New Release: Demand for IDEAL Highest Ever

[Ann Okerson <aokerson@pantheon.yale.edu>]

Forwarded by AP to liblicense-l.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Fri, 4 May 2001 15:12:46 -0700
From: ddecooman@acad.com
Subject: New Release:  Demand for IDEAL Highest Ever

Please distribute freely the following.  Apologies for any cross-posting.

Contact: Daria DeCooman
Academic Press
(619) 699-6283
ddecooman@acad.com

OVER 1 MILLION USER-SESSIONS LOGGED IN MARCH,
Marking the Highest-Ever Demand for IDEAL� -
the Pioneering Online Library from Harcourt

San Diego, May 3, 2001 - During March, researchers in science, technology
and medicine logged over one million user-sessions on IDEAL - marking the
first time usage of this online library has soared so high in a single
month.

Located at <http://www.idealibrary.com>, IDEAL offers STM journals, as
well as access to a growing and diverse body of other electronic research
products - including IDEALReferenceWorks encyclopedias and informatics
databases from SciVision.

The 1,085,206 user-sessions logged in March represent an increase of 57%
over sessions in March 2000, and an increase of 2,577% since IDEAL
statistics were first tracked in 1997. User-sessions totalled 7,416,613 in
2000.

Launched in 1996, IDEAL continues to experience phenomenal growth
indicated by user-sessions as well as numbers of downloads, institutions
licensed, nations where licensed groups are located, and authorized users.

Academic Press President Dr. Pieter Bolman remarked, "We are very pleased,
because we continue to experience 2001 as a year of exceptional growth.
Much credit for this goes to the popularity of IDEAL's Academic Press and
Harcourt Health Sciences journals and our current expansion of HHS titles
on IDEAL.

"However, it's also significant that this record-setting growth is
following fast on the heels of forward-looking technical innovations put
in place last year. More links in and out of IDEAL from third-party
providers such as CrossRef - of which AP is a founding member - make doing
research more seamless than ever for our users. Plus, our bringing aboard
Akamai Technologies' FreeFlow service has led to shorter download times
for users."

Stated Larry Alexander, vice president of electronic publishing systems at
Academic Press, "One more factor we see as crucial to IDEAL's continuing
success is access. So researchers can tailor their access to IDEAL, last
fall we introduced the pick-and-choose Institutional Publications License
and our new pay-per-view service IDEALOnDemand.

"Today, our customers can choose to access individual articles, specific
journals, or a collection of journals on IDEAL. Further, we most recently
launched the IDEAL Charter for Low-Income Countries, making all our online
journals affordable to researchers in the world's poorest nations and
helping reduce the digital divide."

Continued Mr. Alexander, "We are delighted with IDEAL's extraordinary
growth and our track record of successful innovations. And, we are proud
of the terrific value IDEAL always delivers."

IDEAL, the International Digital Electronic Access Library, is licensed in
32 countries by more than 2,000 academic institutions and industrial and
pharmaceutical companies. Over 10 million users worldwide are authorized
to use IDEAL.

IDEAL offers close to 300 journals published by Academic Press and
Harcourt Health Sciences - encompassing Bailli�re Tindall, Churchill
Livingstone, Mosby, and W.B. Saunders imprints. IDEAL includes more than
200,000 journal articles.

The number of journals on IDEAL has just increased, due to the addition of
medical and scientific titles from Harcourt Health Sciences. Over 140 HHS
journals are available on IDEAL.

IDEAL is the online library of the Harcourt Worldwide STM Group. Academic
Press is a Harcourt Science and Technology Company and part of Harcourt's
Worldwide Scientific, Technical and Medical Group. Academic Press is an
international multiple-media publisher of high-quality journals, book
serials, major reference works, databases, textbooks and monographs.

Through its wholly owned subsidiary, Harcourt, Inc., Harcourt General
(NYSE: H) is a leading global multiple-media publisher, providing products
and services to classroom, corporate, research, medical and consumer
markets.

IDEAL is a registered trademark of Harcourt, Inc. More information about
IDEAL appears at <http://www.idealibrary.com>.  IDEAL news releases appear
at <http://www.apnet.com/www/ideal/pressreleases/>.
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