ACQNET v6n037 (November 30, 1996) URL = http://www.infomotions.com/serials/acqnet/acqnet-v6n037.txt ISSN: 1057-5308 *************** ACQNET, Vol. 6, No. 37, November 30, 1996 ========================================= (1) FROM: Amanda Harmon SUBJECT: Charleston report: Saturday (130 lines) [Ed. note: If someone would submit a brief report on the "rump" session I would appreciate it!] (1)--------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 15 Nov 1996 18:15:14 -0500 From: Amanda Harmon (UNC-Charlotte) Subject: Charleston Conference: Saturday summary The Hyde Park Corner Breakfast Discussion hit on a number of topics, most relating to differences in collection development and acquisitions resulting from increased purchasing of electronic/digital access and products. The necessary involvement of systems people in the process, who is involved in selection, the need to comprehend publisher-defined terms of sale (physical area of use, number of users, principles of pricing, title packages, etc.), the percent of total expenditures an institution should devote to non-print and/or electronic products, and the ways such funds should be divided among academic areas, as well as whether these products should come from materials budgets or some other source were questioned and discussed. Some institutions set up electronic resources committees to consider products, while regular subject area librarians select in others. Some institutions use special technology and student fees and money from gifts or "friends" sources to help fund digital purchases; others must depend on the main materials budget. Many now divide their budgets into continuing and non-continuing expenditures. The increasing importance and effect of consortial arrangements was obvious, especially in the purchase of large, expensive databases, but concern was also expressed about how consortial responsibilities are divided. Other issues receiving attention were the use of allocation formulas, line charges on vendor invoices for O% discount serials, and the overall decrease in publisher discounts to vendors. Vendors can no longer service subscribers for what they make on discounts. However, this is a successful example of outsourcing on the part of libraries, and now it may cost them. Chuck Hamaker provided some very interesting follow-up to LSU's "redesigned access to serials" for the university community. All told, LSU canceled over $450,000 in subscriptions, going from 13,000 subscriptions down to 9,000. In return, faculty and graduate students were subsidized and taught to use Uncover and Reveal using the SUMO gateway, which is customized with LSU holdings (requests for titles held by the library are rejected). About $40,000 provided document delivery needs for this segment of the university community. In addition, 260 new subscriptions to titles determined to be necessary and useful were ordered, and the faculty was finding access to a literature they didn't know existed. The Library has been able to obtain good information on the correlation between what they think they want and what they order, and the faculty actually has better access with 9,000 titles than previously. There is a cost ceiling for articles. The library receives a diskette with ordering information which can be sorted in various ways. Overall, there has been very little abuse of the Uncover/Reveal arrangement. Undergraduates are subsidized when requesting articles from canceled titles. There has been some concern about the privacy issue, i.e., who bought what. Generally speaking, the project has been a success because it has been well marketed to faculty in a way which has raised their comfort level with it. Jack Montgomery of the University of Missouri-Columbia Law Library spoke about his experiences with reorganization in Technical Services, which involved teams, outsourcing, and downsizing. After enumerating some of the reasons for failure in implementing change, he concluded that the human factor is the most frequent problem. In a sort of compilation of the problems people have dealing with change, much based on William Bridges' work, he summarized many of the feelings those involved in change go through and how a supervisor might respond to and lead employees in this situation. He also presented several helpful points about leading and promoting successful teams, His talk provided an well chosen and useful summary of points relating to experiencing change and working with teams. Jack Walsdorf of Blackwell North America spoke about his personal experience compiling information and writing _Julian Symons, A Bibliography_, from initiating the idea of the project with Symons to following the effort through to its culmination with the help of Symons' wife. Walsdorf identified the dual signs of book madness to be the words "complete" and "bibliography!" He chronicled his interest in Symons, his correspondence over the years leading to this work, and satisfaction with the final achievement as a tribute to the author. In closing the Conference, Clifford Lynch expressed a concern which could be compounded as electronic publication escalates. While reeling from the financial effects of the serials crisis, libraries have not been able to pay enough attention to getting the technical delivery systems in place or, it's hard to mount this stuff. Publishers are establishing their own websites, developing their exploratory prototypes and final products, and producing packages and marketing them. There are no standards which are routinely observed. Libraries cannot mount the content they want from each publisher; instead, they get what publishers give the way they give it. Integrated library systems offer little support for mounting content in their systems. Lynch speaks of the gap between access and delivery of content, and acknowledges that publishers are in the content production, not the access business. He sees the following as major issues: 1) Authentication - IP addresses and passwords are not acceptable. Are users to know different passwords for all publisher web sites? He offers the digital certificate hierarchy through "trusted" certificating machines as perhaps the most promising method. 2) Printing - a nightmare with which most libraries are familiar from various access and full text services. 3) Consistency - how will the user like accessing numerous websites, remembering who publishes what, individual journal titles and issues, and the idiosyncrasies of each site? Will the user ever be able to go directly to content, rather than to a home page and several other steps before the content? Better linking technology directly from the abstracting/indexing directly to the right level of content is necessary. 4) Abstracting and Indexing Services - these intermixed what libraries did and didn't have in the print world. Now, will they only link to content for which the library has licenses? Lynch spoke of secure containers, digital lock boxes which can make content non-manipulatable to the user, software which mediates access to content and what you can do with it. Viewing may be limited to a number of items or time period, printing may be prevented, or debits may be applied for certain uses. He views this as "disturbing." Archival responsibility in the electronic world is another nightmare. Print is an excellent method, while things in the electronic arena tend to disappear, evaporate. Amanda Harmon Acquisitions Unit Head UNC-Charlotte, Atkins Library Charlotte, North Carolina 28223 E-Mail: ali00alh@Email.uncc.edu Telephone: (704) 547-2284 Fax: (704) 547-2322 ****** END OF FILE ****** ACQNET, Vol. 6, No. 37 ****** END OF FILE ******