RE: Price discrimination for academic subscriptions (discussion)

["Stefan Kramer" <SKramer@fielding.edu>]

If I remember correctly, did DIALOG not -- at the requests of many
librarians, who preferred a *predictable* fee structure over what might be
deemed a more "fair" one for budgeting needs -- begin flat-free charging
instead of or as an alternative to (only) per-search, per-view,
per-minute, etc. charging about ten or twelve years ago?  The budgetary
unpredictability and administrative overhead may make a "by-the-drink
pricing model" unappealing to libraries (I does to me).

Now, if e-journal and aggregator database providers and academic libraries
could at least agree on consistent pricing tiers based on student FTEs, as
long as that model is used ... for one product, the price goes up at 1500
FTE, for another, at 2000 FTE ...

--
 Stefan Kramer
 Director of Library Services
 Fielding Graduate Institute
 2112 Santa Barbara St.
 Santa Barbara, CA 93105, USA
 SKramer@fielding.edu
 http://www.fielding.edu/library
 805-898-2931 tel. / 805-898-4170 fax

>  -----Original Message-----
>  From: owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
>  [mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu]On Behalf Of Rick Anderson
>  Sent: Thursday, September 04, 2003 15:23
>  To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
>  Subject: RE: Price discrimination for academic subscriptions
>  (discussion)
>
>> I would like to resubmit for discussion that any institutional 
>> classification (FTE, Carnegie Class, number of biologists, etc), 
>> are merely estimates of real (or potential) use.  Are the
>> consequences for paying for what you use any different than paying 
>> for what you *may be likely to use*.
>
>  It might be more accurate to say that pricing based on FTE is 
>  based on likely server load.  A school with 30,000 students will 
>  usually put greater strain on an e-publisher's resources than a school 
>  with 1,000 students. You're right, though, that it's a game of
>  probabilities -- a smaller school could generate more hits than a 
>  larger one, depending on the product, the curriculum, etc.

[SNIP]

>  -------------
>  Rick Anderson
>  Director of Resource Acquisition
>  University of Nevada, Reno Libraries
>  (775) 784-6500 x273
>  rickand@unr.edu