NEWSLETTER ON SERIALS PRICING ISSUES

NO 171 - January 29, 1997

Editor: Marcia Tuttle

ISSN: 1046-3410

CONTENTS

I want to be sure that everyone knows about a new listserver relevant to the topic of this newsletter. That is LIBLICENSE-L, moderated by Ann Okerson and attorney Rodney Stenlake at Yale University. Here is the statement about the list from the welcome message:

LIBLICENSE-L is a moderated list for the discussion of issues related to the licensing of digital information by academic and research libraries. Increasingly, libraries are being inundated with information created in digital format and transmitted and accessed via computers. This list is designed to assist librarians and others concerned with the licensing of information in digital format in dealing with some of the unique challenges faced by this new medium. Information providers (creators, publishers and vendors) who deal with libraries are welcomed as members of liblicense-l. Potential areas of discussion include:

* Drafting library and educational license agreements for digital information content

* Insuring that license agreements do not inordinately restrict the use of digital information

* Reconciling license agreements with the fair use provisions of the U.S. Copyright Act

* International agreements relating to the copyright of databases or other digital information in their relationship to content licenses

* Modifications of the U.S. Copyright Act as this relates to digital information via license

* Interlibrary loans of digital information in the way these relate to library content licenses.

171.2 ALCTS JOURNAL COSTS IN LIBRARIES DISCUSSION GROUP, ALA MIDWINTER
Scott Wicks, Cornell University, sbw2@cornell.edu

Vice-Chair
Scott Wicks
Acquisitions Librarian
Central Technical Services
Cornell University Library
Cornell University
SBW2@cornell.edu
607/255-4960

171.3 ADVANCED ACQUISITIONS PRECONFERENCE IN SAN FRANCISCO AT ALA
Julie Gammon, University of Akron, R1JAG@VM1.CC.UAKRON.EDU

[Received December 11, 1996.]

Attention acquisitions and serials librarians, technical services heads, library administrators, book and serial vendors and publishers:

For those of you who like to make your San Francisco travel plans early, please mark your new 1997 calendars with this ALA ALCTS advanced acquisitions preconference:

What: "Rethinking and Transforming Acquisitions Preconference"
ALCTS Business of Acquisitions Advanced Institute

Where: ALA Annual Meeting San Francisco, California

When: Thursday, June 26-Friday, June 27, 1997
[1.5 days, ending noon on Friday]

Plenary speakers:
Michael Keller (Stanford University)
Carol Pitts Diedrichs (Ohio State University)
Clifford Lynch (University of California)

Workshops:
Tools for Achieving Consensus
EDI: The BISAC/SISAC Perspectives
Electronic License Prices: The New Frontier
Electronic License Policy: The Eternal Frontier
Managing Human Resources in Acquisitions
Outsourcing Acquisitions

Informal Discussion Groups:
Acquisitions Web Sites
Acquisitions/Document Delivery Partnership
Life-Long Learning for Acquisitions
Tables Turned: Acquisitions Provides Outsourcing Services
Vendor Evaluations in the Outsourcing Environment
Getting Published

Costs: ALCTS members: $135
ALA members (who are not also members of ALCTS): $185
ALA/ALCTS non-members: $235

Registration begins in January 1997. Contact Yvonne McLean at the ALCTS Office for further information: (800)545-2433, ext. 5032 or yvonne.mclean@ala.org. Complete program information will be available soon on a website -- we'll announce the web address when the site is ready!

From Albert Henderson, _Publishing Research Quarterly_, 70244.1532@CompuServe.COM:

[Received December 18, 1996.]

Two contributions to No. 170 raise the question of value, too often a red herring that has nothing to do with price or price-per-whatever of journals. The value of a journal's content is latent, a potential to be yielded to the appropriate readers. Struggling without sufficient preparation, many researchers engage in useless repetition and random speculation. There are studies of journal articles to support this notion.

On the other hand, Department of Energy research done by Donald King in the 1970s provides ample support for the value of journal articles, reports, and monographs as saving many times the cost of information procurement and readers' time.

Unfortunately no one ever gets back to the librarians with a well-deserved Christmas Bonus when information saves thousands of research dollars or stimulates Nobel-prize winning research!
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From a librarian who has convinced me of the need to remain anonymous:

[Received December 19, 1996.]

In answer to Peter Boyce, I hope he realizes that, for every complaint about the pricing of the JBC, there are thousands of librarians and scientists that are eternally grateful for the incredible value it has been over the years. If JBC were a crass commercial organization, they could probably charge ten times as much and it would still be competitive.

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Statements of fact and opinion appearing in the Newsletter on Serials Pricing Issues are made on the responsibility of the authors alone, and do not imply the endorsement of the editor, the editorial board, or the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.
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Readers of the Newsletter on Serials Pricing Issues are encouraged to share the information in the newsletter by electronic or paper methods. We would appreciate credit if you quote from the newsletter.
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The Newsletter on Serials Pricing Issues (ISSN: 1046-3410) is published by the editor through Academic and Networking Technology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as news is available. Editor: Marcia Tuttle, Internet: tuttle@gibbs.oit.unc.edu; Paper mail: Serials Department, CB #3938 Davis Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill NC 27514-8890; Telephone: 919 962-8047; FAX: 919 962-4450. Editorial Board: Deana Astle (Clemson University), Christian Boissonnas (Cornell University), Jerry Curtis (Springer Verlag New York), Isabel Czech (Institute for Scientific Information), Janet Fisher (MIT Press), Fred Friend (University College, London), Charles Hamaker (Louisiana State University), Daniel Jones (University of Texas Health Science Center), Michael Markwith (Swets North America), James Mouw (University of Chicago), and Heather Steele (Blackwell's Periodicals Division). The Newsletter is available on the Internet, Blackwell's CONNECT, and Readmore's ROSS. EBSCO customers may receive the Newsletter in paper format.

To subscribe to the newsletter send a message to LISTPROC@UNC.EDU saying SUBSCRIBE PRICES [YOUR NAME]. Be sure to send that message to the listserver and not to Prices. You must include your name. To unsubscribe (no name required in message), you must send the message from the e-mail address by which you are subscribed. If you have problems, please contact the editor.

Back issues of the Newsletter are archived on 2 World Wide Web sites. At UNC-Chapel Hill the url is: http://www.lib.unc.edu/reference/ prices/prices.html. At Grenoble the url is: http://www-mathdoc.ujf- grenoble.fr/NSPI/NSPI.html.
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