RE: Who isn't being heard in the Open Access debate?

["David Goodman" <David.Goodman@liu.edu>]

In my experience, the non-academic sector accounts for relatively few
subscriptions because industrial and other special libraries are operated
efficiently, not according to sentiment and tradition. Journals from which
very few articles a year are needed are not purchased--the articles are
obtained via rapid document delivery. The decision is based upon the
relative costs, not the prejudices of the users. Journals that might not
be needed now but might be needed in the future are not even considered
for purchase. Journals that are no longer used are discontinued.  For
seldom-used material, this requires reliance upon major national libraries
and other document sources--and upon universities. All large universities
near industrial organizations are well aware of the extent to which they
are usedfor backup. For public institutions, they may not even be able to
recover costs.

This apparently inefficient system may overall once have been rational. It
was probably appropriate for some institutions to have the burden of
covering this part of the literature need--in the past. Now that
essentially all such publications are distributed electronically, it is no
longer rational or appropriate, because the material can be supplied to
all potential users at essentially the same cost as to a single library.
The subscription model, in spite of its inordinate expense and apparent
waste of resources, was probably the best available model for paper
journals. Paper journals still have a role for those few titles used for
browsing, but certainly not for those merely used as repositories of
articles--electronic repositories do much better. We do not distribute
material in the way that was long traditional, and there is no reason to
distribute the burden of paying for it in the way that was long
traditional either.

Dr. David Goodman
Associate Professor
Palmer School of Library and Information Science
Long Island University
dgoodman@liu.edu