Interlibrary loan license puzzle

[David Goodman <dgoodman@princeton.edu>]

We are puzzled about Elsevier's requirement in their license for Science
Direct (http://www.elsevier.nl:80/homepage/about/esi/ Fall 1998 issue)
that:

 
> The lending library... is asked to report twice a year ... on to whom
> (what library) articles have been sent, by journal title, publication
> year and number of copies. It is not necessary to report either the
> specific article or the specific individual for whom the article is
> ordered, as we want to respect the privacy of the reader. These
> reports are for two purposes: first, to understand better the actual
> ILL demand and, two, to monitor quantity limitations
> 
> If the number of copies provided in one calendar year for any one
> journal title to any one library exceeds five articles, the lending
> library (that is, our licensee) may be asked to pay a fee on all
> additional copies at the standard document delivery copyright royalty
> rate. Elsevier Science will bill for those charges after it receives
> the reports. Libraries, of course, have the option to supply only up
> to five copies and turn down ILL requests over five.

No interlibrary loan department that we are aware of keeps or attempts to
keep statistics of particular items supplied to other libraries.  To
incorporate it into the workflow would add considerable costs to an
already cumbersome and expensive operation. We are not sure that we would
regard it as even possible; it is certainly not desirable.

It is also unnecessary, because, according to standard US interlibrary
loan copyright practice, the payment of the CCC fees if more than 5 copies
are requested from the most recent 5 years of a journal is unambiguously
the responsibility of the *requesting* library (and all academic libraries
are quite careful to keep appropriate records of items requested and to
make these payments properly).

Changing this will cause confusion because the requesting library will
undoubtedly continue to report the copy requests (this function is built
into all relevant software and is a routine part of all procedures) and
pay the CCC; if the lending library also does, the publisher will be paid
twice the proper amount, which is presumably not really Elsevier's
intention. We think doing it the standard way is more realistic in any
case, because if it were up to the lending library to report, and a
library requests 4 copies each from 2 sources, neither source would report
it!

Princeton has considered purchasing Science Direct from time to time, but
has not yet done so. We wonder how those libraries that have purchased it
deal with this provision.

--
This, as always, is our personal view, though, as usual, we suspect some of
our colleagues here agree. 
-- 
David Goodman 
Biology Librarian, Princeton University Library 
dgoodman@princeton.edu         http://www.princeton.edu/~biolib/
phone: 609-258-3235            fax: 609-258-2627


Jane Holmquist * jane@astro.princeton.edu * (609) 258-3820
Astrophysics Librarian * Princeton University * New Jersey