From: Valerie Yaw <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 2015 21:15:02 +0000
It’s great to see discussion of ebooks and various models. One point
I would like to clarify is that the Books at JSTOR program does
include frontlist titles. We currently offer more than 7,000 ebooks
with a copyright year of 2013 or later; of those, 1,700 have a
copyright year of 2015. Because all ebooks on JSTOR are 100% DRM-free
and available for ILL (as Scott noted), some publishers have elected
to leave some of their newest books out for now. These publishers are
concerned about the possible impact of these models on revenue they
generate from sales of titles adopted by professors for classes. We
understand this concern and will continue to work with publishers and
libraries to develop sustainable access models that broaden and
increase the value of monographs by making them much easier to find
and use. In fact, our publisher partners have moved more than 7,700
single-user titles to JSTOR’s unlimited-user model since we
transitioned to offering the unlimited model exclusively earlier this
year. We are monitoring these titles to ascertain the impact of this
change on usage and sales.
If anyone has questions about our program and the content available, I
would be happy to talk with them.
All the best,
Valerie
Valerie Yaw
Senior Marketing Manager
Books at JSTOR
2 Rector Street, 18th floor
New York, NY 10006
http://books.jstor.org
Sent: Monday, September 28, 2015 10:04 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: academic e-book vendors
From: Scott Stangroom <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 2015 15:25:35 -0400
Hi Jim,
I am not sure I can give any advice or deep insight on this issue. It
is still a bit of a new frontier for most of us.
JSTOR Books seems promising. Pricing seems reasonable. Terms of use
(including no DRM) are reasonable. ILL is permitted, but on the
chapter level, not the entire book). We've just begun a "pilot" DDA
program at UMass Amherst with our Five College consortium partners.
The books in JSTOR Books are not front list, but are from reputable
scholarly publishers. Mind you, I am telling you this prior to our
having fully assessed the product - we've just signed a license in
August and we're now in the process of loading discovery records.
We of course have purchased or licensed many e-books from a variety of
vendors, all of whom have up and down sides. We have a DDA program
with EBL, we subscribe to ebrary academic complete (and purchase
ebrary books too), we also "purchase" and license Wiley, Springer,
Sage, Elsevier, Cambridge, Oxford books from the respective
publishers, etc. I can't say that I'm ready to wave the flag for any
of these vendors/publishers too wildly, but the books they offer serve
their purpose and seem to meet some of the immediate needs of our
users as they fulfill assignments and do research.
Not sure it this is helpful.
~Scott
______________________
Scott Stangroom
Acquisitions Coordinator
University of Massachusetts, Amherst
W.E.B. Du Bois Library
Amherst, MA 01003-9275
[log in to unmask]
-----Original Message-----
From: "Jim O'Donnell" <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wed, 9 Sep 2015 13:46:25 -0700
The e-book landscape for libraries is challenging: business models
sharply different from anything else we know, takeovers and
re-alliances among providers, exogenous forces (not only from Seattle)
changing the perceptions of price in the public market, etc. I'm not
being *only* naive when I wonder why, when Amazon drives the price of
low-use e-books down to $1.99 and lower, low-use academic e-books cost
well over $100. How can "perpetual access" be defined meaningfully?
What shall we do when we reasonably wish to borrow a title via ILL?
As we look at these issues at ASU, I'd be glad for advice from list
readers -- what vendors do you think offer the best deals (not just
price, but terms of use), and also in particular the best deals for an
institution committed to patron-driven acquisition?
Jim O'Donnell
Arizona State University
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