erc st 080425

Minutes of the Electronic Resources Committee Meeting 4/25/08

Fairness Issues in ERC purchasing models: case studies – American Chemical Society and Literature Resource Center

Notes by Teresa Hazen

The Electronic Resources Program Manager, Greg Doyle opened the session by stating that there are two basic rules regarding electronic resources consortial purchases that the Orbis consortium instituted years ago:

1. A consortial deal had to save the individual institutions money.

2. The consortium wouldn’t do any deals that didn’t save us at least 5% off street price.

Currently with the Orbis Cascade Alliance, complications have arisen and guidelines on consortial purchases need to be drafted to bring clarity and guide the consortium and the actions of the Electronic Resources Program Manager, when negotiating new and existing deals.

One pertinent issue is when new institutions join a preexisting consortial subscription package, they may end up paying significantly higher annual prices than what the original members pay. For whatever reasons, such as new management or a change in business models, vendors gouge the new subscribers. A particularly glaring example is Gale’s Literature Resource Center.

Literature Resource Center (LRC) quotes are significantly higher for new members than what original members are quoted. Clarity on what to do about this is needed. Simply put, the question was asked: What is fair to do in these cases? Discussion from the ERC members followed, touching on redistribution of the deal over a number of years, general displeasure with the mercenary nature of vendors who engage in this behavior, cancelation of the deal altogether and finally to a tiered system that is transparent to all Alliance members, existing and potential. The tiered approach met with agreement by the group. The following agreement for all existing and future electronic resources consortial purchases through the Orbis Cascade Alliance is as follows:

The job of the Electronic Resources Program Manager is to secure a discount off the street price of a product for member institutions in all Orbis Cascade Alliance Electronic Resources Committee deals. However, due to internal vendor pricing changes, there may be tiers in pricing for older and newer members. The Electronic Resources Program Manager will make sure all members are aware of these tiers before subscription deadlines.

American Chemical Society (ACS)

 
ACS is another consortial deal that is plagued by an unequal pricing model. Like institutions are paying wildly different subscription fees. The problem is that the ACS model is based on print, not electronic, which is not applicable anymore. Though there were two changes made last year to try to help balance things out (libraries with the full package get a discount and the minimum for being part of the deal is $5,000) Greg asked the members to come to a decision, if that was desired by the group, regarding fixing this deal.

 
Donna Packer (Western Washington University) put together a preliminary spreadsheet based on Carnegie Classification. In this scenario, those institutions that were in the same class paid the same amount in the ACS deal. This spreadsheet was presented to the group as a starting point to further discussion and was not meant to be anything other than that. Some of the comments were:

·        Institutions that have the same Carnegie Classification may have very different chemistry departments.

·        The old model is a snapshot in time, showing when the ACS deal moved from print to online, how important chemistry was for each institution. However, this importance may have changed over time for some institutions.

·        A suggestion came to look at both FTE and advanced degrees within chemistry programs across the member institutions to figure out pricing.

·        If we do a major shift in what participating members pay, it needs to be spread out over several years.

·        ACS says we are paying 15% lower than what we should be paying so expect an 8% increase next year with additional increases over the next 3-5 years.

·        The necessity of needing access to this journal content for accreditation of chemistry programs makes it impossible for some institutions to consider dropping out of ACS.

·        Is it possible for small incremental annual percentage increases to occur to bring balance to the ACS deal?

·        Chemistry students aren’t the only ones accessing ACS content at institutions, so just looking at FTE and types of degrees awarded in chemistry departments across institutions may not be showing a complete picture of usage.

After much discussion the following was agreed upon:

There are inequities in the ACS deal and committee will make a commitment to address them with the hope of arriving at a solution that works for everyone. A subgroup of the Electronic Resources Committee made up of ACS deal participants, along with the Electronic Resources Program Manager will work on this.

Greg will put out a notice for volunteers to serve on this subgroup.

E-Journal Package Renewals

Notes by D. Packer

Greg Doyle discussed renewal proposals on four different electronic journal packages, and sought feedback from committee members on offered terms.

1. Sage Premier: There are 400+ titles in this package, and the titles remain the same year to year. Sage took over about 45 new titles this year, and is offering to add them to the existing package for a premium. The spreadsheet displayed is on the Alliance web site, and Greg will set a deadline for members to respond. Sage’s terms are that everyone in this purchasing group must agree to take the new titles at the price listed, or no one can have the added package at the consortial rates listed. The deal is only open to current participants. The cost to participants of the current Sage plan is 12% of their Sage spend. The added package on offer will be for the subscription year beginning 2009, and will also have a 5% price cap.

2. Oxford University Press is repeating last year’s offer. They are offering access to all their journals, with the cost to individual libraries based on the number of current titles the library subscribes to. “Young journals”, i.e. journals just getting started, will be added to the package automatically. Libraries would retain “ownership” of the journals for the years they subscribe to the package. Access would be for the years 1997 on, and there are some 200 + titles available. OUP will delete the titles to which a library currently subscribes from the consortial price for that library; i.e. if one is paying for an independent subscription, the library pays full price for that title, but does not pay again in the “deal”. A spreadsheet is available on the Alliance web site.

3. Springer is offering three options.

· A “flip” model, first presented last fall. This is an annual subscription model offering every title in electronic format. The library “owns” all for a single price. The library “owns” access for the years to which they subscribed, but a cancellation will be for the whole package. Springer has made the same offer to GWLA.

·  A 3-year contract for a “non-flip” model. This option is similar to our existing contract, except that by signing up for three years we would get a better price cap.

· The existing annual renewable contract.

Some committee members noted the need to retain cancellation rights from year-to-year (something only Springer, of these four packages, allows) and also described their long cancellation cycles. Greg noted that with consortium participation we need to understand we have to get our renewal instructions from our selectors and faculty earlier than some of us are accustomed to doing.

4. Elsevier: This 3-year contract is up for renewal for the subscription year beginning January 2009. Despite repeated requests from Greg, Elsevier has not yet come forward with a concrete proposal. They have, however, announced they will no longer continue our seven Uniform Title Lists (UTLs), citing heavy administrative costs. They will permit up to three. 

Those involved in setting up the current UTL lists are aware of how complicated these were to construct. Greg has asked for usage data from Elsevier, so we can determine what actually got used before deciding whether or not to participate in a new UTL. Diane Carroll offered to do the spreadsheet work to help construct new UTLs, as long as there are only three.

5. Taylor and Francis made a proposal, but as they have a large minimum participation fee for their complete consortium deal. Greg deemed it too expensive for our membership and did not send it out

E-books: Controlling the Avalanche

Notes submitted by Sue Anderson

Presenters: Diane Grover, UW; Laurel Kristick, OSU; Joe Kiegel, UW (guest)

Diane - UW:

Numerous changes have occurred:

• In the last 5 years: NetLibrary, propriety offerings, historical and reference collections.
• In the last 2-3 years: competition between EBL, ebrary, mainstream publishers; current materials are available, multiple sources, bundled deals, and new purchasing models.

Role of consortium: how do we build shared collections like databases or ejournals?

Issues:

1) Content, completeness and currency.  We spend time looking at title lists (to check to see what we have); interlibrary loan rights, check on accompanying material, and electronic content is not timed with print publishing;

2) Terms of use: interlibrary loan, course packs or reserves;

3) Digital rights management may be embedded in an item, copying can be tracked and stopped;

4) Acquisition workflow is outside of the monographic ordering mainstream;

5) Purchasing models are not available for a library to share collections within a consortium.

Purchasing models: single (PDF), aggregator/host; subscription, encyclopedia (for the life of an edition); purchase with annual access fee; collection, big deal backfile; front file; multiyear contract, selected collection, patron driven selection, short term loan (an alternate to interlibrary loan); chapter (for reserve), and handheld reader.

 
Laurel:

Implementation/issues at OSU

• Workflow: working on one for e-books
• Selection decisions: individual titles, reference books, EBL, NetLibrary, Oxford Reference Online
• Budget management: one time fee or subscription
• Serials/Acquisitions: choosing a fund to purchase titles
• Visibility of reference titles: adding MARC records to the catalog for individual titles is fine; harder for package titles
• Digital rights management: titles might not work with proxy server; walk-in users may not be able to access some titles
• Usage statistics: difficult to receive from a vendor
• Kindle reader: preloaded with titles
•  

Joe K:

• E-book committee set up a 2-month trial for e-book platforms: ebrary, EBL, MyiLibrary, R2 (medical);
• Evaluated for overlapping coverage and interfaces and screened for show-stoppers - license terms, interface and business models.
• Results: Selectors liked R2, didn’t like the functionality of the others because of limits on printing and reserves, and concerns about preservation issues.  With no recommendations for any of the platforms, UW implemented all four platforms last fall.

Platform configuration issues:

• Non-purchased title displays, short loan periods, request notification, purchases, and title abbreviations.
• Specific issues: reserves, reference replacements, distance education students, second copies (first in print, second in electronic); first copies: first in electronic.  Discussion to convert approval plans to electronic.
• Emerging issues: we are using YBP Gobi to purchase e-books in packages or from publisher: how do we show holdings in Gobi to block ordering duplicates in print or electronic?  We can send ISBNs to Gobi to block duplicate ordering.  For non-permanent electronic books, do we block ordering in Gobi or purchase print?

Alliance issues and questions (Diane – UW)

• Interlibrary loan for electronic books is not allowed or is limited
• Patron initiated borrowing from other institution is not allowed
• Third party MARC records and restrictions cannot be uploaded to Summit or OCLC
• Can the Alliance purchase a subscription to electronic books, either individually or as a collection?
• Can the ER Committee overlap with CDMC to work on this question?
• Can each library put 5% of each library’s fund into an Alliance e-book fund to purchase e-book collections (like OhioLink and Ontario have done)?

Susan Hinken asked the question:  Could there be a threshold in the consortium that after libraries purchase seven or eight copies of a title, all libraries could have access to that title?  Could a model be based on actual use?  Could this be a new model for e-book publishers? 

John Helmer suggested that someone on the ER Committee prepare a position paper with someone on CMDC to raise these issues and add it to the Strategic Planning Retreat agenda in February 2009.

Open Forum: This last twenty minutes of the Annual Meeting provided an opportunity for questions and comments on any topic.

Notes by Joanna Haney

1. Diane Carroll (WSU) asked whether any other libraries are going through a cancellations process.

· OSU is looking at their Elsevier and Springer titles for cancellations.

· PSU is planning for at least a 4 ½% cut.

· UO is okay for now, but might be cancelling titles next year.

· UW is preparing a contingency list while they wait for their budget. If they need to cancel, it will be about $400,000.

· UP actually has a 7% increase in their acquisitions budget.

2. Janis Tyhurst (GFU) raised the issue of FMG problems with proxy servers. There was a mix of responses. Some libraries using ezproxy were having a problem, others not. Some libraries using Innovative’s WAM were having a problem; others not.

Greg warned that when it’s time to renew, we will not likely see the discounts we were given for this year’s subscriptions.

Flora Lippert (PCC) asked if there are other vendors we can try; perhaps PBS?