From: "Mittermaier, Bernhard" <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Sat, 8 Sep 2012 14:19:54 +0000
Dear Bill,
I fully agree with the other respondents and want to add only two more points:
A. When it comes to cancellations, there are several criteria to think
about. I try to name them in the order of importance for us:
1. Cost/download-ratio
2. Absolute download number
3. Usage in the last three years and it's trend
4. Number of articles from our institution in this journal
5. Number of citations to these articles
Additional points:
Editorship from our institution
Relation to publisher including price history
Availability in the full text database we subscribe to
Availability in the A&I databases we subscribe to
Other occasional reasons
So yes, the availability in a fulltext database might be taken into
consideration when it comes to cancellations.
But no, this is never one of the points that really have an effect on
the decision. And no, we do not check the database for candidates in
this regard.
B. What is the very nature of an aggregator database for us?
Is it a substitute for journal subscriptions? In no way! What is it
then? It is a substitute for interlibrary loan / document delivery. We
reduce the workload for our ILL department and reduce the spendings
for document delivery fees by subscribing to a fulltext aggregator
database. And since ILL is only further to subscriptions and not
instead of them, the same holds true for such databases as well.
Best regards,
Bernhard
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Dr. Bernhard Mittermaier
Forschungszentrum Jülich
Leiter der Zentralbibliothek / Head of the Central Library
-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
From: <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Tue, 4 Sep 2012 11:48:22 +0100
If your library takes full text databases (for example, Ebscohost), is
it normal practice to check what's in the database and cancel existing
subscriptions to journals which are duplicated by being in the
database, or to not take out new subscriptions to titles which are
already in the database?
Aggregators' argument, when signing publishers up, is that
availability in the database will not affect existing or potential
subscriptions. Anecdotally that position has been supported by a
handful of librarians, generally from major research institutions. At
the same time we have a similar level of directly contradictory
evidence, librarians specifically saying they are cancelling a title
because its now in a database, or that because it is in a database
they are not going to take out a subscription.
So, what is the general view on this among the academic library
community: does full text inclusion in a database invite cancelling or
not subscribing to a particular title, or is that simply not the case?
Are there complicating factors? Or is there not a general view at all:
some librarians see inclusion in a database as sufficient reason to
cancel/not subscribe, others don't?
Thank you,
Bill Hughes
Multi-Science Publishing Co Ltd
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