selling e-articles

["Okerson, Ann" <ann.okerson@yale.edu>]

A colleague would like to hear of examples of publishers of 
journals that have both print and electronic versions who have 
successfully introduced online sale of individual articles 
unbundled from the original volume or issue.  That is, for 
readers who do not have a personal or institutional subscription 
but want access to a small number of recent or older articles, 
are there examples of being able to purchase those articles "by 
the drink"?  Are there issues of permission from authors that 
need to be navigated?  He has an idea that commercial publishers 
have wrestled with this when e.g. the New York Times wants to 
sell articles "by the drink" from its vast archive.  What have 
journals done to make this possible for academic content?  It 
seems self-evident that there would be a market for this part of 
the "long tail" of academic publishing and the cost of offering 
the service would be trivial for a publisher already delivering 
online content.  Please comment to the list.

Ann Okerson
Moderator, Liblicense