145.3 ELECTRONIC JOURNALS AND IOP, Kurt Paulus
Teri Harrison Wilson, The Faxon Company,harrison@faxon.com.
PRESS RELEASE
Westwood, MA, September 19, 1995. With many 1996 publisher price
lists now in hand, Faxon has analyzed actual journal subscription
price increases versus its projections made earlier this year.
The actual 1996 subscription price increases correspond to the
projections, showing high increases for European journals due to
a weak US dollar.
The last projections, made in June 1995, are provided below,
along with preliminary actual increases based on publisher price
lists received to date:
June 1995 Actual
Projections Preliminary
North American Titles 10.5% 10-11%
Continental European Titles 23.5% 24.0%
UK Titles 15.0% 14.0%
Typical Overall
Collection Increase 14.8% 14.5%
"As we predicted earlier in the year, the weakness of the US
dollar against the continental European currencies is largely
responsible for high increases for journals from those
countries," said Ron Akie, Senior Vice President of Marketing.
"We saw the same effect in 1991 and 1993, other years when the
dollar weakened."
While the US dollar has strengthened very recently, this will
only affect European journals where publishers set the price in
their own currency and let the exchange rate float with market
rates. These are primarily smaller publishers whose journals make
up a small portion of most US library collections. Therefore, the
dollar's strengthening so late in the year will have little net
impact for most clients. The larger European publishers either
set their prices in US dollars or fix the exchange rate earlier
in the year.
The detailed breakdown of price increases by component from
Faxon's June 1995 projection is provided below:
N. American Continental UK
Titles European Titles
Page Inflation 2.5% 3.0% 2.0%
Paper/Postage 3.0% 3.0% 3.0%
General Inflation 2.5% 2.0% 2.0%
Cancellations 2.5% 3.0% 3.0%
Currency Changes N/A 12.5% 5.0%
Total Increase 10.5% 23.5% 15.0%
Typical overall increase 14.8%
145.2 EBSCO 1996 GLOBAL SERIALS PRICE PROJECTIONS UPDATE
Laura Ralstin, EBSCO Subscription Services, lralstin%corpcomm.ebsco@iss.ebsco.com.
PRESS RELEASE, September 19, 1995
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. Subscription rates for 1996 have been received
from most major publishers. As predicted earlier this year, base
price increases for most journals fall within the average range
of 10 to 11 percent. U.S. libraries that subscribe to European
journals for which publishers set U.S. dollar prices face the
steepest increases -- 21 to 23 percent. For libraries worldwide
subscribing to journals priced in publishers' country-of-origin
currencies, exchange rates in effect at the time publishers are
paid for next year's subscriptions will determine ultimate
prices.
The recent increase in the value of the U.S. dollar (due in part
to organized buying of dollars by the central banks of major
countries worldwide) has caused us to revise our predictions
slightly upward for U.S. journals bought by European libraries
and to lower our predictions for European journals priced in
country-of-origin currency and bought by U.S. libraries.
Japanese subscribers will likely pay more than was predicted
earlier for U.S. and European journals, partially due to cuts in
the Japanese discount rate and the organized U.S. dollar buying
mentioned above, which have resulted in a decreased value of the
yen.
*Projected increases by customer billing currency*
Updated projections for libraries invoiced in selected currencies
are provided below.
A base price increase of 10 to 11 percent for 1996 journal
subscriptions is assumed in these projections. This range is
based on historical data and on recent information received from
publishers.
For U.S. journals, projections are based on estimated
subscription price increases and the current, relative value of
the customer billing currency compared to the U.S. dollar.
(Mid-September currency exchange rates were used for these
projections.)
For European journals, projections are based on estimated
subscription price increases and the current, relative value of
the customer billing currency compared to that of a European
currency composite. The European currency composite is the
average value of the British pound, French franc, German mark,
Dutch guilder and Swiss franc. Mid-September currency exchange
rates were used for these projections. Ranges shown are for
European journals published outside the corresponding country
for each billing currency (e.g., the projected increase for
customers invoiced in British pounds does not apply to U.K.
journals).
PROJECTED PRICE INCREASES BY CUSTOMER BILLING CURRENCY
Customer Projected Projected
Billing Increase for Increase for
Currency U.S. Journals European
Journals
______________________________________________________________
Australian dollar 10.0 - 12.0% 13.0 - 15.0%
British pound 10.0 - 12.0% 13.0 - 15.0%
Canadian dollar 9.0 - 11.0% 15.0 - 17.0%
Dutch guilder 5.0 - 7.0% 8.0 - 10.0%
French franc 5.0 - 7.0% 8.0 - 10.0%
German mark 5.0 - 7.0% 8.0 - 10.0%
Italian lira 9.0 - 11.0% 13.0 - 15.0%
Japanese yen 9.0 - 11.0% 12.0 - 14.0%
New Zealand dollar 5.0 - 7.0% 9.0 - 11.0%
South African rand 13.0 - 15.0% 14.0 - 16.0%
Spanish peseta 4.0 - 6.0% 9.0 - 11.0%
Turkish lira 28.0 - 30.0% 29.0 - 31.0%
U.S. dollar 10.0 - 11.0% 11.0 - 13.0%*
21.0 - 23.0%**
*For European journals priced in country-of-origin currency --
journals priced in this manner will be affected by the strength
of the U.S. dollar in early fall when publishers are paid for
these journals. This range will be lower for journals published
in the United Kingdom, as the dollar has not lost as much
strength against the British pound as it has against other
European currencies.
**For European journals priced in U.S. dollars or with fixed
conversion rates -- this rate is most applicable to U.S.
libraries, as most major European publishers now set prices in
U.S. dollars for U.S. customers instead of pricing in native
currencies. These rates are generally set in mid to late summer.
One component of U.S. dollar rates is the strength of the U.S.
dollar as compared to publishers' native currencies at the time
these rates are set.
145.3 ELECTRONIC JOURNALS AND IOP
Kurt Paulus, Institute of Physics Publishing, kurt.k.paulus@ioppl.co.uk.
All Institute of Physics journals will be available, in full, on World Wide Web by Spring 1996. Electronic access is included in the 1996 price of full-rate subscriptions announced recently. We believe that price rises are competitive with or lower than those of most other publishers who are not providing electronic access. There are three principal reasons for launching this ambitious programme, which will start with the release of the first journals in January. Firstly, as a not-for-profit publisher owned by a learned society -- the Institute of Physics, London -- Institute of Physics Publishing (IOPP) has a responsibility to play its full part in electronic communication, helping to get information disseminated ever more widely. Secondly, IOPP has a responsibility to continue supporting the learned and educational activities of the Institute, in the UK and elsewhere, financially. Finally, IOPP as a learned society publisher must move with the needs of the scientific community and play its part in an orderly transition to new modes of communication, if that is indeed what is about to happen. So, we will make all our journals available electronically; we will experiment with informal communication such as preprints; and we will introduce new services and products. Building on our experience to date with _Classical and Quantum Gravity Online_ and _Physics Express Letters_ we have been able to narrow down the available options for delivering journals electronically. We decided on World Wide Web as the vehicle for delivery because of its functionality and increasing popularity. We have chosen HTML for interface and headers, but concluded that the current version was not sufficiently flexible for our highly mathematical material. We therefore shall offer Acrobat PDF and Postscript for full text, maths and figures. Pricing is a critical area. We have already invested heavily in electronic journal development and expect to continue doing so. Much of this investment is in staff, for mounting more than 60,000 pages of articles a year in attractive and searchable form, and with the attendant registration and support services. Rather than -- like most publishers to date -- surcharging subscribers we have decided to absorb the cost in our general price. This has advantages for us as well as libraries: if past experience is any guide, it offers great improvement in take-up and readership, and hence in the service we and the libraries offer to end users. All legitimate users belonging to sites that have taken out a full-rate subscription will be able to get access; no new purchasing decisions have to be made by existing subscribers; it is simple and orders for print subscriptions can be placed direct or through agents in the normal way. We hope that our investment can be recouped by reducing a little the cancellations that we have all seen over the years. In implementing this approach, we shall have to work very closely with the libraries. We think we have devised the simplest system for providing access: it will be based on the IP number(s) of the site -- here we will need the help of the library -- and then individual users will assign their own ID and passwords. You may already have tried our WWW server but if not, have a look at http://www.iop.org. Further details of the electronic journals programme, and particularly the registration and access arrangements, will be announced there over the next few months.
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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,
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The NEWSLETTER ON SERIALS PRICING ISSUES (ISSN: 1046-3410) is
published by the editor through the Office of Information
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: 919 962-1067; FAX:
919 962-4450. Editorial Board: Deana Astle (Clemson University),
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(University College, London), Charles Hamaker (Louisiana State
University), Daniel Jones (University of Texas Health Science
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