I notice that Dan's message below prefaces the quoted sections from Sage's press release with my initials (RA). I suppose that this is an automatic feature of his email program, but I want to make it clear, again, that those quotes are not from me and do not represent my views or opinions. I passed along the Sage announcement as a courtesy to Sage and to the list, not as a statement of my own. ------------- Rick Anderson Director of Resource Acquisition The University Libraries University of Nevada, Reno "I'm not against the modern 1664 No. Virginia St. world. I just don't think Reno, NV 89557 everything's for sale." PH (775) 784-6500 x273 -- Elvis Costello FX (775) 784-1328 rickand@unr.edu > -----Original Message----- > From: Dan Lester [mailto:dan@riverofdata.com] > Sent: Wednesday, July 10, 2002 3:50 PM > To: SERIALST: Serials in Libraries Discussion Forum; Rick Anderson > Cc: Electronic Resources in Libraries > Subject: Re: Statement from Sage > > > > Wednesday, July 10, 2002, 3:17:32 PM, you wrote: > > RA> Sage Publications would like to clarify our position with > respect to both > RA> EBSCO and ProQuest. We have decided to remove our content from the > RA> aggregated databases known as EBSCOhost and ProQuest. This > decision is > RA> effective at the end of this year, but EBSCO and ProQuest > will continue to > RA> fulfill subscriptions to their conclusion up until the end of > 2003. We > RA> have taken this decision, which we recognize will disappoint > some in the > RA> library community, after almost 10 years of experimenting > with aggregated > RA> databases. > > The key word above is "experimenting", which is exactly what all of > the publishers and aggregators have been, and are, doing. As we know, > the standard model of journal subscription and management that has > served us for a couple of centuries (we send money, someone sends us a > journal, whether for personal or library subscriptions) is on the way > out, like it or not. Will it be replaced by free journals on the web, > paid for journals on the web, combinations of print and web, of any > one of a number of other options. And, there will be new options > available in the next few years that we've not even dreamed of yet. > > RA> First, the increasing substitution of the databases for actual > RA> journal subscriptions jeopardizes the continued viability of > our journal > RA> publishing program. Journals cannot sustain themselves > without income from > RA> subscriptions. > > This is interesting. I accept and understand the point they're > making. What surprises me is that, after all of the librarians on > these lists and elsewhere have said that they'd never drop a > subscription because it is in an aggregated service, there has been an > impact on their subscriptions. Are they telling us a story, a good > excuse? Have bunches of us been dropping subscriptions without > admitting it? Or, perhaps most likely, the professors who had > individual subscriptions have dropped them due to the availability of > the content through campus licenses? Or maybe a combination of all > three? > > RA> Unfortunately, the royalties earned from EBSCOhost and > RA> ProQuest are not substantial enough to support the cost of > publishing a > RA> journal. > > And if the royalties were substantial enough, then our database > subscription rates would go up, and many of us would then be unhappy > about that. > > RA> We would potentially be confronted with ceasing publication of a > RA> number of titles. Decreasing the amount of available > scholarly research > RA> will not serve the academic community well. > > Purest nonsense. Half of the published "research" is pure crap. It > is redundant, trivial, and a host of other adjectives. That's true in > library science, in physics, and in all other fields. Yes, we can > quibble forever about whether it is half, or 40 percent, or 60 > percent, that could be done without, but having MORE stuff published > does not mean we've done anything BETTER. Of course if "serving the > academic community well" means that we can all have eight articles > published to help get tenure instead of five, maybe they're right, > though I still don't consider that anything BETTER. > > RA> Second, we believe that our > RA> current and future electronic publishing plans for Sage journals will > RA> provide great benefits to the library community, as we will > describe below. > > I'm willing to give them a chance. After all, I don't have any > choice, do I? > > RA> backward and forward. Each Collection will be hosted on a > platform enabling > RA> key word search functionality, browsing functionality, and > reference and > RA> citation linking capability. The Collections are designed to > be dynamic > RA> research tools for students and faculty members in the social > sciences. > RA> Sage currently plans to release new Collections in new > disciplines each > RA> year. > > This may make business sense, as it is designed to get the students > and faculty in each of those disciplines locked into using their > particular subset of literature of their field. However, it probably > adds yet one more complication to library instruction, reference work, > and other activities we deal with, but, hey, we're used to that. > > cheers > > dan > > -- > Dan Lester, Data Wrangler dan@RiverOfData.com 208-283-7711 > 3577 East Pecan, Boise, Idaho 83716-7115 USA > www.riverofdata.com www.gailndan.com Stop Global Whining! >
