The emergence of competitors to the Science Citation Index and the Web of Science

N/

The Future of Librarianship in Science and Technology Libraries

Librarians, especially subject specialists in academic sci-tech libraries, appear to be facing a very perilous predicament. Two of their major job responsibilities, developing subject collections and providing face-to-face reference service, are in rapid decline. Budget cuts, publisher packages for books and a transition to cost-per-use evaluations for journal subscriptions all clearly diminish the need for active collection development. Meanwhile, because of changes in information-gathering habits, users increasingly approach reference librarians as a last resort

Differential Pricing and Exchange Rate Profits

Prior to 1993, Elsevier Science negotiated "spot rates" which were set sometime in the early summer and would depend on the value of the dollar relative to the European currencies on the day the currency futures were purchased. Futures would be purchased, usually in July, for actual currency delivery in January (i.e., six-month forward purchases). The difficulty in this approach was that Elsevier was dependent upon the dollar's value on currency markets during a very narrow window of time during the summer. In 1993, Elsevier Science implemented a policy to spread forward currency purchases, in monthly installments, over a twelve-month period running from July - June, in order to smooth the peaks and valleys of exchange rate fluctuation that can occur with spot rate purchases. In 1999, Elsevier Science announced that they would hold price increases for the complete package of their print journals to single digit figures in each of the currencies in which they invoice -- US dollars, euro and yen. While Elsevier Science's announced intent was to "create a much more predictable and stable pricing environment for the vast majority of our customers", the net effect appeared to lock in inflated US$ subscription rates and produce windfall exchange rate profits

ChemINDEX Database; The Professional's Version of ChemFinder.Com

ChemFinder.Com and ChemINDEX are interfaces that access the same database. ChemINDEX, however, provides greatly enhanced search, display and customization features (and without any pop-up ads). The common database has indexed nearly 80K compounds (with an additional 160K synonyms) from over 800 publicly available sites

Electrochemical Journals, AIP's Scitation, Cost-Effectiveness

A review of the relative subscription costs, page & article counts of Electrochemical Society journals compared with commercial counterparts. A description of the AIP's Scitation database. The relative cost-effectiveness (normalized cost/article/Impact Factor) of society and commercial journals related to electrochemistry

Exchange rate profiteering and cost-effectiveness of physics journals - 2004 Update

US$subscribers are paying significant 'surcharges' for European journals, when US$ prices are compared with the corresponding EURO prices, suggesting exchange rate profiteering. Furthermore, large differences in the relative cost effectiveness were observed across three publisher titles. The maximum variance in 'cost per use per Impact Factor' analysis was 11/1