From: David Shumaker <[log in to unmask]> Date: Thu, 7 Apr 2016 10:52:18 -0400 Sharon— It’s a fair question. Here’s a response, representing my opinion and only my opinion. We should pay for value. However, it’s hard to pin down value, so we have to use some rough substitutes. Location is a terrible substitute for value. Maybe there was some justification for it in 1985. Since the rise of the ubiquitous Internet, not so much. Institutional headcount is a poor substitute for value. For example, suppose two law firms each have 1000 attorneys. One has 200 in its tax practice; the other 20. Will the second pay the same for tax law materials as the first, because the institutional headcount is the same? I think not. The next options that come to mind have to do with making realistic estimates of the number of “seats” needed, i.e. people who are likely to use the resource, and/or the amount of use; setting a fair initial price; and recalibrating periodically based on actual use and changes in the number of actual or potential users (e.g. number of tax lawyers in the example above). Note that the seats are not assigned, the seatholders are not named, and this is not direct pay for use: estimates are used to help set a flat price for a specified term. Long term licenses can provide for review and adjustment of the price periodically within the term of the license. I believe many licenses are structured along these lines. --Dave From: Sharon Landers <[log in to unmask]> Date: Tue, 5 Apr 2016 07:59:00 -0500 As a small publisher, we struggle with how to set our prices. We currently use a tier-based pricing model, and we do consider the number of geographical sites. We realize that, for quite a lot of our academic and medical library subscribers, "single site" no longer applies. This discussion has been interesting to us, and we would like to pose a question to the list: What pricing model would most librarians prefer? Feel free to email me off-list. Thank you in advance for your replies. I look forward to reading them. ---------------------------------------- Sharon Landers Director of Circulation The Journal of Clinical Psychiatry PO Box 752870 Memphis TN 38175-2870 Email: [log in to unmask] www.psychiatrist.com