Re: digital-copyright Digest 25 Sep 2004 15:00:00 -0000 Issue 424

[Edward Barrow <edward@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Saturday 25 September 2004 19:24, Joseph J. Esposito wrote:
> It won't be negotiable for long.  Interlibrary loans of digital materials
> (not hardcopy) raise the specter of a publisher only being able to sell a
> single copy of a publication, with other copies being disseminated free of
> charge.  I don't know of any institutions that would be willing to shoulder
> the cost (500x?  2,000x?) of providing a subscription for the the entire
> library community.  Widespread interlibrary loan will simply mean that many
> things simply won't get published.
>
> Joe Esposito

This, however, assumes that the current business model for scholarly 
publishing prevails - which is by no means certain.  In fact, for those 
scholarly publishers who rely on subscription income, the emergence of 
so-called "Open Archiving" publishing models, where the cost of publication 
and peer review is met by the author's institution rather than the readers', 
(note careful positioning of apostrophes)  is today a considerably greater 
challenge than subscription erosion through inter-library document delivery. 

Publishers have to ensure that their licence offerings meet the needs of the 
marketplace, and if that means permitting electronic inter-library document 
delivery, it will be negotiable on appropriate terms and subject to fair 
conditions to prevent subscription substitution.

-- 
Edward Barrow
Copyright Consultant
edward@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
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