Hello all,

One of the messages talked about discarding the  print and using
archival providers such as JSTOR.

One thought before you discard.  In STM (Scientific, Technical,
Medical) literature, there are often "historicallly important" articles
where the field has been changed dramatically or in some cases created.
In some other disciplines, this may not be as important.  Any larger
institution will have some sort of archives area.  If for no other
reason, displaying the original artical in an exhibit is certainly
preferable than a printed digital copy.

If you are discarding volumes in whatever subject area, look for lists
of these historically important articles and keep those volumes. Future
archivists will thank you.

John Lucas

Serials Librarian
University of Mississippi Medical Center
2500 North State St
Jackson, MS 39216-4505

(PH) (601) 984-1277
(FAX)  ( 601) 984-1262
JLUCAS@ROWLAND.UMSMED.EDU

>>> mferguson@CSE.EDU 10/17/2006 8:41 AM >>>
Dear all:

I have recently had my budget for the binding of periodicals slashed
from $3500 to $500 p/yr.  This may only be a temporary situation but I
have to come up with justification for why we should continue to bind,
which has forced me to re-evaluate the value of binding, now that we
depend on digital access to periodicals more and more, and on print
less
and less.  We have moved a number of our key titles to an electronic
subscription through either Ovid or ECO which guarantees archival
access
to all the issues we have subscribed to.  And we have ceased our print
subscriptions to them, when we could, and certainly stopped binding
them.

We have also begun to box all of our remaining loose journals that we
subscribe to, which helps to organize and protect them at about one
fifth the cost of binding.  Its not as good as binding, but it is
better
than just leaving the issues loose on the stacks.  We could stop
binding
altogether and simply box all print titles we receive and increase our
reliance on electronic journals.

I am interested to know what everyone else is doing with binding of
periodicals in this age of digitalization.  Is binding becoming a
thing
of the past?

I am looking forward to all of your thinking on this matter.

Mark

Mark Ferguson

Periodicals Librarian, Mahoney Library

College of Saint Elizabeth, 2 Convent Road, Morristown, NJ 07960