Category: Open Access and Other License Agreements

"The Case of the Disappearing E-book: Academic Libraries and Subscription Packages"

College & Research Libraries has released "The Case of the Disappearing E-Book: Academic Libraries and Subscription Packages" by Helen Georgas.

Here's an excerpt:

This study begins with a one-year analysis of "disappeared" titles from ebrary's Academic Complete™ collection at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York (CUNY). Were certain subject areas particularly affected? Which publishers were removed? Were the removed titles mainly scholarly, or were they titles published by popular presses? Were the removed monographs older publications, or were recent titles deleted as well?

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Sitemap

"Reflections on Library Licensing"

Ann Shumelda Okerson has published "Reflections on Library Licensing" in Information Standards Quarterly.

Here's an excerpt:

The way libraries acquire basic content for their readers has been completely upended in the last two decades. In this rapid electronic environment, content providers are pressed to enhance and update existing products or to produce competitive new products, with ever-increasing functionality and with great uncertainty about what users will pay for and how much they will pay. At the same time, numerous new producers are entering the electronic marketplace. We are living in an information Wild West, which can put libraries and publishers face to face on Main Street at high noon, often without the third-party subscription agents or book jobbers we used to depend on. This article discusses how we got to this place; whether one should prefer copyright or license; the differing view of rights by authors, publishers, libraries and their end users; different types of licenses; and current issues in licensing.

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Sitemap

New LIBLICENSE Model License Agreement

The Center for Research Libraries and others have released a new LIBLICENSE Model License Agreement.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

The model license outlines the main provisions a good library e-resources content license should contain, highlighting as well key points for decisions and negotiations with publishers. The document is expected to support libraries' efforts to serve their users and achieve the core mission of preserving intellectual heritage in the digital age by negotiating the best terms of use. The original LIBLICENSE model license, released in 2001, has supported long-term access and stewardship goals; the new revision will help librarians address a new generation of issues and challenges.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

"How Streaming Media Could Threaten the Mission of Libraries"

Steve Kolowich has published "How Streaming Media Could Threaten the Mission of Libraries" in Wired Campus.

Here's an excerpt:

Welcome to content licensing, a great source of anxiety for librarians in the digital era. In previous decades, the university librarians might have bought a CD of the Dudamel album for $25 and kept it in circulation it for as long as the disc remained viable. Here they were asked to pay the publisher 10 times that amount (plus a licensing fee that would probably exceed the processing fee) for access to a quarter of the album for two years.

Digital Scholarship | "A Quarter-Century as an Open Access Publisher"

"Ebook Pricing Hikes Amount to Price-Gouging"

Boston Library Consortium has released "Ebook Pricing Hikes Amount to Price-Gouging" as a letter to the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Here's an excerpt:

Consequently, the BLC will lower the price ceiling below which individual titles are eligible to be included in our ebook program, we will reduce the availability of back-list titles at high price points, and we will increase the portion of our consortial budget that is allocated to those publishers whose pricing remains reasonable. In this way, we mean to reward what we regard as fair dealing, as we attempt to limit the budget impact of what appears plainly to be price-gouging.

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

Big Deals: Beyond the Damage: Circulation, Coverage and Staffing

Walt Crawford has published Beyond the Damage: Circulation, Coverage and Staffing.

Here's an excerpt from chapter one:

Big-Deal Serials Purchasing: Tracking the Damage looks almost entirely at four aspects of library spending and changes in that spending: total spending, current serials, "books" (all other acquisitions) and the remainder”what's left over for staff, automation, preservation, etc.

This book looks at some other aspects of academic libraries and how they have changed from 2002 through 2012: circulation, coverage and staffing. It's designed to complement the LTR report. Indeed, I assume that readers will have access to the report, as it includes details on which academic libraries are included and excluded. This book uses exactly the same universe of libraries (2,594 in all) as the report. I believe this book (and the supplementary PDF) will provide useful additional insights into what's happened in academic libraries over a decade in which Big Deals supposedly improved serials pricing problems”but still had serials spending taking more and more of a sometimes-shrinking overall pie…

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

"Four Facets of Privacy and Intellectual Freedom in Licensing Contracts for Electronic Journals"

College & Research Libraries has released an eprint of "Four Facets of Privacy and Intellectual Freedom in Licensing Contracts for Electronic Journals."

Here's an excerpt:

This is a study of the treatment of library patron privacy in licenses for electronic journals in academic libraries. We begin by distinguishing four facets of privacy and intellectual freedom based on the LIS and philosophical literature. Next, we perform a content analysis of 42 license agreements for electronic journals, focusing on terms for enforcing authorized use and collection and sharing of user data. We compare our findings to model licenses, to recommendations proposed in a recent treatise on licenses, and to our account of the four facets of intellectual freedom. We find important conflicts with each.

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

"Unwrapping the Bundle: An Examination of Research Libraries and the ‘Big Deal’"

Karla L. Strieb and Julia C. Blixrud have self-archived "Unwrapping the Bundle: An Examination of Research Libraries and the 'Big Deal'."

Here's an excerpt:

This study presents and analyzes the findings of a 2012 survey of member libraries belonging to the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) on publishers' large journal bundles and compares the results to earlier surveys. The data illuminate five research questions: market penetration, journal bundle construction, collection format shifts, pricing models, and license terms. The structure of the product is still immature, particularly in defining content and developing sustainable pricing models. The typical "bundle" is something less than the full publishers list. Neither market studies nor market forces have produced a sustainable new strategy for pricing and selling e-journals. Finally, a complex history of managing license terms is revealed in the data.

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

"E-Book Platforms for Academic Librarians"

Audrey Powers has self-archived "E-Book Platforms for Academic Librarians."

Here's an excerpt:

The goal of this issue is to provide a succinct overview of e-book platforms for academic librarians as well as insights into where e-book platforms are headed in the future. Most of the authors work in academic libraries and their job responsibilities include developing, procuring, promoting, and educating users about e-books. The topics covered include an overview of e-book platforms including technical aspects and business models, lending platforms, aggregator platforms, commercial publisher platforms, and university press platforms. It is our hope that when you read these articles it will add to your knowledge base about the current and future state of e-book platforms in academic libraries.

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

"Last Sale? Libraries’ Rights in the Digital Age"

Jennifer Jenkins has published "Last Sale? Libraries' Rights in the Digital Age" in College & Research Libraries News.

Here's an excerpt:

What's the difference between a sale and license? Normally, the law is skeptical of limitations on transfers of property. Can Snickers say you merely "licensed" that candy bar because there was fine print on the label? A court would be unlikely to agree. Can libraries argue that though e-books come with "a license," the library is nevertheless an "owner" with first sale rights? The answer at the moment is "probably not."

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

Open Access Clauses in Publishers’ Licenses: Current State and Lessons Learned

COAR has released Open Access Clauses in Publishers' Licenses: Current State and Lessons Learned.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

As Open Access (OA) policies and laws are being adopted world-wide, the scholarly community is shifting its efforts from advocacy towards practical implementation and support. One of the major routes for making articles open access is through OA repositories. However the variety and lack of clarity of publishers' policies regarding article deposit can be a significant barrier to author compliance of OA policies.

In order to overcome this barrier, some organizations have successfully negotiated authors' or deposit rights with publishers in the context of purchasing content licenses. This report documents the existing OA licensing language that has been implemented by organizations around the world and presents some suggestions for their successful adoption. The report concludes that OA clauses offer a feasible option for institutions to address some of the obstacles to article deposit into repositories.

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

Digital Image Collections and Services, SPEC Kit 335

ARL has released Digital Image Collections and Services, SPEC Kit 335.

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

ARL has published Digital Image Collections and Services, SPEC Kit 335, which examines how research libraries and their parent institutions have responded to the transition from analog to digital images and the growth of digital images available from commercial vendors and/or created within institutions or their libraries. The survey gathers information about current practices relating to the development and management of institutional digital image collections and the acquisition and use of licensed image databases.

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

"Text & Data Mining—A Librarian Overview"

IFLA has released "Text & Data Mining—A Librarian Overview" by Ann Okerson.

Here's an excerpt:

Text and data mining offers exciting research opportunities over a broad range of fields. . . .

This paper reviews some of the possibilities for such work and outlines the challenges and the way ahead for librarians. One challenge lies in the terms by which data sets are licensed and made available to academic and other users; librarians need to be proactive in ensuring that these terms are favorable for the kind of use researchers will need and that the resources themselves are available in a format that allows innovative mining-based research. Another challenge is the need to support users who wish to engage in text and data mining with limited experience, especially when they approach data sets made available through library resources. Librarians should develop the expertise to support their users by making data resources available to them on favorable terms and supporting their mining efforts.

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

"How Institutionalized Are Model License Use Terms? An Analysis of E-Journal License Use Rights Clauses from 2000 to 2009"

Kristin R. Eschenfelder, Tien-I Tsai, Xiaohua Zhu and Brenton Stewart have published "How Institutionalized Are Model License Use Terms? An Analysis of E-Journal License Use Rights Clauses from 2000 to 2009" in the latest issue of College & Research Libraries.

Here's an excerpt:

This paper explored the degree to which use terms proposed by model licenses have become institutionalized across different publishers' licenses. It examined model license use terms in four areas: downloading, scholarly sharing, interlibrary loan, and electronic reserves. Data collection and analysis involved content analysis of 224 electronic journal licenses spanning 2000-2009. Analysis examined how use terms changed over time, differences between consortia and site license use terms and differences between commercial and noncommercial publisher license use terms. Results suggest that some model license use terms have become institutionalized while others have not. Use terms with higher institutionalization included: allowing ILL, permitting secure e-transmission for ILL, allowing e-reserves with no special permissions, and not requiring deletion of e-reserves files. Scholarly sharing showed lower institutionalization with most publishers not including scholarly sharing allowances. Other use terms showing low institutionalization included: recommendations to avoid printing requirements related to ILL and recommendations to allow hyperlinks for e-reserves. The results provide insight into the range of use terms commonly employed in e-journal licenses.

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

"Unintended Consequences: New Materialist Perspectives on Library Technologies and the Digital Record"

portal: Libraries and the Academy has released an e-print of "Unintended Consequences: New Materialist Perspectives on Library Technologies and the Digital Record" by Marlene Manoff.

Here's an excerpt:

Digital technology has irrevocably altered the nature of the archive. Drawing on materialist critiques and the evolving field of media archaeology, this essay explores new strategies for understanding the implications of computer networks in libraries. Although a significant portion of the contemporary literature within Library and Information Science (LIS) addresses issues of technological change, the materialist and multidisciplinary approaches proposed here provide a theoretical basis for investigating the current state of library technologies in new ways. These methods provide insight into the proliferation of digital products and the cycles of platform adoption and replacement that have marked the past decades of library development. They also help to reframe questions about content aggregation and the licensing of digital scholarship.

Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap

"A Pilot Using OverDrive: E-lending in Academic Law Libraries"

Nina E. Scholtz has published "A Pilot Using OverDrive: E-lending in Academic Law Libraries" in the latest issue of AALL Spectrum.

Here's an excerpt:

With these increasing signs of a strong future for e-books, and possibly for e-lending as well, in spring 2012 Cornell University Law Library decided to pilot OverDrive for the Cornell Law School community. . . .

Exploring the future of e-book lending was a natural fit for us. And by embarking on a pilot of the OverDrive service, we could test the waters of e-lending in a cost-efficient way that would not be prohibitive in terms of staff time and library resources. The service would allow us to see specifically how our users would respond to an e-lending program. The library had already successfully introduced a popular small-print reading collection. Trying out an online component to this simple but well-liked outreach program seemed like a logical progression. With these thoughts in mind, in June 2012 we signed a contract with OverDrive for a one-year pilot period.

| Digital Scholarship | Digital Scholarship Publications Overview | Sitemap |

The Thinkpiece "Libraries, eLending, and the Future of Public Access to Digital Content"

IFLA has released The Thinkpiece "Libraries, eLending, and the Future of Public Access to Digital Content".

Here's an excerpt:

In October 2012 IFLA therefore commissioned an independent consultant, Civic Agenda, to prepare a 'thinkpiece' to inform discussion at a meeting of experts from the library and publishing sector. This meeting took place over three days at IFLA Headquarters in The Hague in November 2012. The thinkpiece was the starting point for discussions on desirable characteristics for public access models for library digital content, library user expectations' regarding eBooks, and the relationship between libraries and publishers in the eBook age. During the meeting participants focused on the role of copyright, licensing and legislation in access to digital content like eBooks, as well as reviewing advocacy campaigns and the potential for IFLA as an advocate for library access to eBooks.

| Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography 2010 ( paperback and PDF file; over 3,800 entries) | Digital Scholarship |

"Open Access, Library and Publisher Competition, and the Evolution of General Commerce"

Andrew Odlyzko has self-archived "Open Access, Library and Publisher Competition, and the Evolution of General Commerce."

Here's an excerpt:

Discussions of the economics of scholarly communication are usually devoted to Open Access, rising journal prices, publisher profits, and boycotts. That ignores what seems a much more important development in this market. Publishers, through the oft-reviled "Big Deal" packages, are providing much greater and more egalitarian access to the journal literature, an approximation to true Open Access. In the process they are also marginalizing libraries, and obtaining a greater share of the resources going into scholarly communication. This is enabling a continuation of publisher profits as well as of what for decades has been called "unsustainable journal price escalation." It is also inhibiting the spread of Open Access, and potentially leading to an oligopoly of publishers controlling distribution through large-scale licensing.

| Transforming Scholarly Publishing through Open Access: A Bibliography (paperback, PDF file, and XHTML website; over 1,100 entries) | Digital Scholarship |

EBook Business Models: A Scorecard for Public Libraries

ALA's Digital Content and Libraries Working Group has released EBook Business Models: A Scorecard for Public Libraries.

Here's an excerpt:

The Digital Content & Libraries Working Group (DCWG) began documenting and describing attributes of various licensing arrangements libraries may have with publishers in the August 2012 report Ebook Business Models for Public Libraries. Now we are pleased to share The Ebook Business Model Scorecard, which more fully examines the variables often seen in ebook license agreements or contracts. At the same time, the variables, when considered as a whole, can help libraries conceptualize licenses holistically instead of fixating on one aspect of a contract in isolation.

| Google Books Bibliography (XHTML website; over 320 entries) | Digital Scholarship |

"The State of Large-Publisher Bundles in 2012"

ARL has released a pre-publication version of "The State of Large-Publisher Bundles in 2012."

Here's an excerpt from the announcement:

In this article, authors Karla Strieb and Julia Blixrud report on the results of a recent survey of journal licenses in ARL member libraries. The authors conclude that there are "ongoing strains in libraries' relationships with publishers and in their ability to maintain electronic journal bundles in difficult financial times." They found that journal collections have become smaller and more tailored, and that stronger licensing language is needed in the clauses that are most important to research libraries. The authors note that licenses need to allow libraries to: make new uses of the licensed content, share information with peers about licensing terms, and rest assured that licensed content will be available in the future.

| Digital Scholarship's Digital/Print Books | Digital Scholarship |

Canadian Research Knowledge Network Will Cancel National License Agreement with American Chemical Society

The Canadian Research Knowledge Network will cancel a national license agreement for the American Chemical Society's Web Editions and Legacy Archives products.

Here's an excerpt from the press release:

Termination of the CRKN-ACS license will take effect at the end of 2013, at which time participating libraries may choose to contract directly with ACS or implement alternate arrangements. . . .

Under ACS's new pricing, costs for participant libraries will be determined solely by usage, using the average number of full-text downloads from the most recent three years, and with participating institutions organized into usage bands. Any growth in usage that would move a participating institution into a higher usage band would result in a prohibitive price increase that could double or triple the cost of the ACS content. This pricing regime represents a huge financial risk for those libraries that are most committed to promoting ACS resources, and will penalize those who are most successful in integrating ACS content into new web- and mobile-based discovery and access systems that are used increasingly by university researchers and students.

| Scholarly Electronic Publishing Weblog | Digital Scholarship |

E-books: Developments and Policy Considerations

The OECD has released E-books: Developments and Policy Considerations.

Here's an excerpt:

The essential distinction between permanent and effective ownership of a physical book, and conditional rights of access to the e-book, has, so far, been somewhat obscured by marketing strategies and use of visual images, which tend to present e-books as a superior, but also substitutable, version of the print book product. Given the virtual reality of "traditional books" presented by e-Book platforms, buyers of e-books are likely to confuse their rights (i.e. after purchase) with the property rights model for print books. Users may be surprised to find that they are prevented from doing certain things7 with their e-book, within their private/ personal sphere.

| Reviews of Digital Scholarship Publications | Digital Scholarship |

"Confronting the Crisis in Scientific Publishing: Latency, Licensing and Access"

Jorge L. Contreras has self-archived "Confronting the Crisis in Scientific Publishing: Latency, Licensing and Access" in the American University Washington College of Law Digital Commons.

Here's an excerpt:

In this article, I propose an alternative private ordering solution based on latency values observed in open access stakeholder negotiation settings. Under this proposal, research institutions would collectively develop and adopt publication agreements that do not transfer copyright ownership to publishers, but instead grant publishers a one-year exclusive period in which to publish a work. This limited period of exclusivity should enable the publisher to recoup its costs and a reasonable profit through subscription revenues, while restoring control of the article copyright to the author at the end of the exclusivity period. This balanced approach addresses the needs of both publishers and the scientific community, and would, I believe, avoid many of the challenges faced by existing open access models.

| Digital Scholarship Overview | Digital Scholarship |

"National Licenses and Open Access in Germany"

The Confederation of Open Access Repositories (COAR) has released "National Licenses and Open Access in Germany."

Here's an excerpt:

Over the last years, a number of collaborative negotiations have taken place at a national level in order to push forward on conditions for Open Access within journal license agreements. In 2010, the National Licensing working group of the "Digital Information" initiative in Germany agreed on common guidelines and carried out licensing negotiations for current journals and databases. Special attention was paid to pricing models, archiving and "moving wall" conditions, including a condition for Open Access. The background to and outcomes of these negotiations are described in this paper, with particular emphasis on newly agreed licenses in the Alliance of German Science Organisations framework ("Alliance licenses"). Further contracts are under development.

| Transforming Scholarly Publishing through Open Access: A Bibliography: "This work gives an outstanding overview of scholarship relating to the growing Open Access movement." — George Machovec, The Charleston Advisor 12, no. 2 (2010): 3. | Digital Scholarship |

"How Institutionalized Are Model License Use Terms: An Analysis of E-journal License Use Rights Clauses from 2000-2009"

College & Research Libraries has released "How Institutionalized Are Model License Use Terms: An Analysis of E-journal License Use Rights Clauses from 2000-2009," a preprint by Kristin R. Eschenfelder et al.

Here's an excerpt:

This paper explored the degree to [which] use terms proposed by model licenses have become institutionalized across different publishers' licenses. It examined model license use terms in four areas: downloading, scholarly sharing, interlibrary loan and electronic reserves. Data collection and analysis involved content analysis of 224 electronic journal licenses spanning 2000-2009. Analysis examined how use terms changed over time, differences between consortia and site license use terms and differences between commercial and non-commercial publisher license use terms. Results suggest that some model license use terms have become institutionalized while others have not.

| Scholarly Electronic Publishing Bibliography 2010 | Digital Scholarship |