University Library

Managing serials in the electronic world

Steve Sharp

SABER Team Leader

University of Leeds Library

How do we do it?

SABER (Serials, Acquisitions, Binding, Exchanges & Reading lists)

(- formerly E-Resources)

Reflects need for separate team at Leeds to manage e-resources.

Louise Cole (e-Resources Team Leader)

Kay Johnson (Serials & Binding Co-Ordinator)

Different models!

Merged print and e-Team?

Separate Teams?

Hybrid Team?

Multi-skilled staff and matrix management.

What is a serial?

What is a serial?

“A publication issued in successive parts, intended to be continued indefinitely. Typically, a serial contains a collection of articles by different authors, often in a particular subject area. Serials are also known as Journals and Periodicals”.

“A publication issued in successive parts that is intended to be continued indefinitely and which includes magazines, journals, newspapers, annuals, and proceedings of conferences”.

“A publication in any medium issued in successive parts bearing numeric or chronological designations and intended to be continued indefinitely. Serials include periodicals; newspapers; annuals (reports, yearbooks, etc.); the journals, memoirs, proceedings, transactions, etc. of societies; and numbered monographic series”

“Comprises a potentially unlimited number of episodes and contain a number of interweaving and overlapping plots continuing from one episode to the next”.

“A processed breakfast food (usually ready-to-eat) made from cereal grains”.

What is a serial? (cont.)

Don’t be surprised by the vocabulary!

Serials are known by many names – Serial

Journal

Periodical

Serials – a thing of value?

Hard to underestimate the value of serials to an organisation, especially academic institutions.

Source of up-to-date information, new ideas and research.

Often more rapidly and frequently published than books.

Increasing shift to e-journals, esp. STM subjects.

Some subjects still heavily tied to print, e.g. Arts and Social Sciences.

How to marry the two distinct areas – print and electronic?

Academics are often very attached to “their” journals – without understanding the real cost or how they are managed.

Often unaware of the full significance of a journal - until the threat of cancellation!

Collection management and development:

Will normally inherit an existing set of subscriptions.

Renew, subscribe or cancel subscriptions, based on:

Budget available.

Current research and teaching.

New courses / research / academic staff.

Usage.

Deals available from publishers, nationally or regionally.

Collection management and development: (cont.)

At Leeds, we review our subscriptions annually.

Faculty Team Librarians discuss with Schools and Faculties and their Library reps.

Often, Schools will need to cancel less-heavily used subscriptions in order to free up money for new subscriptions.

Journal price inflation is usually well above normal inflation - and Library budgets are struggling to keep up!

The “big deal” e-packages therefore look very appealing!

Collection management and development: (cont.)

April - finalise journals budget for next financial year.

May - begin discussions with Schools and Departments.

July - receive renewals checklist from subscriptions agent and pre-

payment invoices.

July - receive finalised list of renewals, new subscriptions and

cancellations.

August - confirm orders with subscriptions agent.

Oct-Mar - receive monthly batches of “definite” invoices confirming actual

subscription invoices.

July - reconcile accounts with subscription agent (may be debit or

credit)

Managing, delivering and promoting serials:

Traditional model – Current Journals Area? Subject listings?

OPAC makes it easier to keep up-to-date - e.g. keyword search and limit by material type.

Daily routine: - Journals arrive in post

- Check-in on Library Management System (Holdings display

immediately on OPAC).

- Check for title changes, missed issues, changes in

frequency, etc (Agents can help here!).

- Check online access is available, and report any loss of

access.

- Display issues in Current Periodicals Area.

- Bring in any complete volumes for binding.

- Re-shelve any issues left out by Library customers.

Managing, delivering and promoting serials (cont.):

Managing, delivering and promoting serials (cont.):

Managing, delivering and promoting serials (cont.):

Generic e-journals pages on OPAC?

Need title-by-title access on Library OPAC.

Transience of e-titles in packages!

Don’t forget the impact of cataloguing (and un-cataloguing) e-journal packages!

Often dealing with hundreds (or thousands) of titles!

Paying the price! - financial management of subscriptions:

At Leeds, budget split is: 45% e-resources

27% print journals

28% books

Increasing percentage of budget tied into non-cancellation deals for e-packages.

Direct with publisher or through an agent?

Paying for subscriptions? – One-line payment? Bill actual? (Often depends on institution’s Finance Dept.)

At Leeds, we pay the agent up-front on one-line invoices, and then get “definite” invoices through the year.

Other institutions prefer to pay actual invoices once agents have paid the publisher.

Into the online world! – e-journals.

Many ways of obtaining e-journal content:

- Individual print+online subscription (free or subscribed).

- Individual e-only subscription.

- Part of a publisher “big deal” – may need to maintain any current subscriptions!

- Part of an aggregated package.

- Part of a one-off backfile purchase.

- Open access.

- Freely available.

How your institution acquires e-journals will vary, often from title-to-title, publisher-to-publisher, etc.

Managing e-journals:

Customers often think online access is the easy approach to journal subscriptions!

Great deal of time is spent checking that online subscriptions are set up and active.

Link checking for existing subscriptions.

Managing e-journals (cont.)

- Checking access rights and licence terms.

- Activating full-text access to new subscriptions.

- Routinely checking continuing access to existing online subscriptions.

- Adding titles to e-journals listings.

- Cataloguing.

- Troubleshooting.

- Collating usage statistics.

- Renewals (and checking continuity of access).

- Re-checking access if title moves publisher.

- Checking archival policies.

E-journal usage:

Use of e-journals can be affected by many factors:

- Publisher licence.

- Publisher purchase model.

- Type of subscription.

- Gateway/service provider.

- Authentication, e.g. ATHENS, IP address, password

- On or off-campus?

- Technical issues, e.g. Internet Service Provider.

- Embargo periods or rolling access.

- etc, etc, etc

The factors affecting use are almost endless, and any change to any factor can have a major impact. Hence the need for:

Electronic Resource Management Systems (ERMS):

A tool, often available with LMS, but also a commercially available product.

Key place for recording financial, licence details, catalogue record, and holdings data.

Also records relationship between an individual title and package, and between the print and electronic formats.

Records technical information, such as passwords, IP addresses, contact details, statistics, etc.

Journals nowadays need to be: - Pervasive

- Reliable

- 24/7

- Instant

- Flexible

But, above all, they need to be secure and permanent!

Archiving your e-content:

One-off purchases of backfiles, as made available by publishers.

Hosted by publisher?

Locally hosted?

Collaborative backup, e.g. LOCKSS?

What happens if a publisher goes out of business?

What happens if a title is bought by another publisher?

What happens if a title is taken out of a “big deal” package?

Many institutions hesitant to discard print copies of serials until guaranteed archive access if confirmed.

Implications of Open Access:

Increase in subscription prices for printed and e-journals is becoming prohibitive.

Resulting cancellations impacting on dissemination of new ideas and research.

Value of peer review.

More open publishing model and therefore greater dissemination of ideas.

Who pays? – Author? Institution? Library?

Any questions?

Steve Sharp

SABER Team Leader

Brotherton Library

University of Leeds

Leeds LS2 9JT

s.l.sharp@leeds.ac.uk