Re: FTE-based pricing

["Anthony Watkinson" <anthony.watkinson@btopenworld.com>]

I would like to complement what Mary has written. It does seem to 
me that usage-based charging is in principle fair but I cannot 
see that it will work because the volatility of demand makes this 
approach unworkable for either publishers or librarians who have 
to budget - and do not all of us have to do that? The work at 
CIBER (www.publishing.ucl.ac.uk) has exposed surprising levels of 
volatility of use institution by year (a surprise to me at any 
rate). I do not think we have published this because it was a 
side-observation that we have not been able to follow up but to 
me it is rather significant and important in this debate.

Anthony Watkinson
----- Original Message -----
From: "Mary Summerfield" <msummerfield@press.uchicago.edu>
To: <liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>
Sent: Thursday, October 26, 2006 2:11 AM
Subject: RE: FTE-based pricing

> An issue that hasn't been considered much in this discussion is 
> the fact that the users of digital resources acquired by 
> libraries are not the people who are paying for these resources 
> (the libraries).
>
> These users have no reason to constrain their use of these 
> resources -- nor would it be good for society if they did given 
> the very low cost of their using them.  However, the libraries 
> face very real costs of that use if usage is the basis for 
> charging for these resources.
>
> Mary Summerfield
> Director, Business Development and Planning
> University of Chiago Press
>
> -----Original Message-----
> [mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of Sally Morris
(Chief
> Executive)
> Sent: Tuesday, October 24, 2006 3:25 PM
> To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
> Subject: Re: FTE-based pricing
>
> Isn't this just a matter of time and familiarity?  Despite the
> scorn which has been poured on my use of the utilities analogy,
> I'm sure everyone manages to budget fairly well for electricity
> and phone costs - usage doesn't in fact increase dramatically
> year on year.  I would anticipate that it would be the same with
> online resources.  Yes, we all hope that usage would increase as
> users became more familiar with the resources at their disposal
> (and libraries and publishers promoted them better).  But this
> couldn't, realistically, go on increasing dramatically year on
> year - users simply don't have more reading time at their
> disposal.  So I'd expect levels of usage to level off after a
> while
>
> This might mean, however, that it's too soon to know how to price
> a usage-based model - the more prudent approach might be to
> introduce a (fairly small) usage element into existing models and
> start working out what 'price-per-use' might produce the desired
> effect (i.e. staying in business!)
>
> Sally Morris, Chief Executive
> Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers
> Email: sally.morris@alpsp.org
> Website:  www.alpsp.org