------The impact of electronic journals on libnny collection management: a case study of the Pilkington Library
by
Veronique Mallau, B.A.
A Master's Dissertation, submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the award of Master of Arts degree of the Loughborough University.
September 1996
Supen-isor: Mrs Hazel M. Woodward, BA, ALA, MllnfSc Pilkington Library, Academic Sen-ices Manager
© V. Mallau, 1996 Abstract
----Electronicjournals -(e-journals) are a recent and exciting development of the scholarly communication since they offer a number of practical advantages over the printed ones (e.g. speed of publication, multimedia, etc.). A growing number of enthusiastic scholars are supporting e-journals, and are canvassing to widespread their use. They claim that this new delivery method of information will revolutionise the concept of a scholar journal and may offer a solution to the current serials pricing crisis. Libraries have started to integrate and promote access to e-journals for the benefits of their users. Handling e joumals, however, requires different methods from the ones for the printed publications. The Pilkington Library case study illustrates some of the dilemmas '~' arising in the process of selection and acquisition, access and bibliographical i, control, storage and archiving, costs and resource allocation, training, and other issues such as copyright control and text integrity. For instance, cataloguing rules need to be revised and adapted; a choice between 'pointing to' or 'owning' the material is part of the storage requirements; to reduce costs, libraries could 'publish' themselves e-journals, hence, helping to maintain standards and credibility. A comparison of ten UK library e-joumal service World Wide Web pages with the Pilkington Library one aims to show the different approaches adopted by these to offer e-journal access. The growth of e-journals enables us to assume that a promising future is on its way, where scholars and universities, libraries, subscription agents, and publishers, depending on their active involvement, are likely to shape in which direction e-joumals are heading to.
ii Acknowledgements
------
I would like to thank Mrs Hazel M. Woodward, Academic Services Manager, at the Pilkington Library, to whom I am greatly indebted for her availability, patience, kindness and help during the supervision of the writing of this dissertation.
I would like to thank Mr Jeff J. Brown, Assistant Librarian, who helped me to gather information on the cataloguing process in the Pilkington Library.
And finally I would to thank Ms Ann O'Brien, Lecturer at the Department of Information and Library Studies at Loughborough University, my family and Allan for their encouraging support.
iii
L______TABLE OF CONTENTS
Abstract 11
Acknowledgements 111
Table of contents IV
Introduction 1
Part 1: Current Situation 1.1 Development of electronic journals 2 1.2 Electronic journals: three distinct categories 3 1.3 Definition of electronic journals 4 1.4 Electronic Journals: current issues 6 1.4.1 How many? 6 1.4.2 Access and costs 7 1.4.3 Producers 8 1.4.4 Subject categories 8 1.5 Scholarly communication fostering electronic journals 8 1.6 Comparison of electronic journals with paper journals 9 References 13
Part 11: Collection Management Issues 11.1 Selection and acquisition 16 11.2 Access and bibliographtcal control 18 11.3 Storage and archiving 23 11.4 Costs and resource allocation 26 11 5 Training 28 11.6 Other issues 28 References 32
iv Part ID: Pilkington Libnuy Case Study 111.1 E-joumals available at the Pilkington Library 37 III.l.l Commercial e-joumals 38 Ill 1.2 Free e-joumals 39 III.2 Selection and acquisition 39 111.3 Access and bibliographical control 40 Ill 4 Storage and archiving 46 III.S Costs and resource allocation 46 III 6 Training 46 III.7 Research activities of the Pilkington Ltbrary: Cafe Jus 47 III 8 Pilkington Ltbrary WWW Homepage: evaluation 48 References 52
Part IV: Comparative Study IV .I University of Southampton Library 53 IV.2 University of Liverpool Library 54 IV.3 University College London Ltbrary (UCL) ss IV.4 Leeds University Ltbrary 56 IV.S Keele University Library 56 IV.6 Oxford University libraries Automation Service WWW server Home page 57 IV.7 University of Essex Library 58 IV 8 University of York Library 58 IV 9 University of Sunderland Information Services Home page 59 IV.IO John Rylands University Ltbrary of Manchester 60 IV.ll Comparison with the Ptlkington Library WWW home page and conclusions 60
Part V: The Future V .I Likely picture of e-joumals in the future 65 V.2 The scholars 67
V ------,
V.3 The librarians 71 V.4 The subscription agents 73 V.S The publishers 74 References 76
Conclusion 80
Bibliogmphy Appendices
vi
------' INTRODUCTION
The profusion of information and the technological advances of the past decades have had an important impact on libraries. Online networked databases, CD-ROMs, and CD-I, are some examples of the number of electronic services libraries now offer to their clients, to improve access to information.
Electronic journals (e-journals) are a fairly recent medium of delivery of information. Not only do they add to this glut of information the flexibility of an electronic format, but also the promise of a new era of scholarly communication.
This study aims to introduce e-journals and to study their affect on library collection management The first part describes a broad picture of the current situation, the second part raises the library collection management issues, the third part illustrates the latter with the case study of the Pilkington Library, whose World Wide Web (WWW) based e-journals service is the object of a comparison, in the fourth part, with ten similar services in the UK. The fifth part attempts to foresee the future of e-journals with all the major players involved. As e-journals are a fast moving area, a constant difficulty has been to keep up-to-date with the latest changes to provide an accurate description. Clearly further advances must be anticipated on an ongoing basis for several years to come.
-,
1 E-JOURNALS - part I: Current Situation
Ll Development of electronic journals
The electronic journal (e-journal) is a relatively recent phenomenon. Turroff and Hiltz (1) have recorded that the ftrst e-joumal dates back to 1976, but e-journals outside an experimental infrastructure appeared much later on. They have been mainly generated in the academic environment since the late 1980s and early 1990s and are subjected to a continuous wide expansion.
The first developments comprised experiments including major projects such as DOCDEL in Europe, and BLEND and QUARTET in the United Kingdom; BLEND investigated the feasibility of an e-joumal and the feasibility of supporting the entire communication process via computers; QUARTET examined the implications of Information Technology on the scholarly communication process (2, 3). They allowed important progress but the limited technology of the time (1980s) and the lack of appropriate networks slowed their practical effects down.
According to Rowland (4), the recent and current electronic projects belongs to three broad categories:
a) Services intended from the outset to be commercial activities
Subscription agents are providing CAS-IAS services (Current Alerting Services combined with lildividual Article Supply), though these can be considered more as document delivery services rather than electronic publishing proper (e.g. Uncover, Swetscan, the British Library's Inside Information service). Also comprised in this category are: Chapman and Hall publishers who are making available electronic versions of their printed journals (5).
2 E-JOURNALS - part I: Current Situation
b) Dual publishing experiments run collaboratively by publishers and libraries
This includes: the CORE project, which aims to deliver a large majority of the journal literature needed by one academic community in electronic form to workstations in a library and to terminals on the desks of academics; the TULIP project, which comprises forty two e-journals in the subject field of materials science delivered to fifteen university libraries in the USA; the CD ROM Acrobat Journals Using Networks (CAJUN) project involving the following publishers: Wiley and Chapman and Hall; Elsevier publisher in collaboration with the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) is offering the journal Immunology Today online; other famous projects are MUSE, Red Sage, ELVYN projects (6). c) Completely new electronic scholarly journals
These are e-journals, generally with no printed counterpart, freely accessible through the Internet. Psycholoquy is probably the most famous title, as its producer Hamad has been a precursor of this new delivery method of information. Preprint exchanges is another example defined as the activity of distributing preprints through computer networks (7). The most famous example is the Los Alamos Physics Pre-Print service.
L2 Electronic journals: three distinct categories
There are different types of e-journals, Woodward divides them in three categories (8, 9).
The first is the online e-joumal. Online hosts, such as Dialog Information
3 E-JOURNALS • part 1: Cumnt Situation
Services, provide full-text of some existing printed journals electronically. The integrity of the journal is rarely supplied, parts such as book reviews, notes, calendars are often removed. It is based on a pay-per-use basis and access is expensive.
The second is the CD-ROM e-journal. Electronic versions of some journals and national newspapers are available on CD-ROMs. In addition some CD-ROMs gather collections of full-text journals. For instance, the CD-ROM ADONIS covers 500 biomedical journals.
The third is the networked e-journal, which will be the main focus of this study. This type of e-journal is available, as its title indicates, on computer networks such as the Internet and may be made freely available on the latter or be subscription based, from a commercial publisher.
L3 Definition of electronic journals
According to the British Standard Code for bibliographic identification (biblid) of contributions in serials and books (BS 7187: 1989) a serial is: 'a publication in printed form or not, issued in successive parts, usually having numerical or chronological designations, intended to be continued indefinitely' (10). Thus the term 'serials' encloses a wide range of publications. For instance, it includes periodicals, journals, newspapers, magazines: these publications, which mainly contain articles and other writings from different contributors, are in printed format, but increasingly some of them are in electronic format too. An electronic version in that case will be a parallel edition of a printed one, but it can also be a publication on its own ('e-only journal'). An e-joumal will, therefore, be composed of several articles like in a printed version. There is, currently, not much difference in the layout from a printed journal, except that additional facilities are available. For example, hypertext links are often
4 E-JOURNALS · part I: Cmrent Situation supplied to browse quicker through the document or to link to reference works, databases or other World Wide Web sites.
Scholarly communication relies a great deal on serials, especially on periodicals, learned society communications, conference proceedings and newsletters, for reference purposes and up-to-date information. Some of these publications can be in electronic format such as newsletters, which convey latest news and information for specialised interest groups or research groups. Also available electronically are: bulletin boards, topical and discussion lists, conferences, etc. These particular mediums of communication, also called 'skywriting' are not always considered as e-journals, despite the fact they are original works -not a copy of a printed version- and are fulfilling communication purposes. They are equivalent to other means of communication such as fax, telephone, letters, etc. This 'skywriting' provides platforms for discussions among researchers to put forward new ideas and debates. It is considered as a 'sounding board' before any publication. They will not be included as e-journals in this study in so far as they cannot be regarded as peer reviewed journals.
Roes states that three basic components are to be taken into account when defining an e-journal. First that the primary function of an e-joumal is to communicate an information, second that quality control should be provided, and thirdly archiving facilities are available (11). This study will investigate genuine peer-reviewed e-journals, which are, in other words, networked scholarly journals properly refereed through the peer review process. The latter consists of a board of experts in a particular area, who advises, makes recommendations and amendments on the content of a journal before its publication. This ensures the reliability of the journal, and as a result, its quality. Swinnerton-Dyer underlines the fact that the refereeing board of an e joumal should employ the same standards as for a printed journal. However,
5 E-JOURNALS - part I: Current Situation size constraints will not be as strict as for a printed journal or may even be non existent (12). Nonetheless it may be argued that the peer review process can be too 'conservative' and tends to suppress the emergence of new and original ideas. Furthermore authors from prestigious institutions may be given priority to detriment the of others.
The e-journal is, as we mentioned above, much similar to a printed journal. Nonetheless, one can easily state that it owns a potential to surpass a printed publication. It is interesting to consider that the notion of an e-journal goes beyond that of the printed version. As Roes points out it 'suggests something new, something synergetic, something which has sprung from the Net itself (13). Thanks to the electronic network links, the e-joumals' latent capacities may incline it to evolve towards a complete new concept of a publication. Myers tackles the problem of its definition by saying: 'The term 'electronic journal' does as little to describe [the] future as the term 'horseless carriage' did to capture the promise of the automobile' (14).
L4 Electronic journals: current issues
L4.1 How many?
The ARL directory of electronic publications lists over 700 titles of which it is estimated that over lOO are refereed e-journals. The New/our electronic mailing list is updating this directory daily by providing new e journals titles to subscribers electronic mail boxes (15). Moreover, it provides the ability to search back issues through its archiving site. Hence the number of refereed titles is a relatively small number in comparison to the mass of e journals accessible. However an important development is to happen. Some UK based academic publishers are intending to make all their journals available
6 E-JOURNALS • part I: Current Situation online during 1996, mainly thanks to a pilot scheme set up by the Higher Education Funding Councils for the UK (16, 17). In this project publishers deliver both paper and electronic editions to the subscribing libraries through the intermediary of the HEFCE acting as a central body. Publishers are, then, guaranteed stability of income while libraries will benefit a much larger number of journals at roughly the same expense and with more flexible copyright restrictions.
14.2 Access and costs
Many newsletters, bulletin boards and e-journals are available through mailing softwares such as Listserv, Majordomo. For instance, one only need to register on a Listserv to obtain PACS Review in ones e-mail box. Some of the peer-reviewed scholarly e-journals are available via Gopher, which is becoming an old technology in comparison to the WWW access. The latter is becoming predominant as it is growing in popularity. Publishers, whether individuals or commercial publishers, place their journals on their own servers using various types of softwares to mount the journals. For example, HTML on WWW (e.g. Elvyn project conducted by the British Library and the Institute of Physics publishing); Adobe Acrobat (e.g. Academic press with the Ideal project); Realpage (Carfax publisher). Then libraries connect on the WWW -or point to the server where the journal is. Many of the e-journals are currently free to access. The fee-based ones are often specialising in technical fields and need to recover their expensive production cost. However, many debates and articles are predicting an increasing number of fee-based e-journals as costs are always involved behind each publication even if it do not appear as straightforward. (As McKnight • states: 'there is no such thing as a 'free lunch'!' (18)).
7 E-JOURNALS • part 1: Current Situation
L4.3 Producers
E-journals are currently produced by commercial publishers, learned societies, research institutions or universities. The serials pricing crisis, which will be tackled in part Il.4, is likely, not only to change the cost of access but also to contribute to the emergence of key economic players in the present situation.
L4.4 Subject categories
According to a recent survey on scholarly peer-reviewed e-joumals completed by Harter (15), the highest frequencies of e-joumals belongs to the following categories: education, literature, mathematics and information and library studies in a fourth position. This ranking can be seen somewhat as a surprising result, as one would expect that science and technology fields, such as physics, biology, engineering, would be among the firsts. Although the author suspects that many more e-journals in these areas have appeared since this survey, as changes occur at a tremendous pace on the WWW (16). A probable explanation may that the cost of Science, Technology and Medicine journals (STM journals) is so high to publishers are not prepared to publish them free. Compared with social sciences and humanities, the STM journals display a much larger number of graphs and diagrams and a much larger volume of output
LS Scholarly communication fostering electronic journals
Knowledge is increasing at such a fast pace that organising and making it available effectively is a major concern for scholars and, obviously,librarians. Some enthusiastic scholars are encouraging the use of e-joumals as it offers advantages compared to the printed ones and as it is likely to open a new era
8 E-JOURNALS - part 1: Current Situation of scholarly communication. Information can be easily and quickly transmitted through Internet newsgroups and discussion lists, regardless of how far the specialists are from one another. It is interesting to note that a further step in the democratisation of access to information is occurring as most of this communication was previously addressed through phone calls and letters, hence to a limited number of personal contacts. Harnad speaks about a fourth cognitive revolution in the means of producing knowledge. Speech, writing and print have their own respective strengths and weaknesses but using computers and networks can help to get a well-balanced~ result The speed of communication is getting closer to the speed of thinking, therefore stimulating ideas and productivity (17, 18). One of the main current difficulties over the next few years will be to actually persuade academics to publish through electronic means. Authors are prepared to wait to give their work to high status, prestigious, printed journals to ensure recognition from their peers. Why should they 'risk' publishing in a new type of publication which has yet to establish its prestige? Why should they suffer the process of its wide acceptance, with no assurance guaranteeing its success? Convincing, even more than persuading, has to be performed to make authors understand their role in the advancement of e-journals. Scholarly communication can benefit from e-journals, and scholars may even regain control over the publication of papers, currently held in the hand and freedom of publishers.
L6 Comparison of electronic journals with paper journals
E-journals offer a number of advantages compared to paper journals. The paper journal as a vehicle for scholarly communication can be nearly as slow to be published as a book. E-journals like printed journals are 'prisoner to the temporal, geographic and {shall we call them) "internoetic" constraints of the conventional paper publication' (19). However, e-journals are praised for their
9 E-JOURNALS - part 1: Current Situation
'speed of communication'. Still dependent of the peer-review process, their publication is, nonetheless, shorter in time as this process is carried out through the networks and there is no publishing delay as soon as it is agreed by the reviewing board (20). As mentioned in part 1.3 .1 there are no restrictions in the size of articles, e-journals are quite flexible. Furthermore they can be multimedia, even though this possibility is not yet fully exploited, probably because expensive hardware would be required alongside. 'Colour graphics and photographs are not as costly to include in electronic journals as they are to print on paper, but they are rarely used, and video and audio, unsurprisingly, are to date even rarer' (21). Interactivy can be envisaged, allowing a response time from the readership to the different arguments in a much quicker way than the present paper process allows. Libraries do not have problems like a damaged (often mutilated) or a missing publication (mishelved, in the bindery, etc.) Simultaneous access to users is allowed -unless there is an occasional network crash- while a paper journal will usually allow one reader at a time. Moreover, access beyond the library's building is allowed, provided one has the adequate hardware (e.g universities' information networks allow 'virtual' visits of their libraries). E journals demand less storage requirements and thus libraries can overcome the problem of space on the shelves and avoid binding costs. 'A single copy (plus back-up of course) held centrally takes up less space than hundreds of copies distributed worldwide'(22). However, despite the attractive features, and probably owing to their novelty, e-journals have not 'de-crowned' paper publication yet. Hamad's statement will probably stay true in the near future: 'Paper journals are the only commercially proven medium, and established paper journals continue to attract the majority of papers and the best papers '(23). It would be misleading to claim that e-journals only offer advantages. They, first, require appropriate hardware and software equipments. These can
10 E-JOURNALS - part 1: Current Situation be highly expensive especially if multimedia equipment is purchased to view e-journals with their full features. Furthermore users should have a minimum of computer literacy. Developing countries, countries without established computer base and/or stable networks are bound to be excluded to currently access e-journals. The speed of access on computer networks may be sometimes dreadfully slow to load down on the screen, especially in busy daytime. The problem of archiving is not yet resolved. Will network capacities be able to cope with the amount of data to store on an ongoing basis? To whom should belong the archiving role? Publishers or subscribing organisations (i.e. libraries)? Publishers are currently free to decide how much of the back archive of networked e-joumals to make available online. If libraries want to retain electronically each copy, they must have the possibility of doing so, i.e. adequate equipment, maintenance costs. Improvements in technology are bound to appear, therefore e-journals should not be too software dependent so that the probable conversions should be easily made.
E-joumals are a new and exciting development of the scholarly communication process. Scholars, who were the first to launch them, started realising the opportunity they offer for a quicker and better communication among their community, probably because of the recent advances in technology. Enhanced formats are allowing flexibility, multimedia, and even interactivity: e-joumals are steadily improving. Will the fourth cognitive revolution take place? Will e-journals revolutionise the concept of a scholar journal? Libraries are to fulfil several roles. Among these, they are to disseminate information to their users; they are to inform, educate their users, and democratise access to information. Access should, indeed, not be restricted to written information, all kinds of materials should be welcomed, including
11 E-JOURNALS • part I: Current Situation electronic media. However it should be noted at this stage that the innovative role of libraries is a controversial topic among the profession. Libraries should seek to integrate e-journals not only because it is a new delivery method of information but also for the practical advantages they offer over paper, and for the benefits of their users.
12 E-JOURNALS - part 1: Current Situation
REFERENCES
1. Turoff, M., & Hiltz, S. The electronic journal: a progress report. Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 1982, 33, pp. 195-202.
2. McKnight, C. The electronic journal. LIBS, 1993, 44, pp. 2-3.
3. Row land, F. Recent and current electronic journal projects. In: Row land, F., McKnight C., Meadows J., eds. Project Elvyn: an experiment in electronic journal delivery: facts, figures and findings, 1995, pp.15-36.
4. Ibid., pp. 15-16.
5. Ibid., pp. 17-22.
6. Ibid., pp. 17-27.
7. Ibid., pp. 17-28.
8. Woodward, H. The impact of electronic information on serials collection management. Serials, 1994, 7(1), pp. 29-36.
9. Woodward, H. & McKnight, C. Electronic journals: issues of access and bibliographical control. Serials Review, summer 1995, pp. 71-78.
10. Woodward, H. Periodicals. In: Lea, P. ed. Reference material, 4th edition, 1996, p. 1.
13 E-JOURNALS -part I: Cummt Situation
11. Roes, H. Electronic journals: a survey of the literature and the Net. Journal of information networking, 1994, 2(3), pp. 2. Available at URL http://pill03 .kub.nl:2080/hanshome/articles/ej join.htm)
12. Swinnerton·Dyer, P. A system of electronic journals for the United Kingdom, Serials, 1992, 5(3), pp. 33-35.
13. Roes, ref. 11, p. 2 (of the HTML version).
14. Myers, J. et al. Surfing the sea of stories: riding the information revolution, Mechanical Engineering, 1992, 114(10), pp. 60-65.
15. Woodward, H., ref. 10, p. 1.
16. Hitchcock, S., CaiT, L., & Hall, W. A survey of STM online journals 1990-95: the calm before the storm, 1996. Available at URL http://journals.ecs.soton.ac.uk/survey/survey.html.
17. Bekhradnia, B. Pilot national site licence initiative for academic journals, Serials, 1995, 8(3), pp. 247-250.
18. Me Knight, ref. 2, p. 7.
19. Harter, S. & Kim, H. Electronic journals and scholarly communication: a citation reference study. [paper to be delivered at the AS1S midyear meeting, San Diego, CA, May 20-22, 1996]. Available at URL http://www-slis.lib.indiana.edu/PrePrints/harter-asis96midyear.html
20. Ibid., p. 4 (of the HTML version).
14 E-JOURNALS - part 1: Current Situation
21. Hamad, s. Post-Gutenberg galaxy: the revolution in the means of production of knowledge. PA CS Review, 1991, 2(1), pp. 39-53. To retrieve this article send e-mail to [email protected], body of the message should read GET HARNAD PRV2N1 F=MAIL
22. Roes, ref. 11, p. 5 (of the HTML version).
23. Hamad, S. Premature polls. VPIEJ L Usenet newsgroup archive,1995. Available at URL http://borg.Iib.vt.edu/ejournals/vpiej-Vvpiej-I.Iog9508.html
•
15 E-JOURNALS - part ll: Collection Management Issues
The first libraries to get involved in e-joumals projects were in the United States. Some UK and European libraries are catching up and many discussions are spreading the awareness of the challenges e-joumals represent to libraries. However, adopting e-joumals will not happen overnight, as paper journals are currently predominant on the market. As Woodward states: 'Libraries will have to continue to support a print based system while simultaneously merging in an electronic system' (1). Handling e-joumals requires different methods from the ones for the printed serials. Attempts to find the most suitable answers to all the issues in managing e-joumals are raised within the profession, e.g.: selection and acquisition, access and bibliographical control, cost and resource allocation, training, and other issues.
ILl Selection and acquisition
Similar selection procedures as for printed journals should be adopted, ' and no difference should be made in the treatment of subscription-based e joumals and free e-joumals. Up until very recently, subscription agents did not handle e-journals, so much of the early work had to be undertaken by the librarians themselves. The most comprehensive directory to help tracing e joumals is the ARL Directory produced by the Association of Research Libraries: it displays full access details for all titles. The New Jour electronic mailing list updates the directory and is an important tool to track back issues. Also useful are the following different archiving sites on the WWW: CICNet, the Library of Congress, North Carolina State University, BUBL (Bulletin Board for Libraries) and the University of California (2). As most of the free networked e-journals are launched by individuals, quite often there is no advertisement accompanying it. Despite the powerful search engines such as ~~- ' - -
16 E-JOURNALS - part IT: Collection Management Issues
Yahoo, Alta Vista, Lycos, etc. tracing e-journals still remains a difficult task( with regards to the increasing amount of information circulating on the Internet. Before acquiring e-journals, Weston advise that the following question should be attempted to be answered: 'First, what is its [e-joumal] importance to local users? Next, what is the quality of access via remote sites? Thirdly, are there site licenses? Weston believes site licenses may be the wave of the future of e-journals. Fourthly, what staff and computer resources are available at the library?' (3). A balance should be kept when acquiring printed and electronic journals.
Cancelling printed versions may be a bit premature owing to th~~~lati\'ely novelty _of e~jolJI!l_als. Moreover, most commercial e-joumal subscriptions cannot be separated from the printed version subscription. For instance, publishers like Carfax, Chapman and Hall, Taylor and Francis, are all linking their e-joumals to their printed subscription and are charging of 10-15% on top of the latter. However, if cancellations have to be made, owing to the budget constraints, the same rules as for other formats should be followed (e.g. low-use titles cancelled first). There is still a need to plan, i.e. to set the library's priorities, to determine what to provide access to and what to acquire (4). Ungem-Stemberg claims that 'A systematic planning based on formal, written collection development policy is more important than ever' (5). According to her, the acquisition librarian must perform some pioneering work, in so far as established guidelines, for instance, from the American Library Association, are not yet fully adapted to electronic information. Selection also applies to free e-joumals as a library would do with free printed publications. Furthermore, with regards to the library's budget, it should be anticipated that in the near future free networked e-joumals may convert to fee-based ones. The concept of collection development may be affected by electronic information, including e-joumals: the issue of access versus ownership will have to be tackled according to each context. Hence, Woodward quotes Buckland's following statement: 'Since library materials in electronic format lend
1:7 E-JOURNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues themselves to remote access and shared use, the assembling of local collectio_ns becomes less important' (6). Where is the collection to be developed when wider access is provided to users? Access to electronic information can easily bypass the library walls increasingly as users have access to computer networks o~ which they can carry out their research and download the results. Besides, Woodward predicts that it is possible that users may subscribe themselves to free and low-cost e-journals, as they would for printed journals. If scholars want, however, a personal subscription to commercial e-joumals, a relative small fee will have to be paid in addition to the consequent subscription cost paid by the library. As budgets in academic departments tend to be also tight, this option may only be chosen exceptionally. 'Scientific communication can take place in networks outside the library, and the increased offerings of databases' can make-the library-a(n;all----- and margillal part of the whole network' (7). Hence, libraries should reinforce their intermediary role in orientating users towards the right information in the ever-increasing volume of electronic ' information, including e-joumals. Ungem-Stemberg (8) quotes Perryman's advices to help libraries leading in this direction: strengthen and expand the traditional library values of cooperation and resource sharing offer flexible, multi-faceted services provide access to new and developing formats foster new approaches to information access tap into the developing telecommunications infrastructure pursue and develop new funding sources develop a common vision of the future of information technology. Librarians need to demonstrate a clarity of vision when formulating their collection lllanagement policy, particularly on issues such as access v. ownership, so that users get a clear expectation of what the library can offer.
11.2 Access and bibliographical control
18 E-JOURNALS - part IT: Collection Management Issues
As for books and printed journals, there are several levels of access to e-journals. Basic bibliographic details, such as title, publisher, frequency, publication start date, etc. are provided in the first level. The second level offer access to infonnation about the articles comprised in each issue. The third level is the access to the content of the e-journal itself. The library should seek to provide infonnation at each level and particularly at the third one. Providing access is as important as controlling access: 'how should 'access' be catalogued?' (9). Should e-journal records, for the first level of access, be introduced on OPACs alongside the printed ones? Confusion may arise if no clear distinction appears on the bibliographic record. Cataloguing e journals requires, in this case, additional infonnation on how to access the title. The OCLC (Online Computer Library Center, Inc.), which is a nonprofit membership organisation engaged in computer library service and research, is already cataloguing e-journals, for instance in its WorldCat database (appendix 1). Records indicate in the 'Publication Type' field that it is in machine-readable data, and the 'Note' field is often extensively detailed. However, it is a pity that no 'e-journal' label is displayed anywhere. As the OCLC database contains millions of bibliographic records and is used by libraries worldwide, its cataloguing records are bound to act as model for libraries internationally. The Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC) founded CICNet in 1988, an archival e-journals site on the Internet. CICNet houses one of the largest collection of e-journals in the world with two separate collections: the CIC-Eiectronic Journals Collection (CIC-EJC), a fully managed collection of scholarly e-journals, and the original E-serials Archive. CIC-EJC is a cooperative effort to catalogue e-journals, completed by the CIC member libraries (an academic consortium of the Big Ten universities and the university of Chicago in the United States), CICNet, and the CIC Center for Library Initiatives. Records are also contributed to the OCLC national bibliographic database. This collaborative initiative can be considered as a leading example
19 E-JOURNALS -part II: Collection Management Issues for cataloguing e-joumal titles, including the following fields: Title, URL, ISSN, Topic, Description, Periodicity, Holdings, First electronic issues, and Subscription & Access.
In terms of cataloguing e-joumals articles, it is interesting to note that indexing and abstracting services are slowly beginning to incorporate e-joumals in their services. But no clear distinction between printed journals and e joumals are mentioned. The following entries from OCLC FirstSearch service illustrate this matter with :
[Entty from ERIC)
Author: Hickey, Thomas B.; Noreault, Terry Title: The Development of a Graphical User Interface for the Ooline Joumal of Current Clinical Trials. Year: 1992 Source: Public-Access Computer Systems Review (v3 n2 p4-12 1992) Pub Type: Information analysis; Program description; evaluative/feasibility report; Joumal article Language: English
[Entty from M edlme I
Record no.: 94184519 Author: Huth, E. J. Title: The onlme joumal for current clirucal trials makes It onto the MEDLINE map [ed!torial] Source: Online J Curr Clin Trials (BZC), 1994 Feb 11; Doe No 116 [89 words; 6 paragraphs) • Language: English Countty Pub: UNITED STATES Announcement: 9406 Pub.Type: EDITORIAL
No mention indicating that these articles are belonging to e-joumals, and even less that these publications are in electronic form only. These examples date back to 1992 for Eric and 1994 for Medline, even after extensive searching more recent entries could not be found. One must assume therefore, that e-
20 E-JOURNALS - part ll: Collection Management Issues journal articles are not indexed on a regular basis, and no growing number of electronic sources are covered. It would appear, at present, that indexing and abstracting services are dismissing the value of e-joumal articles; even peer reviewed titles. As e-joumals are increasing, taking little account of their presence can dramatically affect the research of scholars, who largely rely on indexing and abstracting services. However, confusion should not arise between e-joumal articles and e-joumal titles. Most e-joumal titles are catalogued at title level (e.g. in WorldCat database is displayed the e-joumal record of the Internet Journal of Africa Studies) indicating that they are in 'machine readable data' and with their URL displayed.
Research on how to catalogue information on the Internet has been carried out by the OCLC. This has led to the implementation of NetFirst. This database, run under NetSearch, is an authoritative directory for Internet resources, which currently contains 45,000 records. NetFirst indexes all major Internet resources types, including e-journals, WWW pages, discussion fists, Usenet newsgroups, FfP sites, gopher sites, library catalogues, etc. NetFirst software interface is user-friendly and allows access from the display of the record to the source information, via hypertext links. Furthermore, the OCLC Internet Cataloguing Project, funded from October 1994 through March 1996 (10) has published a manual: Cataloguing Internet Resources, which combines a discussion of cataloguing rules, appropriate MARC field and illustrative examples.
One easy solution would be, for indexing and abstracting services and also for libraries, to clearly state in the record that it is in an electronic format and to provide the Uniform Resource Locator (URL), which is the address attributed to each site on the WWW. URLs could be used as hypertext links to get directly from the OPAC's bibliographic record to the Internet resource. Thus, users get the extraordinary possibility to navigate directly to the end-
21 E-JOURNALS - part ll: Collection Management Issues results of their queries without moving away from their desks. In the MARC format, a recent field (field 856) has been created for this purpose to access the electronic source, which is in process of being integrated by cataloguers. NetFirst, as mentioned earlier, allows the above possibility. Furthermore, once a user connects to a source through NetFirst, it can easily come back to the database by pressing the button 'back' on his/hers WWW browser, avoiding the cumbersome task to re-enter the registration number and password.
Providing access to electronic sources through OPAC is, however, a controversial topic: should libraries use their catalogue to lead users to e journals they do not 'physically' own and, consequently, do not control? Or should the catalogue only includes the ones acquired by the library? (11). Handling printed journals is easier to than 'virtual' copies, if any change occurs in the editing board, frequency, etc., the library is automatically aware and amend the records accordingly. But networked e-joumals are in an unstable environment and controlling them is no easy task: 'If a library were to rely on the addition of URLs in the 856 fields of MARC records to access remote serials, the librarians would have to spend much of their time tracking down 'broken' URLs (12)'. Hopefully a scheme of stable Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) could overcome the problem of unstable URLs, but this concept has not taken place yet (13). During a collection development policy meeting concerning Internet resources, in the University of Oregon library, the following questions were raised ( 14 ): Should the Library really collect these resources? What does collecting mean in this vast context? What value is there in organizing a mere microcosm of Internet resources? Isn't this a job best left to powerful search engines, spiders, robots, or the 'Yahoos' of the information world? Concerning the last question, the idea that the WWW offers more sophisticated
22 E-JOURNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues
tools for retrieving e-journals is shared by a number of people. One solution to this issue would that libraries restrict their Internet access through their OPACs to the 'relevant' e-journals in the clearly defined areas stated in collection development policy and on a regular basis check the accuracy of their record. Moreover, Reynolds (15) advocates that a clear distinction between on-site and remote resource should be made to avoid confusion. Accuracy and clarity are the key points to look after in the maintenance of the OPACs.
Another recommendation is that librarians, to help facilitating access to e-journals for their users, should get involved in the design and organisation of local information gateways, or Campus-Wide Information Systems (CWIS) (16). This cooperation would also enable the library to keep its central play in information provision. Burton (17) recommends that the WWW OPAC should compliment the CWIS, rather than there should be a 'competition' between both. An e-journal should be accessible through both routes with a certain degree of commonality; such consistency would be more helpful to users. 'Thus online journals which may exist as a list in CWIS should [also] be accessible through an OPAC search where appropriate with the same level of linking to the journal as through the CWIS' (18).
IL3 Storage and archiving
Unarchived information is well known for its perishability. One of the traditional role of libraries has always been storage and archive of information. The responsibility for archiving e-journals has, nonetheless, raised a number of questions: 'Will gopher access or WWW access eliminate the need to archive locally?' (19). Does the archiving role still belong to information professionals or to publishers? Do libraries need to print bind and shelve? Or should they point to the archival sites on the computers networks?
23 E-JOURNALS - part IT: Collection Management Issues
Relying on publishers may not be the safest solution as the CICNet (20) point out in an on-line announcement in November 1992:
'An increasing proportion of [electronic information] is supplied through the rapidly expanding number of electronic journals and newsletters. .. It has .. become clear that we cannot depend on producers of these electronic forums to maintain full archives of the title, any more than we have been able to count on print publishers to maintain a histoncal archive of their works. Therefore, it is most important that these text be collected and permanently archived in their most extensive form in order to maintain both working sources and the historical record'.
If the decision to archive locally is taken, there is no necessity to print and to bind the e-joumals, as they are always available in electronic format. Redundancy is not without subsequent costs, and storage space requirements. Different solutions are available for local archiving. E-joumals can either be stored on the library computer mainframe or on the one of the university they belong to. A pc-based Local Area Network (LAN) is another alternative. In any case, the library still need to maintain detailed check-in and vendors records as with printed serials (21). Archiving locally implies that the capacity of the computer system chosen should allow to store large files and provide the ability to archive back issues. For this main reason, this option is more suited for small libraries rather than large academic ones, which could not possibly handle such an amount of data. Maintenance and data storage cost will have to be taken into account, while binding cost will disappear. Computer equipment costs are likely to raise the expenses of a current library budget Furthermore it should not be forgotten that hardware and software equipments carry their own potential problems. Paper is probably not the best archival medium as it requires great care (appropriate light, temperature, humidity, etc.), but there is no proof that electronic medium is the best way to store information with regards to
24 E-JOURNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues
archiving: are computer disks, CD-ROMs, reliable?, safe for 'life'? Time is the only clue to answer this question. Moreover, developments in information technology will probably require conversions of the formats storing e-joumals to enable access. Familiarity of users for transferring, downloading and printing files needs to be taken into account: user training will probably need to be supplied.
If the decision is made in favour to point to the appropriate sites through WWW or gopher, the library should work closely with its computing services and therefore be involved in the development of institutional information technology policies and strategies (22). According to an informal mailing list survey completed in 1994, this second model, i.e. point to the sites, is preferred by libraries (23). Virginia Polytechnic and State University Libraries opted for the above solution. They offered access and storage through the library gopher. Although it is not the most up-to-date technology, compared to the WWW or Mosaic, it 'currently meet the needs of the library and those of its user community' (24).
When the library opts for 'pointing to' rather than 'owning' the material, another problem may rise. Often the manifestation of e-joumals as they are mounted on the remote library's Gopher or WWW site, may differ in some ways from the e-joumal version published and received by e-mail (25). Some e-joumals only feature article by article and have no title screen. In these cases the library needs to supply one on its menu through Gopher or WWW. The choice of the title may be problematic as the titles supplied by the gopher builders and Webmasters can be very different from what the cataloguer would have chosen with regard to the chief source. 'The pointing library is really cataloguing something akin to a nonfacsimile reprint of the original publication' (26). One solution proposed by Reynolds is to copy the original institution's catalogue record.
25 E-JOURNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues
Cooperation between libraries could settle arrangements offering the advantage of pointing to the sites which have agreed 'either to retain archives of the journals or notify other cooperating libraries before moving or deleting archive files' (27). n4 Costs and resource allocation
At the present time most libraries are facing financial pressure. Shrinking budgets leave the information professionals to face the tough dilemma to provide 'dynamic' services using latest and updated information media to satisfy their clients' needs, while income is most of the time inappropriate to such aspiring objectives.
The serials pricing crisis within the scholarly communication constrains libraries to restrict their printed journals subscriptions. Currently many networked e-journals are free of charge, possibly, not for long ... The current situation is unstable and prices are likely to be attached in the medium-term future. There are a number of reasons for this: free networked e-journals are currently produced by a few dedicated editors, e.g. enthusiast volunteers in some university departments as most of academic presses are not involved in this 'somewhat subterranean activity' (28). Also if e-journals grow in popularity, and then increase in volume, costs will definitely need to be recovered. As Row land states: 'While a journal publishing 15 papers a year could be run on an amateur basis, one publishing 1,500 papers a year cannot, regardless of the medium it is published in. The sheer administrative load of organizing input, refereeing, copy-editing, formatting and distribution of that many documents, requires full-staff. And since those people have to eat, they also need a salary' (29). Another reason is that the Internet may not stay a free and open information exchange. This prediction is based on the observation that signs of network congestion, network charges and greater commercialisation, are already
26 ------1111111111 E-.K>URNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues
appearing (30). A last reason is that commercial companies, which are rapidly getting involved in electronic publishing, will inevitably attach a cost to their products (31 ). Some authors (Hamad (32), Franks (33), Quinn (34) and others) are encouraging scholars to publish themselves, i.e. without the intermediary of commercial publishers, and in electronic form, i.e. e-joumals. Harnad's 'subversive proposal' has raised vivid discussions (35). He fosters scholarly authors, who want to publish their work without any expectation of financial return, to forget paper publication and use either a globally accessible local ftp archive, or the Internet. Electronic preprint services, which display awaiting peer-reviewed papers without commercial publishers intermediary, are also acknowledged and seen as a way to 'author empowerment' (36). If publishers are side-lined, they will be then obliged to restructure themselves -with the cooperation of the scholarly community- so that cost of electronic-only pages will be reduced. He argues that this solution will enable scholars to cope and regain control over the serials pricing crisis, and provide a faster speed of publication.
Libraries could even play a further role in helping scholars in editing e joumals, or could even 'publish' on their behalf, scholarly e-joumals. 'Publish' in this context would mean to maintain a file of reviewed and edited papers, freely accessible over the electronic network (37). Quinn argues in favour of libraries for two reasons. The first is that libraries are to help maintaining standards, and as a result, credibility, and should move forward a few steps in the quality-control chain, as they are responsible for the quality of their collections. The development of new standards is, indeed, imperative to improve the storage, access and display of networked e-joumals. The second reason is that most scholarly journals are supported by library subscriptions and as no other sources of support can be expected, libraries should be eligible to manage them. Bailey (38) even pleads a step further: librarians should also lobby for the
27 E-JOURNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues establishment of a 'high perfonnance, government-subsidized National Research and Education Network' to help developing networked e-journals.
Costs for libraries handling e-journals are likely to differ from those of printed journals. 'The running costs for a library in handling a printed journal _ are relatively small. How do electronic journals compare in this respect?' (39). To find out the answer, a study carried out in the 1980s in Loughborough University has been updated, providing comparative cost data on the costs of ordering, accessioning and shelving in a new quarterly printed journal. The analysis showed that cataloguing and accession costs will not be less for an e journal, and may even be more. E-journals do not require shelving process, but it is counterbalanced by the fact that it implies library's floor space and maintenance of computer equipment. In addition to the running costs, start-up costs have to be taken into account, as well as staff time. Resource allocation will, therefore, be affected by the management of e-journals. Financial resources will have to be re-directed and human resources will have to incorporate new skills and responsibilities.
11.5 Training
'Successful implementation and user satisfaction in the electronic environment, will only be achieved by a highly trained and skilled library workforce' ( 40). Librarians will need training, and in turn, they will provide group and individual assistance to their users on how to access e-journals. The cost of this training needs to be taken into account in the library budget.
11.6 Other issues
Electronic publishing carries a number of concerns for both publishers and librarians, including copyright control and text integrity.
28 E-JOURNALS - part ll: Collection Management Issues
Copying -also called electrocopying- is relatively easy in an electronic envirorunent and infringement of fair-use can easily happen, damaging the income of publishers. 'In the electronic domain, not only is copying easy and fast but also the resulting copy is identical to the original' (41). A copyright warning statement should be displayed on screen before accessing e-joumals available through the library. In absence of any definitive guidelines' on technology, librarians should advise their users that the same copying rules applying in the electronic envirorunent as they do with printed publications. Once authors have given the permission to publishers to print their work, they sell their copyrights to them and are not allowed to dispose of their work the way they wish (e.g. give to another publisher, distribute free copies in print or electronically, etc.). Such restrictions would appear to foster the move for authors to publish themselves electronically or via routes within the scholarly community. Relaxing restrictions is one way in which publishers may retain their clients. Hence, Elsevier publishers have recently announced that they will allow their authors to mount a copy of their own articles on their personal WWW pages for use within their own institution (while access for people from outside is forbidden) (42). Regarding copyright, libraries are concerned by the lack of fair usage agreements on electronic material. Holding and distributing e-journals are governed by restricted rights as it supposes the initial copying of a file from the publisher's original. The American Library Association and the Library Association of the United Kingdom have called on publishers to allow fair usage gnidelines on electronic materials similar to those already in place for printed material (43). Librarians are also concerned by licensed material as with this kind of agreement, the material is not actually 'officially' owned by the library; this is likely to affect both collection development and resource-sharing schemes.
How can a reader be sure that the article he/she is reading is actually the
29 E-JOURNALS • part II: Collection Management Issues original copy? Only e-journals on CD-ROMs can claim to be secure from data manipulation, as it is a read-only medium. Networked e-joumals are hardly protected: changes of data, such as deletions and additions, can be easily made and thus the authenticity of a text can be jeopardized. This can dramatically affect the scholarly community, which will lose its high standards -guarantee of reliability and quality.
All e-joumals should obtain an ISSN at the start of publication, just as print journals. '( ... ) assignment of ISSN to electronic journals is accepted, and actually performed, in the Nordic countries as well as in the US and elsewhere around the world' (44). Where a title exists in print and electronically, two distinct ISSNs should be allocated; this would facilitate both librarians and publishers to retrieve and promote e-journals.
' Owing to their novelty, handling e-joumals is not a simple task. However, if libraries decide to tackle the issues this challenging medium of information represents, a large advancement in the electronic information environment will be achieved. Libraries must face a number of problems: only few selections tools are currently available; choice between access v. ownership has to be considered, probably leading to a re-conception of collection management policies; standards should be created so that access, and consequently bibliographical control, will be facilitated; archiving needs to be done efficiently by whatever option adopted; on one hand, costs will probably increase, but on the other hand, a possible solution to the serials pricing crisis, with the cooperation of scholars, might be found; training for staff and users will be needed and other issues include copyright control and text integrity which will probably need reinforced regulations. The Pilkington Library at Loughborough University may provide its
30 E-JOURNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues contribution to the current discussions on handling e-journals, as it has chosen to embark in this promising experience.
31 E-JOURNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues
REFERENCES
1. Woodward, H. Electronic journals in libraries. In: Rowland, F., McKnight C., Meadows J., eds. Project Elvyn: an experiment in electronic journal delivery: facts, figures and findings, 1995, p. 53.
2. Ibid., p. 55.
3. Sullenger, P., reconler. Methods for collecting, processing, and providing access to electronic serials, 1995, p. 328.
4. Ungem-Stemberg, S. von., & Llndqulst, M. G. The impact of electronic journals on library functions. Journal of information science, 1995, 21(5), p. 399.
5. Ibid., p. 399.
6. Woodwanl, ref. 1, p. 55.
7. Ungem-Stemberg, ref. 4, p. 396.
8. Ibid., p. 396-397.
9. Ibid., p. 400.
10. Sleeman, A.M. Cataloging remote access electronic materials. In: Duranceau, EF., ed. Cataloging remote-access electronic serials: rethinking the role of the OPAC. Serials review. 1995, (21), p. 73.
32 E-JOURNALS - part ll: Collection Management Issues
11. Ibid., p. 67.
12. Ibid., p. 70.
13. Ibid., p. 70.
14. Watson, M.R. The ambivalent lzbrary. OCLC Internet cataloging project colloquium, Field report, 1996. Available at URL http://www .oclc.org/oclc/man/colloq/watson/fieldrep.htm
15. Reynolds, R. Inventory list or information gateway? the role of the catalog in the digital age. In: Duranceau, E.F., ed. Cataloging remote access electronic serials: rethinking the role of the OPAC. Serials review, 1995, (21), p 67-77.
16. Woodward, ref. 1, p. 56.
17. Burton, J. The wonders of the Web: developing graphical OPACs. In: Woodward, H. & Morley, M., eds. Endangered species?: evolving strategies for library collection management. UKSG, 1995.
18. Ibid., p. 88.
19. Sullenger, ref. 3, p. 329.
20. Rustad, K. Electronic journals in the national library, 1994. Available at URL http://rosa.nbr.no/etids/e-tids.html
21. Woodward, ref. 1, p. 55.
33 E-JOURNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues
22. Ibid., p. 55.
23. Ibid., p. 55.
24. Ibid., p. 58.
25. Reynolds, R. Inventory list or information gateway? the role of the catalog in the digital age. In: Duranceau, E.F., ed. Cataloging remote access electronic serials: rethinking the role of the OPAC. Serials review, 1995, (21), p. 75-77.
26. Ibid., p. 76.
27. Ibid., p. 77.
28. Bailey, C. W. Network-Based electronic serials. lnfonnation technology and libraries, 1992, 11(1), p. 33.
29. Rowland, Fytton. Electronic journals: neither free nor easy. EJoumal, 1994, 4(2).
30. Woodwanl, ref. 1, p. 61.
31. Ibid., p. 60.
32. Hamad, S. Post-gutenberg galaxy: the fourth revolution in the means of production of knowledge. PACS-Revzew, 1991, 2(1), p. 39-53. To retrieve this article send e-mail to [email protected], body of the message should read GET HARNAD PRV2N1 F=MAIL
34 E-JOURNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues
33. Franks, J. The impact of electronic publication on scholarly journals. Notices of the American Mathematical Society, 1993, 40 (9), pp. 1200- 1202.
34. Quinn, F. A role for libraries in electronic publication. EJoumal, 1994, 4(5).
35. Okerson, A.S., & O'Donnell, J.J., eds. Scholarly journals at the crossroads: a subversive proposal for electronic publishing: an intemet discussion about scientific and scholarly journals and their future. ARL, 1995.
36. Taubes, G. Electronic preprints point the way to 'author empowerment'. Science On-Line, 1996, 271 (5250). Available at URL http://science-mag .aaas.org/science/scripts/display/full/27l/5250n 67 .h t ml?alt
37. Quinn, ref. 27.
38. Bailey, ref. 21, p. 34.
39. Rowland, F., et al. Implementation at individual sites. In: Rowland, McKnight C., Meadows J., eds. Project Elvyn: an experiment in electronic journal delivery: facts,figures and findings, 1995, pp. 134.
40. Woodward, H. The impact of electronic serials on collection management. Serials, 1994, 7(1), p. 34.
41. McKnight, C. The electronic journal. Library & Information briefings, 1993, 44, p. 7.
35 E-JOURNALS - part II: Collection Management Issues
42. Elsevler. [letter sent to all members of Elsevier's editorial boards], June 1996.
43. Norman, S. Electronic copyright a time to act. Lzbrary Assoczation Record, 1995, 97(4), p 209.
44. Rustad, ref. 20.
36 E-JOURNALS - part m: Pilkington Library Case Study
The Pilkington Library offers its services to the Loughborough University community. It opened in 1980 and houses a collection of more than 500,000 items including current subscriptions to 3,108 journals and reports. The full and part-time library staff currently numbers nearly 90 people, and the total library budget is over £2 million per annum. The main function of the university library is to provide staff and students with literature and information to support their teaching, learning, and research activities. Since 1994/95 the library has started to provide access toe-journals. This following case study highlights the issues involved in the Pilkington Library collection management of the e-journals, and assesses the means of access its electronic publications, i.e. BLCMP Talis Web OPAC and the Library Web pages.
III.l E-joumals available at the Pilkington Library
In 1994/5 the annual report stated that '( ... ) largely fuelled by developments in the World Wide Web, a growing number of electronic journals became available in the course of the year' (1). Although poor quality and short duration is often associated with them, in 1994/1995 the library staff selected some 15 e-journals of the most relevant refereed titles, and made them accessible through the Loughborough Information Gateway. In 1995/96 the growth of e-journals is growing rapidly. Access to e journals is accordingly increasing. This fast moving area implies that access within the Pilkington Library is also evolving quickly, i.e. in space of weeks.
The library offers through its WWW Home page an 'Electronic Journals Service' providing access to :
37 E-JOURNALS • part ID: Pilkington Libmcy Case Study
- commercially produced full text E-joumals - Freely available full text E-joumals -Sample issues of E-joumals (often with abstracts of articles) - E-joumal collections at other sites
III.l.l Commercial e-joumals
As already mentioned in part 1.4.1, all higher education libraries in the UK are involved in a three year pilot site licence scheme initiative launched by the Higher Education Funding Council for England (HEFCE). This project intends to investigate various issues (the diverse means of dissemination, the legal implications, etc.). Three commercial publishers are involved: Academic Press, Blackwells Scientific, and the Institute of Physics Publishing (IOPP). These publishers supply an electronic version of their printed journals, but these are currently not meant to replace the print format. The terms of the pilot licence scheme varies between the publishers. IOPP allows libraries access to the electronic version of titles which they subscribe to in print (as will Blackwells Scientific when they make their electronic verions available in late 1996). Academic press, however, are allowing libraries access to all their electronic versions, regardless of how many print subscriptions they take.
(At 09.07.96) Carfax on-line journals offers 8 titles. Chapman & Hall offers 70 titles. IDEAL Academic press offers 60 titles, but intends to put up 174. The Institute of Physics Publishing offers 31 titles.
The 'sample issues of E-journals' section give access to mainly commercial titles, which obviously require a subscription fee to get access to the entire collection. Titles include The Economist, Internet World, Marketing
38 E-JOURNALS - part ill: Pilkington Libmry Case Study
Week, Nature, etc. lll.1.2 Free e-joumals
The free full text e-journals lists is increasing quite rapidly. This fact is not surprising: the New Jour list reflects this fast moving area by announcing in average about five new titles per day. There are 31 titles available through the Pilkington Library service, including journals like A riadne, First Monday, Public-Access Computer Systems Review, Psycoloquy, etc. m. 2 Selection and acquisition
Acquiring printed serials is one of the main activity of the library in terms of materials budget. Indeed, the library collection management policy stipulates that approximately 60% is devoted to the purchase of serials, while the remaining 40% to the purchase of books. However, it is underlined that an expenditure limitation of70% is authorized to indiVidual umversity deparunents, who wish to allocate their funds differently with regard to the purchase of library materials. The primary criterion for the selection of any item is the value and relevance of the information content and secondly, the format, although due account is taken of the associated equipment requirements and price of material in non-print format. There is no separate written policy that specifically addresses the selection, access, storage of e-journals. Regular meetings with the librarians involved with e-journals have been held to discuss the issues and the decisions to be taken. The collection development policy is, nonetheless, covering e journals in the sense that the same selection criteria apply to e-journals as they do for printed journals. They must be relevant to the teaching, learning and research needs of the university. Hence, there are no particular selection criteria for free e-journals as for commercial e-journals, but only refereed free titles are
39 E-JOURNALS - part ill: Pilkington Library Case Study made available, on the assumption that if individuals are interested in newsletters, discussion lists, etc. they will subscribe to these free services themselves. The Pilkington library is not the only academic library which has no distinctive policy for e-joumals. The SCONUL (Standing Conference on National University Libraries) Advisory Committee on Scholarly Communication (A COS C) distributed a questionnaire during 1996. It surveyed 33 universities in the UK on their policy and practices regarding e-joumals. To the question: 'Has your institution documented policies and/or strategies relating to e-joumal acquisition?' Twenty did not have a written policy, ten claimed to have policies in place -in the main these were subsets of existing collection development policies- and three institutions had policies under development (2).
No cancelled print based journals have been replaced with e-joumals. As one university argued in the above questionnaire: there is currently no groundswell of demand for e-joumals, and as there are still problems related to availability and access of these, it made no sense to encourage substitution (3).
III.3 Access and bibliographical control
Problems of access are still a barrier to e-joumal use. Some of the access problems relate to the viewers required to view full-text articles. Within the Loughborough services, three types of softwares are used: (i) HTML via the WWW which is the easiest method from the library perspective, (ii) Adobe Acrobat which has to be loaded as a separate piece of software onto the campus network and individual machines, (iii) Realpage, which is a proprietary software package used by Carfax and Taylor & Francis, and which currently is causing problems of access as it is difficult to load onto the campus network. It is intended to load Adobe Acrobat onto the campus network during the 1996 summer vacation, which should alleviate some of the problems.
40 E-JOURNALS -part m: Pilkington Library Case Study
A large amount of effort is going into improving bibliographical control of e-journals. The Pilkington Library has offered the a BLCMP Talis Text OPAC since 1994 and more recently its WWW version. The WWW OPAC was a joint research project between the library and BLCMP. One of the main objective of the Web OPAC is to be easier to use than the text OPAC: it should be more user-friendly. 'LUT and BLCMP have devoted a large amount of time ensuring that the WWW OPAC is as configurable and extensible as possible, since this was felt to be the least desirable trait of textual Talis OPAC' (4).
The Pilkington Library intends to provide e-journal records both on its text OPAC and its WWW OPAC for the journals available through its Electronic Journals Service page. The cataloguing work is currently in progress, as it started only a few months ago. Free e-journals started to be catalogued first, the cataloguing of the commercial ones has not been done yet. This is mainly due to the following difficulty which needs to fmd an appropriate solution: the URLs for these e-journals point to the publisher's site instead of pointing directly to the e-journal as the free ones do, and publishers require a login and a password to get access to the contents. No selection criteria is needed to select the titles which will be catalogued as the objective is to provide a record for each of them. The library support the idea of making e journals as most accessible as possible within all the means it has at its disposal.
The Pilkington Library participates in the BLCMP resource sharing scheme (which includes over 40 libraries), so that whenever a participating library creates a new record, it is possible to obtain it through computer networks. Redundancy of work is, as a result, avoided and only few amendments may be made on the records. But so far the Pilkington Library has been the first to catalogue e-journals, hence, to create new records.
41 E-JOURNALS • part ID: Pilkington Library Case Study
The library uses the AACR2 cataloguing rules and follows the BLCMP advice which resulted from a meeting of the BLCMP Bibliographic Standards Subgroup on the 15 May 1996 (5). The Library also incorporates current UKMARC format amendment proposals on fields for describing computer files into its working practices. Consequently, current practice is a mixture of the meeting conclusions and the UKMARC proposals, specifically on the use of fields 258, which is already in use and 542, which is on suggestion. Guidelines advise the creation of separate records for the paper and electronic version when an e-journal exists in these two formats. The main reason is that it allows records to be shared, otherwise the information about the electronic version would have to be entered locally, in so far as, some libraries would only possess the paper version. The second reason is that the electronic version would benefit from a better and clearer description on a separate record. However the guidelines state that exceptions are allowed: not all remote electronic sources should be catalogued separately. 'Information on the electronic table of contents for a book, for example, is more useful recorded in the record of the book, but it must be entered locally since not all libraries with the book will have access to EToC [Electronic Table of Contents]' (6). BLCMP also recommends that within the BLCMP scheme the cataloguing should be done at the level of the individual journal and not to e-journal services. The level of cataloguing does not differ to a great extent from the cataloguing of the paper journals, only some extra data and fields are added. The following • elements should be provided (7): • In the title, the description 'Computer file' should appear. (GMD: 245 *zComputer file) • In the description 'Computer data and program' should appear. This was proposed originally by the British Library guidelines. (Computer file characteristics (AACR2 9.3): 258 0 00 *aComputer data and program) • The mode of access and the address should be present. (Mode of use note (AACR2 9.7Blc): 542 0 00 *aAccess: Internet. Address: http:// .. etc.)
42 E-JOURNALS - part ID: Pilkington Library Case Study
• The location should be displayed in the field 856 (Electronic location an access: 856 0 XO various subfields. e.g. 856 0 70 *uhttp:// .. etc.) The field 856 is the shared equivalent of field 859, to allow for multiple electronic locations relevant to different libraries. The appropriate one should be copied to a local 856 field for use in the catalogue. The call number assigned to the records corresponds to the ISSN number supplied with the electronic version. There should be indeed two different ISSN when the e-journal exists in print and electronic version. When no ISSN is attached, BLCMP provides some guidelines to create a serial control number.
The recording of the holdings is dependent on the local storage policy. Libraries, within BLCMP are, therefore, free to take different approaches. However, two ideas have been suggested: the first is to create an additional site to represent external resources, namely Site Serial Holding with no shelfmark and holdings statement for the range that the library has access to; the second is to put the holdings infonnation i~ a local bibliographic note (tag 500), e.g. a 500 0 00 Vol.8-, 1993-. The Pilkington Library opted for the flrst approach with some modifications for the 'Holdings' (e.g. Ariadne: a magazine for librarians and infonnation specialists):
[Text OPAC] Holdings summary Location: Shelfmark: Holdings: Pilkington Library Remote access Accessible via the Computer file Internet
Hence, the library minimizes the risk of errors and avoids a holdings statement from a particular date, which requires some extra work and may mislead the user, who will assume they are physically present in the library as the location indicates 'Pilkington Library'.
43 E-JOURNALS • part ID: Pilkington Library Case Study
Kingston University, which is also a participant to BLCMP, has opted for another presentation as follows:
[Text OPAC] Holdings summary Location: Shelfmark: Holdings: Internet website/
The location statement 'Internet' seems more appropriate than the actual library (Kingston) where you can get access to. However, the shelfmark is unlikely to help the user and may rise more confusion than ever. The holdings are specified, which is a useful information, provided that the user has read and understood that the location is on the Internet. It is also interesting to note that before accessing the record of the e journal, the Kingston University Library adds after the title the following information: (!http:), which easily differentiate it from the other title for paper version. Unfortunately, the Pilkington Library does not give this additional information, 'obliging' the user to check both records. This omission may be explained by the emphasis on the WWW OPAC, which should become the most used catalogue between the two available. There seems to be no ideal solution, as yet, for the 'holdings' information, and both the Pilkington Library and the Kingston University Library demonstrate the different approaches that can be taken.
The Pilkington Library, as mentioned above, does not take into account individual issues of e-journals within its cataloguing, it only needs to be aware of the new titles selected to incorporate them into the OPAC. The co-ordination of the e-journal service is handled by the Academic Services Manager who
44 E-JOURNALS - part ill: Pilkington Library Case Study
liaises with the various departments in the Library who are responsible for different aspects of the services: this includes cataloguers, acquisition staff and system staff.
Owing to a lack of staff time, the library does not regularly check the URLs mentioned in the records. Its practice is rather 'unethical', as it currently relies on reports from users that these are no longer right. This damages the credibility of the library's catalogue. Nonetheless, the library is looking forward to get hold of a software, newly created, which does an automatic URL checking overnight and reports back failures. As the server may be down at that time, these failures would not necessarily mean that the URL is incorrect, but if it is repeated several times step to address the problem will be taken
The WWW OPAC version displays e-journal records of an amazing clarity (appendix 2). Additional data is displayed when compared with the text OPAC. Not only does the title indicate, as recommended, 'Computer files' but also the mention 'World Wide Web version'. The note field specifies the mode of access and also the format: 'remote access computer file in HTML format'. The advantage of the WWW OPAC is the possibility to create outward links to the e-journals themselves by clicking on the 'URL' field. The weakness of BLCMP Talis Web OPAC is that the URL is automatically broken on the screen, as the original field length was not prepared to receive so long addresses. Users may be confused if they write down on paper the URL displayed as such in order to try it later on directly on the Internet. it will automatically fail. But at that stage, to access thee-journal is very simple as the user only needs to point and click the mouse button on this field address.
Cataloguing is a challenging task to provide good quality access. Clearness and consistency should be the watchwords so that users 'enjoy' getting information or access to the e-joumals the library offers.
45 E-JOURNALS - part Ill: Pilkington Library Case Study
111.4 Storage and archiving
Like most libraries, the Pilkington Library is not storing e-journals on its local network owing to the 'astronomical' file space this would require. The option of 'pointing to' the original server has been opted as most publishers tend to archive their back issues on their own server. Elsevier is one of the few publishers who are still trying to push libraries to locally archive their publications. The Pilkington Library, as many other libraries, hopes that a national archiving centre will soon take the responsibility for storage: this could be an institution such as OCLC or the British Library.
111.5 Costs and resource allocation
As are all academic libraries, the Pilkington Library is concerned by the high rate of increase in the cost of scholarly journals. 'The cost of the Library's journal subscriptions increased by approximately 18% in 1995, with some titles rising by considerably more. Increases of this order cannot be matched by increased expenditure, with the result that 98 titles were cancelled' (8). Unfortunately, cancellations of printed journals have to be repeated on an annual basis. The library policy is, thus, moving towards access rather than acquisition, by providing articles only when needed. E-journals may be seen as partly compensating these restrictions. There is no specific budget dedicated to e-journals, they are comprised in the overall serials budget. Because the majority of the subscriptions are linked to the print journals, their fee only represents an additional percentage, which is very small compared to the costs of printed journals.
111.6 Training
Training is probably the best way to promote the use of e-journals. Like
46 E-JOURNALS - part ill: Pilkington Libracy Case Study the majority of libraries surveyed by the ACOSC, the Pilkington Library values user education programmes. Training courses for library staff are organised internally. The University Staff Training Unit offers, additionally, to all academic and research staff a wide range of courses on Information Technology. Courses on e-joumals began in May 1996 and will be on the programme in greater quantity from October 1996. User training will also be provided in the library in the shape of open sessions free to anyone, usually at lunch time not to interfere with lectures. As e-journals fall within the wider category of electronic information (CD-ROMs and online information services) with which the majority of users are familiar, the training sessions will expect users have a minimum of computer literacy. Optional exercises will be available from the library's Web page with a variety of example titles to link from there. lll.7 Research Activities of the Pilkington Libracy: Cafe Jus
As the Pilkington Library along with the Department of Information and Library Studies has been involved in a number of projects concerning e-journals (e.g. ELVYN), it obtained a grant from the British Library Research and Development Department to lead the Cafe Jus project. Cafe Jus is a project which aims to find out how academic staff and students are using e-journals. Much has been said about the views of authors, publishers and librarians on e joumals, though little research has been carried on the views of those who use the electronic publications, i.e. the readers. During the summer semester of 1996 (21.04.96- 14.06.96) the Cafe Jus team asked 8 groups of taught course master students in different departments, to select appropriate e-journals and to complete a questionnaire (appendix 3). Furthermore, during the summer vacation, 30 PhD research students using relevant e-journals are asked to keep a diary record of use. Analysis of these data will be completed by the end of
47 E-JOURNALS - part ID: Pilkington Library Case Study
1996, beginning 1997.
ms Pilkington Library WWW Homepage: evaluation
Accessible through the Internet, the Pilkington Library offers information and services to its users and, in some cases, to anyone who visits the site .. (appendix 4). Of course, certain services, e.g. BIDS, SwetScan, are only available to members of Loughborough University. The Pilkington Library Services page has a clear layout as the user is not from the start overwhelmed by too much text, which may put him/her off. Two lines introduce the list of services offered: • About the Library: provides basic information, such as opening times, regulations, and names of other East Midlands Academic Libraries cooperating with the Library. • Library Directory: provides general and specific list of services and academic contacts. • Library Catalogue (OPA C): available in two versions: the Web OPAC and the text OPAC through Telnet. • Electronic Journals: gives access to a selected number of e-journals. • Library Publications: these are an electronic version of the library's information leaflets and newsletters, which are available on display shelves within the building. • /nfonnation sources: offers the possibility to look at the OPAC, references to published information, services such as BIDS, other OPACs, STILE, and to a guide explaining and connecting to Internet resources. The library logo (picture of one side of the building) is displayed at the corner of the screen enhancing the page. In addition, a hypertext link, at the bottom of the page, allows the user to go back to the Loughborough University Information Gateway Homepage.
48 E-JOURNALS - part m: Pilkington Library Case Study
The Electronic Journals Service page (appendix 5) provides access to a range of full text e-journals as well as to journals article information and abstract which are categorized in four services (see III.l). A note inform the users that some of these services require additional software (e.g. Adobe Acrobat) to access full text information, which remove a 'nasty' surprise at some stage of the navigation in the service. The user is also offered the possibility to criticize the service and/or to suggest access to other titles, viae-mail. From this page to the following ones, a hypertext link to either the library home page or the e-journals service is available: users can get quicker access to their starting point. Providing such simple return key may increase the confidence of users encouraging them to navigate, venture into the different links.
The Free full text £-journals page displays in alphabetical order its 31 titles. No classification by subject is used. Access to the journals is made clicking the mouse button on the desired title.
The Sample issues of £-journals page displays titles which in most cases require a subscription fee to access the e-joumal beyond the issues available on the screen. For a small minority a registration is necessary despite the free access to all issues.
The Commercially produced E-journals page offers a diverse range of
publications. The introducing comment reminds users that access is free to member of the university, and that some services require a registration before use for copyright purposes. Titles are not classified by subject at that stage, but underneath their related publisher: Carfax on-line journals, Chapman & Hall, IDEAL: Academic Press Journals, Institute of Physics Publishing, and Project Muse. The presentation of the titles from the following pages is dependent of each publisher (e.g. alphabetical, by subject), therefore, users need to adapt their search according to each new layout. These are usually user-friendly, but the
49 E-JOURNALS • part ID: Pilkington Library Case Study display of the titles, the availability of added services, and search tools are highly variable. Currently users do not have access to a 'local keyword search' which could retrieve titles of e-journals offered by the library by subject or keyword. But such a useful tool may be soon available thanks to the Blackwell's Electronic Journal Navigator project (see further details V.4) for which the Library will be a pilot site.
The E-joumal collections at other sites page provides access to eleven sites on the Internet. These comprise e-journals catalogues, archival sites, libraries highly involved with e-journals, a selected bibliography, etc. Users can have access to a greater number of titles, and can obtain more information on e-journals with their related projects, issues and discussions.
There is no single way to handle e-journals: choices concerning the acquisition, cataloguing, storage, etc. have to be made. Adapted decisions to the libr¥)' have been reached. But as e-journals quickly evolve, the library should \ expect other issues to be raised. The Pilkington Library aims to provide an awareness of e-journals, to foster their use and to ease their access. This objective is partly achieved through its e-journals service Web page. One can feel confident navigating in it, as its layout and links are clear and generally easy to understand. The contents correspond to what might be anticipated. Perhaps the main difficulty for users is to adapt to the different presentations and access to the commercial titles. To the ACOSC questionnaire, the majority of libraries claimed to promote access to e-journals via university network, using either the library Web page or the university Web page. How does the library service compare with other UK libraries Web page? Does the Pilkington library demonstrate a leading edge in this area? To give a better judgement of the service, a
50 E-JOURNALS • part ill: Pilkington Library Case Study comparative study may emphasises pitfalls to avoid and hints to follow.
51 E-JOURNALS - part m: Pilkington Library Case Study
REFERENCES
1. Arfield, J.A. Pilkington library annual report: I August 1994- 31 July 1995. Loughborough University of Technology, 1995, p. 3.
2. SCONUL Advisory Committee on Scholarly Communication. [E-m ail on the meeting of Thursday 4 July 1996], 1996, [3 p.].
3. Ibid., [3 p.].
4. Burton, J. The wonders of the Web: developing graphical OPACs. In: Woodward, H. & Morley, M. Endangered species? Witney: UKSG, 1995, p. 86.
5. Teny, W. Cataloguing electronic journals. BLCMP, 3 June 1996, [2 p.].
6. Ibid., [2 p.].
7. Ibid., [2 p.].
8. Arfield, ref. 1, p. 2.
52 E-JOURNALS - part IV: Comparative Study
Ten e-journals services on libraries WWW Homepage have been randomly chosen through the WWW Directory or directly on the Internet, in order to compare with the Pilkington Library one. They include the University of Southampton Library, the University of Liverpool Library, the University College London Library, the Leeds University Library, the Keele University Library, the Oxford University Libraries, the University of Essex Library, the University of York Library, the University of Sunderland Information Services, and the John Rylands University Library of Manchester. A brief review of each of these, will eventually show the diverse 'philosophies' in their approaches and the pros and cons attached. This small scale study aims to show not only the different layouts which have been opted, but also the advancement in accessing e-joumals in this country through the university libraries.
IV.l University of Southampton Library- (appendix 6)
The layout of the first page is simple comprising only three titles ('Guide to the library', 'Opening hours of the universities libraries', 'Online Public Access Catalogue') with hypertext links and a range of thumbnail buttons. Although one may quickly assume that the first link 'Guide to the Library' is a simple library induction tour with maps of each floor, it is actually through this link that e-journals can be accessed. Two further steps have to be followed: a second guess has to be made within the list of services offered. By clicking on the' Index to subjects and services' an alphabet is displayed. The letter 'E' allows access to the 'Electronic Journals at Southampton' page. A short paragraph reminds that the full text is only available to the persons registered at the University of Southampton. A 'Remember also .. .'
53 E-JOURNALS- part IV: Comparative Study cleverly reminds users that other electronic sources are available through the library. Owing to the 'exciting' novelty of e-journals, users may neglect other information sources and services, such as CD-ROMs or BIDS. They might falsely assume that these are superseded bye-journals, which IS neither the case, nor the intention. In addition, a hypertext link to the 'World Wide Web Virtual Library's Electronic Journals' pages is displayed to enable access to the free e journals on the Internet. The contents page is, consequently, dedicated to the commercial e journals. It includes three links to the services currently subscribed to: 'Electronic versions of Academic Press journals- the IDEAL service', 'Institute of Physics Publishing: Electronic Journals', and 'The Research Index'. The Research Index is an original service: it is not a full text e-journal service but a journal index. The database indexes news, views and comments on industries and companies worldwide, as reported in the UK national press and a range of business magazines, including the Financial Times and Wall Street Journal Europe. It is, nonetheless, unclear that it is included with the e-joumals service. The URL address is given for this site which can only be accessed from Southampton. Also displayed on the contents page, are two forthcoming services: 'Blackwell's (the publishers) Humanities and Science journals', as the library is about to subscribe to major titles in the humanities and sciences e-joumals published by Blackwell's the publisher; and 'Blackwell's (the subscription agent) "one stop shop" pilot'. Although the name attributed for the latter is "so new that we haven't got a name yet", it seems to correspond to the Electronic Journals Navigator Project. The aims are displayed, and staff and students of the university are invited to participate in the project.
IV.2 University of Liverpool library- (appendix 7)
The Library Homepage features a number of services, including two
54 E-JOURNALS - part IV: Comparative Study different routes within the same page to e-joumals: 'Electronic Resources in the Library' and 'The Journals Pages. Information and access to electronic journals'. The second route is, as could be anticipated, the more straightforward one. The 'University of Liverpool Library Journals Page' offers access to e-joumals and the records of paper journals through its OPACs. For the commercial e-joumals, a note reminds that they are subscribed by the library, and consequently users of the university must register, and that Adobe Acrobat is launched automatically if using the 'PCMNS'. Accessible are the: 'Institute of Physics (lOP) journals', 'IDEAL. Academic Press', and 'BioMedNet'. In addition to these sites, are available to individual e-joumals: 'JMB online. Journal of Molecular Biology' and 'NAR online. Nucleic Acids Research'. Some information about each can be obtained before accessing the services themselves. For the free e-joumals, no list is provided but instead are three sites linking on the Web to: the 'WWW Virtual Library of Electronic Journals', the 'Scholarly Journals Distributed via the World Wide Web', and the 'NewJour Electronic Journal & Newsletter Archive'.
LV.3 University College London Library (UCL Library)- (appendix 8)
Three routes can be taken to access e-joumals: (i) A 'A - Z index of topics' enables users to scroll directly within its alphabet, (ii) a local search engine 'Search the Library WWW pages' allows users to retrieve the e-joumals service, (iii) e-joumals are comprised within the resources on the Internet 'Internet resources elsewhere, includmg other libraries and electronic JOurnals'. The 'Electronic Journals' page offers on the top of its list of services a link to 'Directories & general sites'. The names of the directories is given with a short description or annotation: it includes the 5th edition of the 'A R L Directory of Electronic Journals, Newsletters, and Academic Discussion Lists', the 'WWW Virtual Library Electronic Journals List', the 'E-journal Site Guide',
55 E-JOURNALS • part IV: Compamtive Study the 'CIC-EJC - Committee on Institutional Co-operation (US)', the 'Online Newspapers', and the 'New lour archive'. This list is quite complete, but being displayed as the first service of the e-joumals page may be confusing. Users who may not read the screen properly, may assume that it is the way to fmd them out The second service is titled 'General titles and newspapers': a registration is required for most of them and a warning clearly states that the amount of full text material available free varies. Then the third service restricted to the UCL members offers access to commercial e-journals of the IOPP titles, the IDEAL site of Academic Press and BioMedNet. The fmal service advises users to follow the hypertext link 'UCL Internet Resources Guide' for individual titles.
IV.4 Leeds University Libmcy- (appendix 9)
Accessing the e-joumals service page is not straightforward. The library homepage displays a long list of services grouped in different paragraphs, the 'Electronic journals and texts' service is comprised in the 'External information sources. Library WWW gateway'. The service is very detailed offering access to commercial e-journals, newspapers divided in the British ones and International listings, and other services which display three links to related sites ('Hypetjoumals home page', 'New lour, 'Electronic journals listed in the WWW Vinual Library'). The commercial e-joumals section includes: the IDEAL service, the IOPP site, the individualjoumal'Journal of Molecular Biology' and 'BioMedNet'. Short descriptions and annotations are displayed alongside each link, including local information access for IDEAL and IOPP.
IV.5 Keele University Libmcy- (appendix 10)
The 'Library Home Page' is divided in two sections: the information and services internal to the Keele library and the Internet resources. Two routes to
56 E-JOURNALS ·part IV: Comparative Study access e-joumals are consequently proposed. The 'Library Infonnation' service leads to four choices. Users looking specifically for e-joumals are not given much help on which one they should choose. For instance, one could suppose that 'Collections' gathers a collection of e-joumals among other kinds, which is not the case. E-joumals are included in the 'Infonnation services'. Access to commercial 'Full-text electronic journals' displays a remarkable table. It list% in alphabetical order the titles of the e-joumals, with their starting date for the holdings (e.g. 1996- ). The name of the publisher or site is provided, being either IDEAL or IOPP. This is particularly useful as users obtain from a single screen all the commercial titles offered regardless to the provenance. Local information for each can be obtained before accessing the e-joumal. The second route through the Internet resources displays the 'Online journals, newspapers and news services'. A 'Full-text journals' link connects to the above table. 'A selection of newspapers and news services' is displayed alphabetically, with short descriptions and/or annotations. A third link is dedicated to the 'Directories of online journals, newspapers and news services'. It is a long list, including for instance the 1995 ARL Directory of £-journals, The Daily news, News/ink, the UK Media Internet Directory. If users are further interested in e-joumals, the link 'Electronic journal projects: infonnation and discussion' tries to satisfy their interest by linking to two sites: eLib and Hyperjoumal.
IV.6 Oxford University Libraries Automation Service WWW server Home page - (appendix 11)
The Home page is clear with a limited number of headings, but may not be the most useful to quickly find e-joumals. By clicking on 'Oxford University Library Infonnation', users get another choice of headings in which 'Bibliographic IT services' has to be chosen. The page then obtained displays in a 'confused' way a long list of different services. Fortunately, the first is
57 E-JOURNALS - part IV: Comparative Study entitled 'The HEFCE pilot Site Licence Initiative' with a short explanation for users who do not know that it links to some e-journals. The 'HEFCE Online Journals in Oxfort! provides a structured and much clearer layout. An 'Overview' details the project with the 'File fonnat of journals articles and software requirements' for the technical aspects. Information and access to IDEAL, IOPP, and Blackwell Science Ltd. and Blackwell publishers are available.
IV.7 University of Essex libracy- (appendix 12)
The front page displays a long list of services with no particular order. 'Full text journals online' provides access to the commercial e-joumals belonging to Academic press, the IOPP, and the individual titles Journal of molecular biology and Numensche M athematik. Information about the software required (e.g. Adobe Acrobat) and a brief description are also displayed on this service. 'Contents pages of journals from various publishers' is not specifically dedicated to e-journals, but is, nonetheless, worth mentioning: by clicking on a publisher name, users can access the contents pages or abstracts of some of the journals they publish. The library also offers a wide range of newspapers through the link 'Newspapers on the Internet' from the home page. Titles are classified by countries.
IV.8 University of York Libracy- (appendix 13)
Called LibWeb the home page introduces the service and what can be expected from it, and reminds that the intention is not to be exhaustive. 'Electronic journals' with the tag New! is listed within the first page, but can also be retrieved through the 'Alphabetical index of topics on Lib Web'. The service offers a complete range of links, comprising on the top of the page 'Full text journals', followed by 'Newspapers and general titles', 'Tables of contents
58 E·JOURNALS • part IV: Comparative Study and abstract services', 'Directories of electronic journals' and the 'Library Catalogue' obviously containing e-journals records. A short description is attached for each of these. The 'Full text Electronic journals' displays two routes to access e journals: either through the publisher's site or directly by the title. The alphabetical list of journals titles is cleverly presented. Some abbreviations are attached to the titles, stating the provenance (Academic Press, Cambridge Scientific Abstracts, Institute of Physics); for Academic Press the table of contents symbol ('[ToCJ) indicates that it is the only information available at the time, as full text is in the process of being implemented; another useful tag
'PRINT' indicates that the journal is also held in printed form. For the 'Newspapers and general titles' the service clearly warns that the titles are usually not directly equivalent to the print version, which will avoid any later disappointment. A link to 'Collections of links to newspapers' is also displayed at the end of the page, enabling to link get access to comprehensive collections of newspapers. The 'Directories of electronic journals' displays many links about e journals, divided in three categories: 'Announcement of new electronic journals', 'Discussions and projects on the future of electronic journals' and 'Directories of electronic journals'. Furthermore, the 'Electronic Tables of Contents and Abstract Services' provides table of contents and/or abstracts of titles for some publishers or sites like 'BUBL's Journals Table of Contents and Publzshed Abstracts'.
IV.9 University of Sunderland Information Services Home Page - (appendix 14)
The Information Services Home Page gathers the homes pages of the different libraries belonging to the university. However, one link on behalf of all of them is provided for the e-joumals. The 'Electronic Journals' service page
59 E-JOURNALS - part IV: Comparative Study has a simple layout, offering three choices: a direct link to the IDEAL site through the 'Academic Press Journals' service, a link to a list of 'Free Full-text E-Journals', which is actually a connection to the Pilkington Library free full text e-journals list, and the possibility to access the 'Internet Resources Newsletter, which is a monthly electronic newsletter aiming to raise awareness of new sources of infonnation on the Internet.
IV .10 John Rylands University Libracy of Manchester- (appendix 15)
The Home page offers a number of services with no special mention to e-journals. Users need to guess they belong to the Internet resources to click the following link: 'Navigating the Internet for lnfonnation: suggested links'. The 'Electronic publications' service is divided in two separate pages: 'Electronic journals' and 'World news'. The first is again subdivided in two sections: the 'Collections of electronic journals', which connects to diverse sites related toe journals on the Web, such as the WWW VIrtual Library, the ARL directory, New Jour, and Ejournal Site Guide; the second section concerns the commercial e-journals the library subscribed to (IOPP, Les Editions de Physique, Computer Physics Communications, Journals of Material Science). 'World News' is a list of links to newspapers or comprehensive sites on them.
IV .11 Comparison with the Pilkington Libracy WWW home page and conclusions
When designing an e-journal homepage, libraries are bound to face a dilemma. How much do users know about them? Finding the nght balance between a clear, simple and enhanced screen with enough infonnation is not an obvious task.
Retrieving e-journals is usually fairly easy as links are clearly indicated
60 E-JOURNALS - part IV: Comparative Study from the first page (e.g. Liverpool library, University College London library, Keele University library, Essex library, University of York library, Sunderland University library). However for some of the WWW home pages users must demonstrate 'subtle thinking' to access them (Southampton library, Leeds University library, Oxford University library, John Rylands University Library of Manchester); moreover, if users are not aware e-journals are accessible. they may not have the curiosity or the chance to discover them through these particular sites. Either one, two, or three, routes are offered to access e-journals. When e-joumals are only included in the Internet resources, the library makes the assumption that users have a minimum of knowledge about them, i.e. they are a networked resource. In some sites an index of subjects and services are quite helpful (Southampton library, UCL library, University of York library). Sometimes a local search engine is provided (e.g. UCL library) but users must type the 'right' keyword 'electronic journal' and not 'e-journal' to obtain the service. The Pilkington library offers a single route, but which is straightforward as 'Electronic Journals' is stated from the front page.
In most cases access to commercial publishers sites part of the HEFCE initiative are provided. No detailed explanation of the scheme, except maybe for Oxford libraries, is supplied to enable users to understand why they have access to these particular publishers. Short descriptions of the publishers' sites are, nevertheless, often attached. Individual commercial titles can also be a single entry.
Two sites (Keele University library, University of York library) provide two impressive attempts to provide access to commercial e-journals not only through publisher site but also by titles. A table displays titles in alphabetical order, so that users do not need to check each publisher site: what primarily
61 E-JOURNALS • part IV: Compamtive Study matters to the user is the journal. These libraries are in a way precursors of the main concept of the forthcoming Blackwell's Electronic Journal Navigator project. Reference to the latter is displayed in the Southampton library service called forthcoming subscriptions. This information may sustain users' interest if the service did not satisfy them so far.
Access to free e-journals is often provided. The Pilkington library and consequently Sunderland University library, opted for a hst of selected titles, while others have opted to directly connect toe-journal sites such as the WWW Virtual library, New Jour, ARL Directory, CIC-EJC. This is an additional feature for the Pilkington library. Providing access to archival sites seems of course to be the most comprehensive way to access free e-journals. A selected list, however, may still be appreciated by users who, first do not need to look further for these particular titles, and secondly to 'familiarise' themselves with e-journals if they have not yet.
A compromise between paper journals and e-journals has been found at Liverpool University library. Emphasis on e-journals links may damage in a way the perception of the paper journal collection. Hence, a link from the e journals service still 'values' paper journals.
In many homepages access to newspapers and news services are offered (e.g. University of Essex library, Leeds University library). Titles worldwide or news services like Reuters maybe highly valued by users to access newspapers which would not be physically present in their library. The Pilkington Library may plan to provide a similar service.
Sunderland University libmry opted to link to one service from the Pilkington Library. Should cooperation be fostered between libraries in this area? Cooperation could avoid redundancy of work in creating a 'central' link
62 E-JOURNALS - part IV: Comparntive Study to, at least. free e-joumals. But maybe one could consider that it already exist. for instance CIC-EJC collection could take the lead in providing access to scholarly e-joumals.
E-journals services layouts are designed according particular approaches, and there seems to be no right or wrong decisions. The services should be easy to understand and access to e-joumals straightforward. Users should be able to rapidly grasp the underlying concept (e.g. e-joumals belongs to the category of Internet resources). Offering several routes to access them is, nonetheless, an advisable precaution. In any case users must demonstrate a minimum of curiosity to understand 'how it works', to differentiate commercial e-joumals, free e-joumals, sample issues of e-joumals, etc. The Pilkington Library in comparison with the above university libraries demontrates an efficient service. As Blackwell's Electronic Journal Navigator Project (see further information in section V.4) is likely to be soon integrated, the library does not need to reshape its access to commercial e-joumals by adding title access rather than a single entry through publishers sites. One suggestion could be to offer links to collections of newspapers if the library senses that it would be appreciated by its users. Adapted services to the library community should be borne in mind when creating an e-joumal service. In the light of the above small scale study, one can conclude that the above libraries and the Pilkington Library have managed to provide user-friendly interfaces to access e-joumals, despite the variety of • their approaches. Libraries are trying their best to provide the more convenient access to e-joumals for their users. Are all their efforts subjected to a lasting future? Will e-joumals grow in such significance that they will supersede paper format? And will libraries need to constantly re-design their homepages? An outlook at the
63 E-JOURNALS - part IV: Comparative Study possible scenarios, may help to shape the future of e-journals and to predict the likely consequences on each parties involved, i.e. scholars, libraries, universities, publishers, subscription agents and end-users.
64 E-JOURNALS - part V: The Future
The Association of Research Libraries has recently announced the availability of the 6th edition of The Directory of Electronic Journals, Newsletters and Academic Discussion Lists. It describes this new edition as a compilation of entries for over 3,000 academic and professional discussion lists and 1,688 e-joumals, newsletters, and newsletter-digest, 'representing a 257% increase in journals and a 26% increase in lists since the 1995 Edition' (1). This publication enables us to believe that the foreseen growth m e-journals is a reliable assumption, that e-joumals are not a 'fashion' medium bound to a short term future but will last over the years. Their advantages over paper, indeed, settle their abilities for a promising future. Scholars and universities, libraries, subscription agents, and publishers are likely to shape the future of e-joumals, in so far each of them has a potential to be involved in it. The extent of their active participation is likely to determine in which direction e-joumals will be heading towards and who will take the lead of their 'control'. Before examining the trends and views of each of these major players, an attempt to define the e-joumal of the future will be first stated.
V.l Likely picture of e-joumals in the future
'Will e-joumals revolutionise the concept of the scholarly journal?' This question was asked in the conclusion of the first part, and can now be examined in a more focused perspective: will e-joumals revolutionise the concept of scholarly communication? Duranceau (2) claims that the notion of periodicity may be altered. First, , updates are made directly on the articles already published, therefore, there is
65 E-JOURNALS ·part V: The Future no need to create a new issue for that purpose. Second, full-text searching can replace numerical or chronological access. Third, unbundled article distribution does not need to be associated with the concept of issue or volume. E-journals may evolve and differ from the strict definition of a serial. For instance, the PA CS Review publishes articles as soon as they are available instead of waiting for a minimum number to 'allow' an issue. This policy does not affect to a great extent the notion of a serial as bundles are only smaller than they would be in print. A further example is the Journal of Electronic Publishmg (JEP), according to Geller (3), it acts as an 'electronic archive'. There are, however, no 'issues' (i.e. a bundle of article and/or information): articles are added on a continuous basis. Despite each article is dated, a chronological search is not allowed. Author, title, subject are the three possible entries. 'The concept of an 'issue' is clearly missing from this electronic archive' (4). Geller also gives a similar example of the Olive Tree e-journal. A central database replacing the concept of issues, therefore, 'hiding' the chronological aspect may emerge in the future, • as both of the electronic archives -JEP and the Olive Tree- prove to communicate information quicker since 'bundles' do not need to "be wait to be created. E-joumals, whatever their publication pattern -'bundles of articles' or 'electronic archive'- will still present advantages over paper journals. Video and audio, although uncommon today, will proliferate as scholars acquire wider access to the latest equipment. Search functions may become a standard to allow, at least, retrieval by subject, title, or author. An important feature is that discussion forums will enable to speed the communication of scholars, who will be able to connect and interact from anywhere in a quasi instantaneous way. '(... ) the interactive powers of the Internet [enables] to turn journals into perpetual electronic conferences, where articles take the place of lectures and sprout on-line discussion groups and commentary' (5). 'Already a mouse click can take a subscriber from one article to related articles in the same journal,
66 E-JOURNALS - part V: The Future other journals, and resources such as databases of DNA sequences, protein structures, or galaxy images.' says enthusiastically Taubes ( 6): the capacity to link to other resources on the Internet is, indeed, another consequent advantage. For instance, linking to another publication would be difficult in print and linking to a database would be simply impossible. Personalised current-awareness services are already available (e.g. Uncover Reveal). As the number of e-joumals grow, even more sophisticated systems could be set up, enabling users to be alerted of the new articles concerning their interest A main concern is that e-joumals may not stay free of access. Attaching a cost to the current free e-joumals will probably mean that they will decrease in number, in so far as users are not prepared to subscribe to them all and, above all, the tight library budgets -which are likely to remain unchanged- will oblige further restrictions. 'For the moment, the Internet is freely available to millions, most of whom are shielded from its actual costs by their institutions. If the Internet support moves toward metered and restricted use, how many of today's "free" electronic journals would survive? If they did, and if a "subscriber" were free to extract, adapt, and retransmit any and all of the articles in an electronic journal, how would the interests of publishers and authors be protected?' (7). Franks asks: 'What will the organization and economics of electronic journals be like?' Perhaps an examination of each major players involved will provide an answer.
V .2 The scholars
Franks affirms that: 'electronic publishing will come to scholarly research journals before it comes to other kinds of publications' (8). To support his statement, he provides three reasons why academics will be the first The first
67 E-JOURNALS ·part V: The Future reason takes mathematics, his field of specialisation, as a convenient example, since it is 'relatively homogeneous and generally amenable to being put in an electronic form'. The second reason, which applies across any discipline, is that the 'readership [is] much more highly connected to the Internet than the general population'. Then the last reason is that there is 'a strong economic motive to find less expensive ways for scholars to communicate their work' as they are aware of the serials pricing crisis (9). Scholars should retain and gain advantages by moving towards electronic publishing. Their requirements while publishing their work, in any kind of publication, can be stated as follows: rapidity, accuracy, wide audience, cheapness, preservation for 'posterity' and to be a vehicle for discussion (10). As Whalley stresses some of these benefits are, however, conflicting notions. To publish in a prestigious journal, a scholar will usually be prepared to accept the long delay, which slows down the notion of rapidity. Even if they wish to reach a wide audience, there is often the notion of 'target readers' underlying many prestigious publications, which interferes with their aspiration. Moreover, prestigious scholarly journals are frequently very expensive. 'As Harnad and others have recognised, there is a gross waste of money in going through all the complexities of publishing for a small, and perhaps very small, number of readers. It is important for posterity that the referenced and final 'lodged' material is accessible to all' (11). E-journals could be reached by a wider community, and the notion of prestige may not be altered if a good peer-review process is implemented. Rapidity will be gained. With regards to costs, to improve the current situation, attitudes should change. Only a few scholars are involved in e-journals and, even fewer, in actively supporting them. Even though scholars may claim their radicalism, they are still very conservative (12). 'Scholars may be intellectually adventurous, they tend to be conservative in their work habits' (13). Convincing them to publish in e-journals will still need to be pushed further today and
68 E-JOURNALS - part V: The Future tomorrow.
As already mentioned in part II.4, some institutions are encouraging scholars to publish themselves, and on a small scale it is already happening (e.g. MIT University Press with Chicago Journal of Theoretical Science ). Scholars should react from now if they are to stay in control of their work. Until now, free e-joumals are the work of some academics, who do not receive any income from this activity. Other models of publishing must develop if e-joumals are to increase: the 'somewhat subterranean activity' must expand to become a recognised activity. Franks (14) claims that'( ... ) costs can be much less than traditional publishing. This is especially true for an organization or department which must have a computing infrastructure for other purposes. In such a setting the marginal cost of an electronic publication can be quite low'. Hamad believes that electronic publishing could cut 70% of print publishing costs. He argues that electronic publishing provides an opportunity for scholars to escape from the 'Faustian' bargain forced upon by the economics of print publications (15). Most university presses have had a non-existent role so far, but they could specialize in electronic publication. Cooperation with publishers is also suggested, provided that the current situation is reversed: scholars must stand on the most powerful side, not that of the publishers.
'While traditional publishers try to extend their publishing empires to the Internet, an underground movement of researchers hopes to head them off.' states Taubes (16). Their means are electronic preprints. Preprints services are fast and free, they are low-budget operations with no peer review.The first and foremost of these, the Los Alamos pre-print service intends to expand to cover biological, social sciences and eventually all 'fields of learned inquiry'. In Hamad's subversive proposal, an author should be able
69 E-JOURNALS • part V: The Future to give his work to the publisher of his/her choice for a print version, and in parallel should put the draft freely on the public e-print archive. Once peer review is completed the work should not be removed from the service, but the final, agreed copy should replace the electronic draft version. 'The rest can be entrusted to human nature. When the paper journal accepts the article for publication, are the researchers on that day going to be crazy enough to remove it from the public archive and say no one can see it electronically anymore?' (17). The 'hidden agenda' in such proposal, is that readers will opt for the electronic version, 'because it's up first and it's easy, and eventually everybody will realize that the paper version is useless' (18). This view is also shared by Okerson who asserts that '( ... ) a paper published in a prestigious university database might eventually pre-empt the paper version, provided some network review mechanism is added.' (19).
If e-joumals are to become the predominant mean of publishing academic works, a change in scholars working habits may emerge over the years. It is interesting to note the following assumptions. With an easier and quicker communication among researchers, Odlysko assumes that the share of knowledge and experiences will lead to team work, probably on a wider scale than currently. 'Electronic publishing and electronic communication in general are likely to have a profound influence on how scholarly work is performed, beyond destroying paper journals. It is likely to promote a much more collaborative mode of research.(20)' Unger-stemberg goes further by stating that 'with increased information availability, research might be more information-based as opposed to experimental-based' (21).
Scholars are to rapidly realise the benefits of e-joumals, and should aim to decrease the value-added by publishers, if not even replacing them, if they
70 E-JOURNALS - part V: The Future want to terminate the serials pricing crisis. They should publish themselves with the help of their parent institution. Some scholars already realise that university libraries should not be put aside and see the management and coordination function 'falling naturally' in the hands of librarians (22).
V.3 The libmrians
Libraries are facing the publishing crisis, since they must deal with increasing prices and scholarly output (23). Will the promotion of e-journals access be an extra burden for librarians or an opening to solve their tight financial budget in handling serials? A possible assumption is that electronic information on a long-term basis will cost less to libraries, however higher costs, especially transition costs, can be firmly expected. To the question: 'will electronically-distributed journals ( ... ) prove to be cost-saving for libraries?', Ekman and Quandt answer that libraries are likely to save on the average cost of storage and access; nonetheless, they emphasise the rise in the transition costs, which will be compensated by an increase of use of e-journals by readers owing to the easier access (24). In order to prevent e-journals subscriptions rising, the role of libraries may need to be developed a step further. Several routes can be opted. Librarians could publish themselves. Quinn and McMillan (25) suggest 'library eo publication units'. These will consist of a small library department dedicated to the acquisition and maintenance of e-journals. It should be managed by five staff: the director, the system administrator, the software manager, the database manager and the office staff. Cooperation with publishers is another route. Quinn and McMillan wrote a second proposal illustrating this option. Each journal would appear in two parts: a full-text flle archived in libraries and free of access and a paper subscription journal, more suitable for browsing as it would only contain the summary of the work. The cost of archiving will belong
71 E-JOURNALS -part V: The Future to the libraries. The expensive editing functions will be reduced as they will not be dedicated to the entire journal but to short summaries (26). Row land hopes a cooperation of libraries with further players in the: 'I hope to see in 20 years ..... within which learned societies, university presses and university libraries, employing skilled information professionals -librarians, editors, graphic designers, and sound and video specialists- ( ... ). (27)' In the above schemes, libraries retain the archiving role. Libraries have defmitely a role to play not only in providing access to e-journals but also to ensure a long-term reliable access. However, owing to the large space files required, storage in libraries is compromised. Hence, librarians hope for a national archive to take the responsibility of archiving. For instance, organisations such as the CIC-EJC have already taken a firm advance in that direction. The CIC-EJC objectives are (28): to create the largest collection of e-journals to involve technologists and librarians in the development of the system to identify optimum procedures for permanently archiving materials, hence to serve as a testbed for the national electronic information preservation community and to serve as a model repository of that kind.
The current issues, investigated in part 11, will still need to be addressed in the future, and probably new ones with the fast advance of e-journals. Cooperation will have to be the watchword in the different approaches to e journals. Collection development issues will be put into question: should the library provide access to all e-journals -at least for the free ones-? Or should an appropriate selection be made with respect to the specialisation fields of their parent institution? Stronger cooperation will have to be developed to link to other libraries to share electronic resources. Moreover, one may wonder the
72 E-JOURNALS • part V: The Future purpose of hundreds of different homepages for accessing eventually the same e-journals on the Net? Should a central route be provided instead? Site licensing for commercial e-journals is common now, but is generally not satisfactory for libraries. 'Site licenses may not be a lasting solution' (29). Consortium of libraries may need to be created to obtain better price deals for commercial e-joumals packages than a single library would for itself. The danger of licenses is that libraries cannot preserve the material they paid for, as they do not own it. As soon as they decide to end up a contract, they will probably loose access to the previous e-joumals. Furthermore, copyright problems attached to licenses need to be addressed to be fairer to libraries and their users. Libraries will need to develop new models for paying information, and access versus ownership will be an even stronger issue as 'pay-per-use' pricing model may develop. Okerson predicts that in the year 2000: 'subscription model wanes; license and single-article models wax' (30). In addition she lists four areas where librarians should hope for a better future: quality (i.e. good peer-review process, good editing, reliable technological delivery vehicles), standards for delivery and presentation (i.e. a common 'front-end' for users easing the handling of e-joumals), dialogue (i.e. between publishers and librarians), and experimentation (i.e. encouragement for different projects to help resolving their difficulties) (31).
V .4 The subscription agents
Intermediary organisations such as national library automation organisations like OCLC could play a role in accessing e-journals. Subscription agents seems, however, to have taken the lead: projects have been recently announced. For instance, Blackwell Ltd. is about to introduce the Blackwell's Electronic Journal Navigator Project. Participating libraries will be provided with a single point of access, reference, control, and financial management for
73 E-JOURNALS - part V: The Future with a single point of access, reference, control, and fmancial management for all their e-journal subscriptions irrespective of their format and of their original publishers. The aims are described as follows: simplify e-joumal subscription purchasing, simplify password and access management, provide usage analysis and reports, provide access to document viewers, provide appropriate search facilities, enable electronic 'document' delivery, assist with electronic archiving. This single route will not only benefit to libraries but also to publishers. For a six month period Blackwell will work with a number of publishers, librarians, and library system vendors from Europe, UK, North America and Australia to ensure that their requirements are met when the commercial service is launched in January 1997 (appendix 16). Other subscription agents are also competing: Swets Electronic Warehouse will be an e-joumal service which w11l be announced shortly and Dawsons are also moving into this area.
V .5 The publishers
Publishers willingly or not have to get involved with e-joumals not to loose their market They are currently being pushed in that direction rather than taking the lead. Hence, a common agreement is that publishers should 'run faster'. Odlysko illustrates the matter by quoting Lewis Carroll's character Alice in Through the looking glass, constrained to run to stay in the same place in the strange land of her dream. Taubes states: 'Publishers are tom between the fear of losing print subscribers and topflight research papers if they din't move fast enough into the electronic world - and the fear of losing revenues if they move too fast'. (32). The slow development of e-joumals from commercial publisher might be due to the current technology: their concerns are mainly the difficulties they encounter to achieve high quality publication. The lack of copyright protection and the difficulties to generate profits from e-journals is another concern (33). Despite the above statements and their reluctance, when
74 E-JOURNALS · part V: The Future questioned publishers do not sound that pessimistic. A survey conducted by Falconet shows that they think electronic publishing should not be significantly cheaper than paper publications. They are sceptical about the future of the free e-journals produced by academic institutions, since their funding, sustainability and prestige need to be consolidated to become potentially competitive (34). Odlysko, too, admits that his vision might be wrong. The HEFCE pilot scheme enables publishers to experiment with the publication of parallel electronic copies and may help them to decide their next steps in that area.
All parties have legitimate interests in e-joumals. If e-journals are to take their 'launch' in the near future a drastic revolution might be envisaged. 'It is often thought that changes will be incremental, with perhaps a few electronic journals appearing and further use of email, ftp, etc. My guess is that change will be far more drastic. Traditional scholarly journals will likely disappear within 10 to 20 years, and the electronic alternatives will be different from current periodicals, even though they may carry the same titles' (35). Scholars may develop a reliable and long-lasting publication scheme avoiding the traditional 'help' of publishers, and author empowerement is on its way thanks to the preprint servers. Libraries, which have an acute awareness of the serials pricing crisis since they are directly confronted with it, should find the best solution to serve adequately their users' needs. This will probably involve a deeper involvement than so far. Subscription agents through their diverse projects may ease access to e-joumals for libraries, thereby users, but at what price? Publishers have had a slow start witH e-journals, but seem to have caught up with the schedule.
75 E-JOURNALS • part V: The Future
REFERENCES
1. Mogge, Dru W. Re: ARL Directory of electronic journals, newsletters and academic discussion lists. 6th ed. 1996. To multiple recipients of lists VPIEJ-L
2. Duranceau, E.F., Column ed. Old wine in new bottles?: defining electronic serials. Serials Review, Spring 1996, p.69
3. Geller, Marilyn. A better mousetrap is still a mousetrap. In: Duranceau, E.F., columned. Old wine in new bottles?: defining electronic serials. Serials Review, Spring 1996, p.72
4. Ibid., p. 72.
5. Taubes, G. Science journals go wired. Science on-line 271(5250)764, 1996, [6 p.]. Available at URL http://science-mag.ass.org/science/scripts/display/fu!U271/5250n64.html?alt
6. Ibid.
7. Crawfonl, W., & Gonnan, M. Future libraries: dreams, madness & reality. Chicago: ALA, 1995, p. 68.
8. Franks, J. The impact of electronic publication on scholarly journals. Notices of the American Mathematical Society, 1993, 40(9), pp. 1200- 1202.
76 E-JOURNALS ·part V: The Future
9. Ibid., pp. 1200-1202.
10. Whalley, B. Electronic journals: evolutionary niches.I996. Available at URL http://ukoln.bath.ac.uklariadne/issue3/ggg/
11. Ibid.
12. Ibid.
13. Odlyzko, A. Tragic loss or good ridance ?The impending demise of traditional scholarly journals, 1995, Chapter 7. Available at URL ftp://netlib.att.com/netlib/attmath.odlysko/tragic.loss
14. Franks, ref. 8, pp. 1200.
15. Duranceau, E.F., Editor. The economics of electronic publishing. Serials Review, Spring 1995, 21(1), p. 77.
16. Taubes, G. Electronic preprints point the way to 'Author Empowerment'. Science On-line 271(5250)767, 1996, [5 p.]. Available at URL http://science-mag.ass.org/science/scripts/display/full/271/5250n 67 .html ?alt
17. Ibid.
18. Ibid.
77 E-JOURNALS- part V: The Future
19. Oken;on, Ann. A librarian's view of some economic issues m electronic scientific publishing. UNESCO invitational meeting on the future of scientific information, Paris, February 1996, [16 p.]. Available at URL http://www.library.yale edu/-okerson/unesco.html
20. Odlyzko, ref. 13, Chapter 8.
21. Ungem-Stemberg, S. von, & Lindquist, M.G. The impact of electronic journals on hbrary functions Journal of Infonnation Science, 1995, 21(5), p. 399.
22. Schauder, D. Electronic publishing of professional articles: attitudes of academics and implications for the scholarly commumcation industry. Journal of the American Soc1ety for Infonnation Science, 1994, 45(2), p. 87.
23. Odlyzko, ref. 13, Chapter 9.
24. Ekman, RH., & Quandt, RE. Scholarly communication, academic libraries, and technology. February 1994, [22 p.]. Available at URL gopher://arl cni.org·70/00/scomm/scalt
25. Quinn, F. & McMillan, G. Library copublication of electronic journals. In: Duranceau, E F, Editor. The economics of electronic publishing. Serials Review, Spring 1995, 21(1), pp. 80-83 .
• 26. Ibid., pp. 80-83.
78 E-JOURNAI.S - part V: The Future
27. Row land, F. The need for information organizations and information professionals in the Internet era. In. Duranceau, E F., Editor. The economics of electronic publishing. Serials Review, Spring 1995, 21(1), p. 85.
28. Cochenour, D. CICNet's electronic journal collection Sena/s Review, Spring 1996, p. 67.
29. Taubes, ref. 5
30. Okerson, A. The electronic journal: what, whence and when? The Public Access Computer Systems Rev1ew, 1991, 2(1), p 21.
31. Okerson, ref. 19.
32. Taubes, ref. 5.
33. Falconet, C. Publishers' opimons on the future ofthe academic electronic journal. MA dissertation, Department oflnformation and Library Studies, Loughborough University of Technology, 1995, p. 111.
34. Ibid., p. 114.
3 5. Odlyzko, ref. 13, Chapter 1.
79
------CONCLUSION
Even if printed information will continue to be an important vehicle for scholarly communication in the future, e-journals alongside with other electronic information can be firmly expected to affect the latter. The shape of e-journals is bound to evolve from the model of a paper journal to maybe a series of articles in a database, loosing the attributions usually accorded to the notion of a serial, in order to suit the needs of the users.
_Handling and providing access to e-journals is a real challenge for libraries owing to their novelty and fast moving advances. For instance, the collection development policies need to be revised, selection procedures should f_ollow adapted criteria, the bibliographical control requires additional cataloguing rules, staff and users must be adequately trained, etc. The Pilkington Library case study illustrates the practical difficulties e-journals impose on libraries and some of the possibilities to overcome them. E-journal service WWW pages have started to mushroom on the Internet and the comparison of ten UK academic library services with the Pilkington Library one, demonstrates the similarity of the philosophy in each approach, though with some interesting distinctions. E-journals seem to stand in a major crossroad where scholars should react from now to re-assert their control over their publications, where libraries can support them, thereby, hopefully diminishing the cost of their serials budget, where subscription agents and publishers are experimenting new frameworks for providing access and selling e-joumals, to not loose their market and even expand it.
Libraries are moving towards the concept of the virtual library -libraries without walls- increasing their access to networks and electronic information. E-journals seem, consequently, to fall naturally in this move. Today's libraries
80 have the chance to grant equal access to information to all their users and to help them satisfy their needs from the vast amount of information available. The extending choice of mediums of delivery of information helps the profession to provide not only the right information, but also in the right format.
•
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Reynolds, R. Inventory list or information gateway? the role of the catalog in the digital age. In: Duranceau, E.F., ed. Cataloging remote-access electronic serials: rethinking the role of the OPAC. Serials review, 1995, (21), p.75-77.
Roes, H. Electronic journals: a survey of the literature and the Net. Journal of information networking, 1994, 2(3), 169-186. Available at URL http://pill03 .kub.nl:2080/hanshome/articles/ej join.htm
Rowland, F., McKnight C., Meadows J,, eds. Project Elvyn: an experiment in electronic journal delivery: facts, figures and findings. London: Bawker Saur, 1995.
Rowland, F., et al. hnplementation at individual sites. In: Rowland, McKnight C., Meadows J., eds. Project Elvyn: an experiment in electronic journal delivery: facts, figures and findings, 1995.
Rowland, F. Electronic journals: neither free nor easy. EJournal, 1994, 4(2).
Rowland, F. The need for information organizations and information professionals in the Internet era. In: Duranceau, E.F., Editor. The economics of electronic publishing. Serials Review, Spring 1995, 21(1), pp. 84-85.
Rowland, F. Recent and current projects. In: Rowland, F., McKnight, C., Meadows, J. eds. Project Elvyn: an experiment in electronic journal delivery: facts, figures and findings, 1995, pp. 15-36.
Rustad, K. Electronic journals in the national library, 1994. Available at URL http://rosa.nbr.no/etids/e-tids.html
Schauder, D. Electronic publishing of professional articles: attitudes of academics and implications for the scholarly communication industry. Journal of the american society for infonnation science, 1994, 45(2), pp. 73-100.
SCONUL Advisory Committee on Scholarly Communication. [E-mail on the meeting of Thursday 4 July I996], 1996, [3 p.].
Sleeman, A.M. Cataloging remote access electronic materials. In: Duranceau, E.F., ed. Cataloging remote-access electronic serials: rethinking the role of the OPAC. Serials review, 1995, (21), p.72-74.
Sullenger, P., reconler. Methods for collecting, processing, and providing access to electronic serials, 1995, pp. 327-331.
Swinnerton-Dyer, P. A system of electronic journals for the United Kingdom, Serials, 1992, 5(3), pp. 33-35. Taubes, G. Electronic preprints point the way to 'Author Empowerment'. o Science On-line 271(5250)767, 1996, [5 p.]. Available at URL http://science-mag.ass.org/science/scripts/display/fulU271/5250n 67 .htrnl ?alt
Taubes, G. Science journals go wired. Science On-line 271(5250)764, 1996, [6 p.]. Available at URL http://science-mag.ass.org/science/scripts/display/fulU271/5250n64.htrnl?alt
Terry, W. Cataloguing electronic journals. BLCMP, 3 June 1996, [2 p.].
Turoff, M., & Hiltz, S.R. The electronic journal: a progress report. Journal of the American Society for lnfonnation Science, 1982, 33, pp. 195-202.
Ungem-Stemberg, S. von, & Lindquist, M. G. The impact of electronic journals on library functions. Journal of lnfonnation Science, 1995, 21(5), pp. 396-401.
Watson, M.R. The ambivalent library. OCLC Internet cataloging project colloquium, Field report, 1996. Available at URL http://www.oclc.org/oclc/man/colloq/watson/fieldrep.htrn
Woodward, H. Electronic journals in libraries. In: Rowland, F., McKnight C., Meadows J., eds. Project Elvyn: an experiment in electronic journal delivery: facts,figures and findings, 1995, pp. 53-66.
Woodward, H. Periodicals. In: Lea, P. ed. Reference material, 4th edition. London: Library Association, 1996 (In press).
Woodward, H. The impact of electronic information on serials collection management. Serials, March 1994, 7(1), pp. 29-36.
Woodward, H. & McKnight, C. Electronic journals: issues of access and bibliographical control. Serials Review, summer 1995, pp. 71-78. APPENDICES 1-16 APPENDIX 1: OCLC FirstSearch- WorldCat Database ~Q. Journal of Elologlcal chem ... http://www.ref.oclc.org: ... ::%3Asesslonid-23758:5·5
ii.'WI-~ tTil •••• dalallwe semb mulls mm n~~m ex!! ~!p [Database= WorldCat I Search= Journal of biological chemistry I Results= 61 records I Record=
OwnershiP• Check the catalogs in your library. ACCESSION: 32808313 TITLE: Journal of biological chem1stry EDITION: Online vers1on. PLACE: Bethesda, Md. : PUBLISHER: Arner1can Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, YEAR: 1995 9999 PUB TYPE: Machine-readable data FREQUENCY: Weekly NUMBERING: Vol. 270, no. 15 (Apr. 1995)- NOTES: World Wide Web version eo-published with: Highwire Press, the electronic imprint of Stanford Libraries. Title from journal home page. System requ1rements: Ability to display images. Mode of access: World Wide Web; Gopher via Internet. Table of contents available on gopher: gopher://exogene.genethon.fr:/70/11/Biblio/Journaux, then choose the journal title. ISSN: 1083-351X SUBJECT: Biochemistry -- Per1odicals. ALT TITLE: Journal of b1ological chemistry Journal of biolog1cal chemistry (Online) JBC onllne JBC OTHER: American soc1ety for Biochem1stry and Molecular Blology.
~.. '!!~~ FtntSearch. Copynght 1992-1996 OCLC as to electromc presentation and platform. All nghts reserved Comments? Send us eD1311 at epub@oclc ore
08/29/96 09·37:38 d. SAlk . . http://www.ref.oclc.org: ... ::%3Asess>on>d=23758:8:8
~11-'tB ~ .-.1:1)11@1 dalabMa se~rn:b m~ rei:Wd flllm exit llel~ [Database= WorldCat I Search= JAIR I Results= 47 records I Record= 6]
ownership: Check the catalogs in your library. ACCESSION: 32636311 TITLE: JAIR PLACE: (S.l.] : PUBLISHER: AI Access Foundation, YEAR: 1994 9999 PUB TYPE: Mach>ne-readable data NUMBERING: Vol. 1 (Aug. 1993-June 1994)- NOTES: Title from contents screen. Web version includes WAIS-search engine and author index. system requirements: Internet access; Post Script viewer Mode of access: Internet VIa World Wide Web, FTP, gopher, email (send message to [email protected] or to [email protected] With subject •autorespond,' and the body •subscribe (email address]'), and USENET newsgroups (comp.ai.Jair.announce and comp.ai.jair.papers). Some issues are accessible VIa the CICNet Electronic Journals Collection via gopher (URL: gopher://gopher.cic.net:2000/11/e serials/managed/alpha/J/jair) and the World Wide Web (URL: http://ejournals.cic.net/entry.1B.html). ISSN: 1076-9757 SUBJECT: Artificial Intelligence -- Periodicals. ALT TITLE: Journal of artificial intelligence research OTHER: AI Access Foundation.
•
FzrstSearch. Copynght 1992--1996 OCLC as to electromc presentatJ.on and platfam. AU nghts reserved. Comments? Send us email at epub@oclc or~
08/29/96 09:40:12 http://www.ref.oclc.org: ... %3Asess>on>d=23758:11:11
d~labll$t semb mulls AMGil ll!lm tilt ~$1~ [Database= WorldCat~"-- I Search= Early modem literary---=-· studies I Results= 90 records I Record= 4
OWnership: Check the catalogs in your library. ACCESSION: 33901527 TITLE: Early modern literary studies PLACE: Vancouver, B.C., Canada : PUBLISHER: Dept. of English, University of British Columbia, YEAR: 1995 9999 PUB TYPE: Machine-readable data FREQUENCY: Three times a year NUMBERING: Vol. 1, no. 1 (Apr. 1995)- NOTES: 'A journal of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century English literature.• Mode of access: Internet email and World Wide Web. For email subscription, send a subscription request to: [email protected]. ISSN: 1201-2459 SUBJECT: English literature -- Early modern, 1500-1700 -- History and criticism -- Periodicals. ALT TITLE: EMLS
FlrstSet~rch. Copyright 1992-1996 OCLC as to electromc presentabon and platform. All nghts reserved. Comments? Send us emrul at evub@oc!c or~
08/29/96 09:41.37 APPENDIX 2: Pilkington Libraty Talis Web OPAC - Serials Holdings: Ariadne record 101 I CC epee OS-I &IIIPUt-ARIADNE& I I I LE_PROMP i_NAME=-Input&coll_name=Maln+Catalogue
Serial Holdings
Title Ar1adne:the internet magaz1ne for l1brar1ans and information special1sts[computer file).World W1de Web version Publ1sher Dundee:Un1versity of Abertay Library:UKOLN Notes Remote access computer f1le in HTML format Ctrl.no 1361-3200 URL http://uko ln.bath.ac.uk/ar1 adne/
Shelfrnark Holdings
Remote access Access1ble v1a the Internet
[List of references] [Main OPAC menu]
Pilkington Library T~isWeb OPAC- we welcome any comments.
06/05/96 15 55 45 APPENDIX 3: Cafe Jus - User questionnaire Commercial And Free Electronic Journals: User Studies USER QUESTIONNAIRE
Thank you for agreeing to take part in tlus study. We are interested in user responses to electronic journals. Some of these journals have paper-based equivalents, wlule others are only available in electronic form. It is likely that m the future you w111 find it increasingly necessary to use electronic journals for your work. We are cooperating with a number of pubhshers to try to evaluate the problems faced by readers of such journals. Your participation in this project will help in the development of improved versions.
' '
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
User name:
Journal title:
Viewed on what machine (eg, PC, Mac):
Machine location (eg, Haselgrave Bldg, Pilkington Library):
Did you experience any difficulties in finding the journal and connecting to it?
CONTENT OF JOURNAL
1. How relevant is this journal to your interests?
A 0~!.~ ; 1 2 3 4 5
2. Is the level of the contents about what you would expect from the title of the journal?
worse Aboutnght "R~it;;>'- ' 1 2 3 4 5 ' I I I I '
3. How would you assess the overall quality of the articles in this journal, compared ' with other journals in your field? ' ' '
lil.lCUVl the same 1 2 3 4 5 I I f I ' ' 4. Any other comments on content? APPEARANCE OF JOURNAL
1. Is the text clearly legible? Difficult to read Easy to read 1 2 3 4 5
2. Has colour been used in the text? YES/NO If so, has it been used effectively? Not effectively 11 11 V"l' "''''"clY 1 2 3 4 ~ I I I 5 3. Are there any graphics? YES/NO
If so, did you find their contents easy to read?
11 Eas~to read 11 D>ffirul< " ""' I 2 3 4 5 1 1 I I
4. Are there any tables? YES/NO If so, did you find their contents easy to read?
Dllfirulno =
Please give examples of terms you found difficult to understand
6. Are any icous used easy to understand? Difficult to Easy to understand understand 1 2 3 4 5
Please give examples of icons you found difficult to understand FACILITIES OFFERED BY THE JOURNAL
1. Does the journal allow browsing at YES I NO I DON'T KNOW the Title/Author level? If so, how useful do you find this facility Not at all Very useful 1 2 3 4 5
2. Does the journal allow browsing at YES I NO I DON'T KNOW the Abstract level? If so, how useful do you find this facility
Not at all 11 11 Very useful I 1 I 2 3 4 I 5 I 3. Does the journal allow browsing through YES I NO I DON'T KNOW figures/diagrams/tables? If so, how useful do you find this facility
Not at all 11 11 Ve!:l useful 1 2 3 4 5 ~ I f I 4. Once you are viewing an individual article, how easy is it to move: to the beginning of the article?
Difficult 11 Eas~ i 1 I 2 3 4 I 5 I to the end of the article?
Difficult 11 Eas~ 1 2 3 4 5 I I 11 I to specific sections of the article?
Difficult 11 11 Easy I 1 I 2 3 4 I 5 i within the article generally?
Difficult 11 11 Eas~ 1 2 3 4 5 I t t i 5. Does the journal support searching YES I NO I DON'T KNOW within an article? If so, how useful do you find this facility Not at all 11 V< ~ Nou< ill I 11 V«y_ ;""' 11 7. Does the journal have hypertext links within YES I NO I DON'T KNOW the article (eg, a clickable contents list)? If so, how useful do you find this facility IF=N=o=t~=t=a11==~~~~2 ===*====3===9==~4~~~==V=ecy~5=us=efu=I91 8. Does the journal have hypertext links to YES I NO I DON'T KNOW other documents? If so, how useful do you find this facility 11 No<" ill I I V«y_ ;'"I 11 F=~1==~I==~2~=*==~3===F==~4==~I==~==9 9. Can the user add hypertext links? YES I NO I DON'T KNOW If so, how useful do you find this facility Not at all 11 ! V