RE: Message from EBSCO - Attn: Academic Librarians

[Janet Croft <jbcroft@ou.edu>]

I'd have to agree with the conclusions below.  I haven't been at my current
institution long enough to speak for it, but at my previous institution (a
very small college), we looked on aggregator databases as an opportunity to
drop some (but by no means all) duplicated print and fiche journals so that
we could purchase new titles not carried by the aggregators.  In fact,
economically, the only way to get our administration to support the idea of
subscribing to aggregated databases was to show that the number of things we
could drop would free up the money needed for the database subscription AND
several new paper or fiche titles. Of course we still kept a few titles
(Time, Newsweek, that sort of thing) in all three formats, but the bald
financial fact was that we simply couldn't afford to keep too many titles in
multiple formats and had to choose the one that was most accessible and
required the least upkeep. It seems Ebsco may not understand the economics
of smaller institutions; subscribing to the same title in multiple formats
is a duplication of content that takes money away from other needy subject
areas. We couldn't possibly have afforded to view them as a "complement" to
our print and electronic collections; they had to BE the collections!

Janet Brennan Croft
Head of Access Services
University of Oklahoma
Bizzell Library NW106
Norman OK 73019
405-325-1918
fax 405-325-7618
jbcroft@ou.edu

-----Original Message-----
From: Hamaker, Chuck [mailto:cahamake@email.uncc.edu]
Sent: Tuesday, March 20, 2001 3:46 PM
To: 'liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu'
Subject: RE: Message from EBSCO - Attn: Academic Librarians

Response to Sam Brooks
Senior Vice President of Sales & Marketing
EBSCO Information Services

Your recent e-mail message to libraries "Full Text Databases, Print
Journals, and Electronic Journals - Distinctly Different Products" seems
to me to show some misunderstanding about how libraries look at aggregator
databases in the context of traditional journal collections. I've been to
many conferences where librarians were agonizing over whether aggregator
content was stable enough to rely on in terms of titles in their
collections. The decision to substitute aggregator content for a
traditional subscription title is not one that librarians take without a
great deal of thought. Aggregator content when that content seems to be
stable (and perhaps aggregators should consider providing some context for
individual titles-ie. Length of contract, etc) is important but neither
ebsco nor publishers should be afraid that its existence means that
traditional subscription lists are shrinking based on that content.

What is more likely, and is certainly true in every instance I know of, is
that if a title appears to be stable, it is considered not as expendable,
but as a candidate for increasing the pool of available content to a
library. I suspect publishers are seeing increases in subscriptions from
libraries, overall, as aggregator content is integrated into library
collections. That is, instead of retaining paper and microfilm of some
titles, if they are also reliably available in aggregator databases, then
libraries are considering adding additional titles. In fact this is the
most likely case, since microform suppliers report increasing sales,
almost across the board. That is, since some journals published are
problematic in terms of really receiving all issues, of surviving
physically long enough to be bound, and the physical issues have to be
replaced with a longer term copy, libraries are deciding that current
issues of a title available in an aggregator database which they also get
in paper might be substituted for new titles, with microform retention
copies for the older one. New journals subscriptions, perhaps for the
first time in 15 years, in some libraries, are actively being selected.

I hope neither publishers nor aggregators become fearful of this. If you
have a standard title it's not going away. This is a plus for publishers
and for companies like ebsco. The drive for this is perfectly
understandable: publishers continue creating new titles that are needed
for new teaching and research areas. In fact, the aggregator databases
are, I suspect, resulting in a re-birth of the publishing industry as
start up journals have a better chance of reaching profitability much more
quickly than at any time in the last fifteen to twenty years. And I
suspect that the "loss" rate for paper subscriptions is minimal compared
to the numbers and dollars going for new subscriptions and multiple sales
channels. Instead of this caution that seems evident in your post, I would
think content providers should be celebrating a new wave of subscriptions
coming in, the first sign of a thaw in a long time in this industry. I
suspect this is true given the continued acquisition of older publisher of
new titles in their "stable" of titles, by the announcement of Taylor and
Francis' acquisition of Gordon and Breach (which actually has some good
titles, but had created serious image problems for their products) and by
Elsevier's focusing on Academic/Harcourt. What this all says is that the
aggregator databases are creating new publishing and profit opportunities
for publishers, and creating the opportunity for libraries to look at
broader coverage for newly emerging interest areas.

Chuck Hamaker
Associate University Librarian for Collections and Technical Services
UNC Charlotte

-----Original Message-----
Subject: Message from EBSCO - Attn: Academic Librarians


Full Text Databases, Print Journals, and Electronic Journals
- Distinctly Different Products

EBSCO's leading online full text databases offer access to full text
articles from peer reviewed journals published by many of the
world's most prestigious academic publishers.  EBSCO's full text
databases offer tremendous value to an academic library by expanding
access to the content of important publications already in the library's
print or e-journal collection while, at the same time, providing new
access to a great number of highly valuable full text resources
previously unavailable to the library's users.   In addition, EBSCO's
databases offer a convenient way for users to search the full text
articles from a large collection of publications in one easy process.
And now, with the advent of EBSCO SmartLinks(TM), users can access the
full text of articles after searching popular abstract/index databases
such as PsycINFO and Sociological Abstracts.  Users can link to full
text articles in EBSCO's aggregated full text databases as well as to
online journals from citations in leading secondary databases available
via EBSCOhost.

Online journals (also known as e-journals) provide users with online
access to articles from current issues of the journal.  Online journals
generally contain the same current articles that are included in
current issues of the printed journal.

Many full text journals in aggregated databases have embargo periods
(delay of availability of full text articles imposed by publisher), and
some journals that don't now have embargoes may have embargoes in
the future.  In addition, as the publishers own the content and control
the availability of the full text through databases, there is no
guarantee that a full text journal currently available via a database
will continue to be available in future years.  These are important
distinctions between aggregated databases and online journals.  For
these reasons, full text databases are not a practical, long-term
substitute for print or e-journal subscriptions purchased or licensed
directly from the publisher.

Over the past several years, libraries have realized tremendous benefits
from the use of full text databases.  Costs for print subscriptions have
increased an average of 8.3% each of the last two years.  This is greater
than the average price increase for full text databases, despite the fact
that the amount of content available in these databases has increased
dramatically over that same period.   However, if these databases are
exploited, the benefits now experienced by libraries and their users could
erode.  Full text databases are here to stay, but the favorable ratio of
content and access to cost may not be.  Naturally, modest price increases
will take place as publisher royalties increase and delivery methods are
improved, but dramatic cost increases may be avoidable.

Databases should be viewed as a complement (not a replacement) to the core
print and electronic journal collections.  If publishers experience
cancellations of current (print or online) journal  subscriptions due to the
inclusion of their content in aggregated databases, they are likely to
remove their content from these databases or increase their royalty
requirements.  Were this to happen, library users could be forced to deal
with incomplete library collections as publishers remove content from
aggregated databases, and the price of databases could increase
significantly.  However, this potential turmoil can likely be avoided if
librarians make print and e-journal purchasing decisions independent of
whether the full text of a journal is available in an aggregated full text
database.  Proceeding in this way should result in price and content
stability within aggregated databases, ensuring that end  users continue to
enjoy the benefits of access to these large collections of valuable data.


Sincerely,

Sam Brooks
Senior Vice President of Sales & Marketing
EBSCO Information Services