Hi, everybody,

Here's a Friday question for the group that I'd be interested in seeing
some discussion on: What do you call the various types of databases?
A long time ago, I wrote an article for the Biz of Acq column in Against
the Grain about defining more precisely how we refer to databases and
types of access to electronic journals ("A Database By Any Other Name?"
_Against the Grain_, v.14#2, April 2002), and I think it might still be
a pertinent question. (Coincidentally, I found out after I started
drafting this post that the article will soon be online on the Against
the Grain website, because it's included in a reading list for an ALA
course, Fundamentals of Electronic Resources Acquisitions. Not sure how
soon.)

For me, when I think of a "true" electronic journal, I think first of
those that come from the publisher--the equivalent of the print, in the
publisher's own interface, whether bundled or individual or packaged.
Then I think of those that come from the publisher but "hosted" through
a second-party interface. Thirdly, there are the aggregators--third
party vendors that assemble electronic versions of licensed periodicals
content into their own databases, with a common interface--in this case,
we subscribe to the *database* as a whole, not the individual titles
(and access to any of the individual titles included can change without
notice to us, as so many have noted--they are not stable or archival, so
if that's important for a title, think carefully about aggregator
access.) The crucial difference, from my point of view, is *who owns the
content* and is either publishing it or licensing a version (or
"selected" content, as they sometimes refer to it, rather than
cover-to-cover) or allowing indexing or abstracting (A & I) only.
Another variable is whether the version is HTML or PDF, whether it
includes images, etc., etc. It's all in how they're sliced and diced. So
do you all call them something else or think of them differently? I
think what we call them is important both for evaluating and for
arranging/keeping access.

Aggregator databases are great for giving us lots and lots of content,
but some of that is "extra," in that we might not pay for, say, Regional
Cheerleader E-Forum for the years 1992-1998 (a title I made up, but if
you have access to an A to Z list, take a look sometime if you haven't,
by title or by subject/category & dates of coverage, at what's in there.
Someone said that publishers sell/license what they have a lot of, not
necessarily what you want! I'm not faulting their business model of
generating revenue so much as saying we need to be aware of what we're
getting. I think it all comes down to licensing. I sometimes compare the
complicated models to cable subscriptions--some titles/channels are more
desirable, others are thrown in with the basic for good measure, to add
to the title count. For "premium" titles, we may have to go direct.) But
is there a better term than "aggregator" that makes sense to people?

Anyway, for a package such as Project Muse, there are both their own
publications ("primary" online journals? "publisher" online journals?
what do you think we should call them?) and some "secondary interface"
ones that they have licensed from other publishers (which is why there's
a fixed wall for some, when they lost the licensing rights as those
publishers pulled out to mount their own interfaces.) JSTOR, to me, is
an archival, second-party database, (and they've had some of the same
licensing issues in the past.) Some databases are subject-specific, too,
and might be from one or several publishers. Some publishers also have
fixed bundles or packages, perhaps arranged by subject *or* collection,
with no choice of individual journals; others will let you order a la
carte, so to speak, and price it differently. It seems to be that it
would be useful for us to have a more standardized way of referring to
online journals and databases, so we know we're on the same page when we
discuss evaluating them or dealing with loss of access to individual
titles or packages, so I'm interested in hearing other thoughts on this.
What do you call the different types of online continuing resources?
Could we/should we give them categories or would that make it worse?
Sorry this is so long. Thanks for your thoughts!

Sue

--

Sue Wiegand

Periodicals Librarian

123 Cushwa-Leighton Library

Saint Mary’s College

Notre Dame, IN 46556

574 284-4789

swiegand@saintmarys.edu <mailto:swiegand@saintmarys.edu>