From: "Kearney, Richard" <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Fri, 4 Nov 2016 16:48:31 +0000

*Question:  Should a library administrator option to suppress
non-subscribed content on a publisher platform (as a default search option)
be a licensing issue?*

Background:  An increasing number of publisher platforms have either
removed, or have never provided, or refuse to provide, an ability for local
administrators at subscribing institutions to establish a default setting
such that searches on the platform are limited to the subscribed/leased
content. The result of this for users who have the misfortune of conducting
searches on their platforms is enormous and increasing frustration as they
encounter item after item to which they are denied access. While a few
publishers offer a hard-to-notice checkbox on the search screen that users
can check or uncheck to limit their searches to subscription content, most
do not enable subscribing libraries to set this as the default search mode.

Publishers have every right to use their platforms as marketing tools to
the public and are free to sell their articles, book chapters, etc. to
anyone who wants to buy them. But subscribing libraries that place links to
publisher platforms on their web sites because they hold subscriptions or
leases to some portion of the available content (rarely, if ever, all of it
because no library has the budgetary resources for that) have a reasonable
expectation that such links should represent that part of the publisher's
content that is in the library's collection. When users conduct searches
using publisher interfaces through links accessed on a library's web site,
they also have this expectation and do not understand why so many of their
results lead to paywalls and denials of access. In a multitude of cases
this has led to avoidable inquiries/complaints to libraries and the
consumption of costly staff time to reach the conclusion that an item is
not accessible because a library does not hold a subscription or lease, a
conclusion that is clearly communicated to the user when the path they
follow is through a citation in an index (and which also provides a link to
request said item through ILL).

I am well aware of the interest many libraries have in "evidence-based"
observation of user behavior for the purpose of informing collection
development decisions and the allocation of limited budgetary resources.
For this purpose they look at turnaways in their usage reports, patterns of
inter-library loan requests, web analytics, and other data. But this
interest should not be conflated with these publisher practices. They are
not the same thing. No publisher platform constitutes a subject index.
There may be many libraries that prefer to have links on their sites to
publisher platforms that do not limit searches to subscribed/leased
content, but at a minimum libraries should have the option to apply such
limits through their local administrative accounts.

In the short term, libraries can address this issue in a number of ways:

1) In some instances, they can modify login URLs to check or uncheck boxes
to limit searches to subscribed content when that option is available;

2) They can insert intermediate pages prior to platform logins with
screenshots directing users to select the option to limit searches to
subscribed content to avoid having non-accessible content returned to them
in searches

3) They can simply remove links to publisher platforms from their web sites
and enable access to subscription content through their e-resource
knowledgebase, which in turn will connect to their online journal
directory, their link resolver, and their discovery service.

But none of these are really satisfactory. Instead, I submit that libraries
should consider incorporating an ability to set a default search
restriction to subscribed/leased content as a feature of their licenses.

Thoughts from librarians?

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Richard Kearney

Working without a contract since June 2015!
Electronic Resources Librarian
David and Lorraine Cheng Library
William Paterson University
300 Pompton Road
Wayne, NJ 07470
Tel. 973.720.2165
Fax  973.720.2585
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