121.2 DAWSON HOLDINGS PLC PURCHASE AGREEMENT ACCEPTED BY FAXON INC, Press release
121.3 NEW PUBLISHER REDUCES PRICE OF _THE SOCIOLOGICAL QUARTERLY_, Rebecca Simon
121.4 ANOTHER NEW PUBLISHER LOWERS ANOTHER PRICE: _BLOOD CELLS_, Cindy Hepfer
121.5 POLITICS OF CANCELLATION -- NEUTRALIZE THE EFFECTS WITH USAGE STUDY, Carole Francq
121.6 NEW YORK TIMES ARTICLE IN SCIENCE TIMES, Press release
Press release, Madelyn Bonnett, EBSCO Corporate Communications, 205 991-1184
September 1, 1994 BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - EBSCO has terminated its consideration of the acquisi- tion of Faxon's non-U.S. operations, excluding Europe, and of the Turner subsidiary. The results of due diligence work by EBSCO and the subsequent efforts to set an agreement and to plan its legal conclusion in a timely fashion have not been satisfactory to EBSCO. Timeliness has been a major EBSCO concern and emphasis in this effort. Discussions and consideration of the possible acquisition of the non-U.S. operations, excluding Europe, and of Turner have ended. EBSCO stands fully committed to international subscription service. EBSCO possesses strong operational and financial resources. The company has good working relationships with publishers. Customers are serviced locally through EBSCO's 28 regional offices worldwide. EBSCO is able and ready to respond to inquiries and to offer its services.121.2 DAWSON HOLDINGS PLC PURCHASE AGREEMENT ACCEPTED BY FAXON INC; DAWSON TO BECOME NUMBER TWO WORLDWIDE
Diana Brewer, Faxon Company, brewer@faxon.com.
The following is the press release which Dawson is distributing today [September 2, 1994]. For more information contact: Vernon W. Cain, President Dawson Subscription Services 815-732-9001 Folkestone, U.K. -- Dawson Holdings PLC, a publicly traded worldwide sup- plier of information services to the library community, jointly announced with The Faxon Company, Inc. their agreement for Dawson to acquire The Faxon Company and all Faxon subsidiaries. The purchase of Faxon will make Dawson the second largest library information services organization in the world. Westwood, Mass.-based Faxon President Judy Davis confirmed that "Faxon has accepted a Dawson Holdings PLC offer for the purchase of all of The Faxon Company." Brian Ingleby, Group Chief Executive of Dawson Holdings PLC of Folkestone, UK says, "Dawson PLC has a record of service in the supply of information dating back to 1807. The acquisition of Faxon positions us for dynamic growth well into the next century." Collectively, sales will be in excess of a half billion dollars. Says President and CEO of Dawson US Operations Vernon W. Cain, "The pur- chase of Faxon is an exciting move for Dawson and a strategic one. It is the next logical step in our drive to lead the library information services industry." Both Dawson and Faxon are highly diversified, experienced sup- pliers of information services to the international library purchasing community. According to Cain the acquisition of Faxon will add considerable stability and reliability to the library information services supply industry as well as continuity of supply and services to the purchasing community. It is anticipated that this agreement will be concluded shortly. "Dawson will be providing interim support to Faxon, and looks forward to meeting and working with the Faxon clients on a one on one basis," said Cain.121.3 NEW PUBLISHER REDUCES PRICE OF _THE SOCIOLOGICAL QUARTERLY_
Rebecca Simon, University of California Press, rrs@uclink.berkeley.edu
University of California Press is pleased to announce a price reduction for _The Sociological Quarterly_. This year, libraries will be able to order the journal for $10 less than last year. The 1995 subscription rate for domestic institutions is $135 (compared to $145 in 1994) and $141 for for- eign institutions. _The Sociological Quarterly_ may be ordered through subscription agents or from University of California Press directly.121.4 ANOTHER NEW PUBLISHER LOWERS ANOTHER PRICE: _BLOOD CELLS_
Cindy Hepfer, University at Buffalo Health Sciences Library, hslcindy@ubvm.cc.buffalo.edu.
I received an interesting letter yesterday I want to share with you for the Newsletter. The text of the letter follows. I find the Foundation's goal of lowering the price now and continuing to lower it as they pick up new sub- scribers to be very noble and notable. With an expanded scope and reader- ship, though, I can't help but wonder if the size of the journal will in- crease, thus costing more to produce. It will be interesting to monitor the price and size of this title in coming years. In any event, I am sure health science librarians will applaud and support Dr. Beutler. Incidentally, I just wrote Regina Reynolds at NSDP about the Foundation's intent to change the title to reflect a broader scope, but have the ISSN remain the same. I'm not sure they'll get that wish! *************************************************************************** Blood Cells Foundation Ernest Beutler, MD The Scripps Research Institute (SBR-3) 10666 North Torrey Pines Road La Jolla, CA 92037 Phone: (619)554-8040 Fax: (619)554-6927 August 12, 1994 Health Sciences Library State Univ of NY at Buffalo Abbott Hall 3435 Main Street Buffalo, NY 14214-3002 Dear Subscriber: A bill for your 1995 subscription to _Blood Cells_ is enclosed. _Blood Cells_ has recently been acquired from Springer Verlag by the non-profit Blood Cells Foundation. The journal will continue to publish high quality contributions in the field of hematology, and will broaden the scope of hematologic topics to be offered. Accordingly, the name of the journal will be amended to _Blood Cells, Molecules, and Diseases_. It is our intention to have the ISSN number of the journal remain as 0340-4684. Because of the non-profit status of the foundation and because we expect to greatly expand the readership of the journal, we are taking the unusual step of _lowering_ the subscription price from $169 to $159. Postage and handling will continue to be $10 in the U.S. and will be $20 outside the U.S. We hope that further and more substantial reductions in the subscrip- tion price will be possible as our subscriber list grows. In the meanwhile, we hope that we may count on your continued support. Checks for subscrip- tions should be made out to Blood Cells Foundation and sent to: Ernest Beutler, M.D. Blood Cells Foundation The Scripps Research Institute (SBR-3) 10666 North Torrey Pines Road La Jolla, CA 92037 Very sincerely yours, Jane P. Verenini Res. Admin. Assist. to Ernest Beutler, M.D.121.5 POLITICS OF CANCELLATION -- NEUTRALIZE THE EFFECTS WITH USAGE STUDY
Carole Francq, Indiana University Ruth Lilly Medical Library CFRANCQ@INDYVAX.IUPUI.EDU
There are collection management tools that are easier to implement than dealing with infuriated faculty trying to out guess you. No need to appear capricious or playing favorites. No need to apologize for subscription cancellations, when you are empowered with collection usage facts. What can be more obvious than journal usage/cost statistics, especially two years or more of circulation or reshelving data. It takes planning, effort, and some expertise -- the kind of things on which a bright, untenured librarian can build a tenure case. And yes, a usage/cost study takes some seed money (barcode readers, barcodes, staff to barcode volumes, some basic programming for the barcode readers). We auto- mated a usage/cost study with $6,414 of equipment and supplies which we recouped with the first report. We hired a programmer with some experience and between jobs, who was asking us for work by the hour. Our process is simple and NOT a cost-per-use study, which requires a full year's subscription price for every publication year in the usage study. For details, see "Bottoming Out the Bottomless Pit with the Journal Usage/ Cost Relational Index" by Carole Francq in _Technical Services Quarterly_, Vol. 11(4)1994: 13-26. I sympathize with Bill Miller and Florida Atlantic University. Indiana University's Ruth Lilly Medical Library was fortunate to have manual, then automated, journal reshelving statistics. We credit our good fortune to the usage/cost data for each title, the major factor in avoiding intense facul- ty irratation with the cancellations we made.121.6 NEW YORK TIMES ARTICLE IN SCIENCE TIMES
Press release from Gordon and Breach Publishers, Inc., P.O. Box 200029 Riverfront Plaza Station, Newark NJ 07102-0301; 201 643-7500.
August 23, 1994 NT TIMES INCORRECTLY REPORTS THAT GORDON & BREACH LAWSUIT DISMISSED An article in the Science Times section of the NY Times on August 16 incor- rectly reported that the lawsuit of Gordon & Breach Publishers, Inc. against the American Institute of Physics and the American Physical Society was dismissed. The suit contends that the societies had issued false and misleading surveys comparing cost and citation frequency of their journals with those of commercial publishers. The court held that if the societies used those surveys to promote either the sale of their journals or deci- sions to publish with them, then federal law could be violated. The court ordered that the case should continue to give Gordon & Breach the opportun- ity to prove that the societies in fact used the surveys in this way. Once this issue is proved, the case will proceed to determine whether the sur- veys are false and misleading, which Gordon & Breach is confident it will establish. Gordon & Breach also reiterates that it has [sic] and remains willing to resolve the dispute if the societies will agree to some form of peer review of its cost comparison studies. Gordon & Breach was surprised to learn that no peer review had occurred when the surveys were first issued, and remains surprised that the societies are not willing to discuss peer review for future surveys. According to Gordon & Breach "the only conclusion we can draw is that the societies know that they are using a methodology for com- paring their journals with ours that is so misleading that no independent reviewer will agree with it." The company also noted that a judge in Swit- zerland where G&B's main headquarters are located had agreed that the soci- eties should obtain a third party opinion about its surveys before publish- ing a new one, but that the societies had rejected this approach.
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