Lifecycle information for e-literature: full report from the LIFE project

This Report is a record of the LIFE Project. The Project has been run for one year and its aim is to deliver crucial information about the cost and management of digital material. This information should then in turn be able to be applied to any institution that has an interest in preserving and providing access to electronic collections. The Project is a joint venture between The British Library and UCL Library Services. The Project is funded by JISC under programme area (i) as listed in paragraph 16 of the JISC 4/04 circular- Institutional Management Support and Collaboration and as such has set requirements and outcomes which must be met and the Project has done its best to do so. Where the Project has been unable to answer specific questions, strong recommendations have been made for future Project work to do so. The outcomes of this Project are expected to be a practical set of guidelines and a framework within which costs can be applied to digital collections in order to answer the following questions: • What is the long term cost of preserving digital material; • Who is going to do it; • What are the long term costs for a library in HE/FE to partner with another institution to carry out long term archiving; • What are the comparative long-term costs of a paper and digital copy of the same publication; • At what point will there be sufficient confidence in the stability and maturity of digital preservation to switch from paper for publications available in parallel formats; • What are the relative risks of digital versus paper archiving. The Project has attempted to answer these questions by using a developing lifecycle methodology and three diverse collections of digital content. The LIFE Project team chose UCL e-journals, BL Web Archiving and the BL VDEP digital collections to provide a strong challenge to the methodology as well as to help reach the key Project aim of attributing long term cost to digital collections. The results from the Case Studies and the Project findings are both surprising and illuminating

No More Liaisons: Collection Management Strategies in Hard Times

Collection development in medium to large academic libraries typically involves multiple subject librarians or “liaisons.” The University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) Libraries have lost significant numbers of personnel in the last four years due to attrition and retirements, including most of the professional liaison librarians whose positions will not be replaced in the foreseeable future. In addition to this challenge, collection budgets have been severely reduced due to the State of Alaska's ongoing budget crisis, necessitating large cancellation projects. This article examines UAF Libraries’ collection strategies used to sustain a research-intensive collection without liaisons and with a drastically reduced budget

General cost analysis for scholarly communication in Germany : results of the "Houghton Report" for Germany

Management Summary: Conducted within the project “Economic Implications of New Models for Information Supply for Science and Research in Germany”, the Houghton Report for Germany provides a general cost and benefit analysis for scientific communication in Germany comparing different scenarios according to their specific costs and explicitly including the German National License Program (NLP). Basing on the scholarly lifecycle process model outlined by Björk (2007), the study compared the following scenarios according to their accounted costs: - Traditional subscription publishing, - Open access publishing (Gold Open Access; refers primarily to journal publishing where access is free of charge to readers, while the authors or funding organisations pay for publication) - Open Access self-archiving (authors deposit their work in online open access institutional or subject-based repositories, making it freely available to anyone with Internet access; further divided into (i) CGreen Open Access’ self-archiving operating in parallel with subscription publishing; and (ii) the ‘overlay services’ model in which self-archiving provides the foundation for overlay services (e.g. peer review, branding and quality control services)) - the NLP. Within all scenarios, five core activity elements (Fund research and research communication; perform research and communicate the results; publish scientific and scholarly works; facilitate dissemination, retrieval and preservation; study publications and apply the knowledge) were modeled and priced with all their including activities. Modelling the impacts of an increase in accessibility and efficiency resulting from more open access on returns to R&D over a 20 year period and then comparing costs and benefits, we find that the benefits of open access publishing models are likely to substantially outweigh the costs and, while smaller, the benefits of the German NLP also exceed the costs. This analysis of the potential benefits of more open access to research findings suggests that different publishing models can make a material difference to the benefits realised, as well as the costs faced. It seems likely that more Open Access would have substantial net benefits in the longer term and, while net benefits may be lower during a transitional period, they are likely to be positive for both ‘author-pays’ Open Access publishing and the ‘over-lay journals’ alternatives (‘Gold Open Access’), and for parallel subscription publishing and self-archiving (‘Green Open Access’). The NLP returns substantial benefits and savings at a modest cost, returning one of the highest benefit/cost ratios available from unilateral national policies during a transitional period (second to that of ‘Green Open Access’ self-archiving). Whether ‘Green Open Access’ self-archiving in parallel with subscriptions is a sustainable model over the longer term is debateable, and what impact the NLP may have on the take up of Open Access alternatives is also an important consideration. So too is the potential for developments in Open Access or other scholarly publishing business models to significantly change the relative cost-benefit of the NLP over time. The results are comparable to those of previous studies from the UK and Netherlands. Green Open Access in parallel with the traditional model yields the best benefits/cost ratio. Beside its benefits/cost ratio, the meaningfulness of the NLP is given by its enforceability. The true costs of toll access publishing (beside the buyback” of information) is the prohibition of access to research and knowledge for society

Recent developments in scholarly communication: a review

This review article on recent developments in scholarly communication focuses on the content of three 2013 publications: The future of scholarly communication, edited by Deborah Shorley; Debating open access, edited by Nigel Vincent and Chris Wickham; The big deal and the damage done, by Walt Crawford

Ready or Not? : An Assessment of Shelf-Ready Materials Management Practices in US Academic Libraries

This paper analyzes results of a survey on shelf-ready materials management and cataloging practices in US academic libraries with various collection sizes. The survey respondents consisted of managers and librarians in technical services operations. Survey questions addressed topics such as the volume of shelf-ready materials, perspectives on shelf-ready expansion, the effect of local cataloging practices on shelf-ready services, the amount of cataloging and processing errors, and quality control. The majority of participants were from small- and medium-size academic libraries, and print materials were the prevalent format for shelf-ready treatment. Two main reasons for shelf-ready implementation across libraries of all sizes were the need to improve materials turnaround time and the desire to redeploy staff for other projects or task

LIFE: Costing the digital preservation lifecycle

Having confidence in the permanence of a digital resource requires a deep understanding of the preservation activities that will need to be performed throughout its lifetime, and an ability to plan and resource for those activities. The LIFE (Lifecycle Information for E-Literature) Project1 has advanced understanding of the short and long-term costs in this complex area, facilitating better planning, comparison and evaluation of digital lifecycles. The LIFE Project created a digital lifecycle model based on previous work undertaken on the lifecycles of paper-based materials. It applied the model to real-life collections, modelling their lifecycles and studying their constituent processes. The results were then used to estimate the costs of each element of the digital lifecycle. Organisations can now apply this process, enabling evaluation and refinement of their existing lifecycles and facilitating more effective planning for the preservation of newly acquired content. Phase 2 of the LIFE Project began in February 2007. It is evaluating and refining the models and methodology developed in the first phase of the project and developing lifecycle costings for a range of further case studies

Are Economic Pressures on University Press Acquisitions Quietly Changing the Shape of the Scholarly Record?

The monograph remains central to humanities and qualitative social science (HSS) research as the form most suitable for the long-form argument and, crucially, as foundational to the tenure process in these fields. University and other scholarly presses have played a vital role in supporting the publication of scholarly monographs where such narrow research is not seen as being as commercially viable as, for example, journals. While there appears to be an erosion of traditional revenue streams, new funding models are not yet recuperating costs for scholarly monographs. Library budgets continue to tighten, with new collection strategies taking hold, putting strain on monograph purchasing where libraries were central supporters of the form. We wanted to know what these economic pressures meant for the ways in which editors at university and other scholarly presses choose to acquire books. Recent research has addressed the impact of cooperative library purchasing, the role of American university presses in shaping the monograph, effects of new business models and approaches to access, and the costs of producing scholarly monographs. But there has been little exploration into editorial practices as a part of this larger ecosystem. This paper presents preliminary results from a pilot study exploring the connection between revenue, the economics of publishing scholarly monographs, and the behaviors and choices of acquisitions editors

The impact of technology on collection development in selected academic and research libraries in the southeastern United States

The purpose of the study was to assess the impact of technology on collection development and the collection, and the probable impact of future technologies on collection development and the collection in selected academic and research libraries in the Southeast. An interview methodology was utilized to collect the data. Nineteen librarians from 13 libraries participated in the study. The findings of the study are not generalizable to libraries outside the study population

Organizing acquisitions: the Yale University experience

ManuscriptThe acquisition of materials for large research library collections is a complex process requiring large numbers of staff and highly developed management skills. Even in the best of times it is easy for this complicated process to be less than effective. When faced with budget cuts, staff layoffs, or currency fluctuations, the organization of acquisitions functions must be adaptable, flexible, and quick to respond. Organizations must be designed to maximize the library's staff, its automated system, and its network of publishers and vendors. This article will discuss the changes that have occurred in the organization of acquisitions activities at Yale University in the past five years. This case is indicative of the climate of challenge that has prevailed in recent times over the role of acquisitions departments and acquisitions librarians in libraries. Perhaps it will serve to enlighten others who are reevaluating their acquisitions services