read, and it means that we now have to
incorporate another field of information into our ejournal locator
database.  In my opinion, it is false advertising to indicate that a
database is "current" when there may be an embargo of 3 months to 2 years
for half of the titles and thus, the most recent information does not show
up.

I hadn't picked up on this yet, but interestingly enough, the publishers
you mention below also provide current electronic full image access to
their titles via their own websites (Oxford University Press, American
Institute of Physics, Springer-Verlag, Sage [if not now, then soon]) or
through Catchword/Ingenta (Carfax, Taylor & Francis, Blackwell, Routledge,
Lauwrence Erlbaum) or a combination thereof.  I don't know if this is a
drawback or not, but electronic and print subscriptions are bundled;
although Springer is currently investigating the option of separating the
print and electronic subscriptions.

Regards,

Stefanie

Stefanie DuBose
Collection Development/Serials Librarian
Joyner Library
East Carolina University
Greenville, NC 27858-4353
(p)252-328-2598
(f)252-328-4834 
duboses@mail.ecu.edu
The views expressed are my own and do not necessarily represent those of
either Joyner Library or East Carolina University.


-----Original Message-----
From: Donnelyn Curtis [mailto:dcurtis@admin.unr.edu]
Sent: Tuesday, May 15, 2001 6:30 PM
To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
Subject: Aggregator Embargoes


I just took a look at the title list for EBSCO's Academic Search Premier
and was shocked to realize that of the 2947 full text titles, 1460 (or
49.5%) have an embargo period of 3 months or longer. 1081 (36.7%) have an
embargo period of at least 12 months. For these titles, the full text
holdings statements on EBSCO's title lists and MARC records, which many of
us are putting in our catalogs and on our web pages, says "to present."

This is not only misleading to our users, but I'm not sure that all of us
are aware that some of our databases are losing their currency. It is a
trend that has crept up on us, or at least I was never informed. I haven't
had a chance to look at title lists for other aggregator databases to see
whether this is an industry trend or if it is limited to EBSCO.

The publishers whose journals are embargoed in Academic Search Premier are
familiar academic publishers: Carfax, Taylor & Francis, Blackwell,
Blackwell Science, Routledge, Oxford University Press, American Institute
of Physics, Springer-Verlag, Sage, Lauwrence Erlbaum, and several others.

Donnie Curtis
Director of Research Services
University of Nevada, Reno Libraries