Re: Announcement from Kluwer- For Immediate Release 5/6/03

[David Goodman <dgoodman@princeton.edu>]

Before buying e-books (or any books) from Kluwer, librarians would be well
advised to check that they do not already have the material in one of the
many Kluwer journals.  This publisher has been continuing its practice of
dual publication in both formats.

This did not make much sense with paper, but if a library had really
abundant funds it could conceivably argue that it was acquiring a
circulating and a non-circulating copy.  It is singularly absurd with
electronic formats.

This is not intended a s adverse comment on the merits of the actual
publications. No library now has abundant funds, and a publisher is doing
well in the present environment if it can sell a library one copy of a
specialized symposium, however excellent it is.

Dr. Dav id Go odman
Princeton University Library
and
Palmer School of Library & Information Science, Long Island University
dgoodman@princeton.edu