The "Shared Electronic Resource Understanding" is a Recommended Practice
document from the National Information Standards Organization (NISO). It
offers publishers and librarians the opportunity to save both the time
and the costs associated with a negotiated and signed license agreement
by agreeing to operate within a framework of shared understanding and
good faith. The document (RP-7-2008) is available for free download
here: http://www.niso.org/workrooms/seru. The website also provides
additional materials to help publishers and libraries adopt a SERU
approach including a registry of publishers who wish to use SERU with
any of their products and librarians who would like to request that SERU
apply to some of their products.

The lastest addition to the SERU Registry is Taylor & Francis, a leading
international academic publisher. Margaret Donahue Walker, North
American Journals Sales Director for Taylor & Francis stated on joining,
"SERU doesn’t do away with contracts. It just sets mutually implicit
terms and conditions if we chose to forego the long process of
negotiating a full license agreement. Many of our current customers and
consortia contacts are signed up, as well. This means we can expedite
orders and deliver content to end users without delay."

If you would like more information on using SERU or joining the
registry, please contact Karen Wetzel, NISO Standards Program Manager,
kwetzel@niso.org.

Note: This message was cross-posted.

Cynthia Hodgson
NISO Technical Editor Consultant
National Information Standards Organization
Email: chodgson@niso.org <mailto:chodgson@niso.org>
Phone: 301-654-2512