E‐books and the academic market: the emerging supply chain

The supply chain that is now emerging in the electronic book market bears a striking resemblance to established supply chains in the paper book market. In this article, the author describes this emerging supply chain and what both publishers and booksellers need to do to secure their place within it.     

Acquisitions personnel management: A librarian's perspective

Acquisitions librarians' personnel management responsibilities are discussed. Hiring, evaluating, rewarding, disciplining, staffing levels, staff positions, and staff morale as encountered in academic libraries are treated. Three predominant influences of academia on personnel management are identified: bureaucracy (in its pejorative sense), unions, and the changing roles of librarians.     

A medical librarian's bag of tricks: coordinating books and media.

The development of a coordinated program of print and nonprint materials in the Library of the College of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey is traced. Fundamental to creating a successful program is a good staff, freedom to grow, and strong administrative support. A positive and aggressive attitude on the part of librarians is an important ingredient in increasing utilization of media.     

E‐journals: developing country access survey

Concern over the information gap between developed and developing countries has led to a number of initiatives to promote access to information, but is there a potential of overlapping and conflicting information being given to the recipients? And what are publishers' attitudes towards the supply of their content at greatly reduced prices, or for free? During 2002 INASP was commissioned to undertake a survey to identify publishers' activities and opinions in this area. The survey found that the majority of respondents were involved in one or more access programmes and there was a willingness from both the commercial and the non‐commercial sector to provide their information in this way.     

E‐learning: new opportunities in continuing professional development

The growth in professional learning is opening up many new opportunities for the application of e‐learning to the world of continuing professional development (CPD). CPD programmes require professionals to engage in annual programmes of professional development, and in some cases revalidation or recertification. To date, most of this activity has been off‐line. Increasingly, CPD requirements will be satisfied through the use of learning resources available on‐line or packaged into specially tailored e‐learning courses. Societies and professional associations – as the primary managers and coordinators of CPD programmes – are in a strong position to expand upon their existing Web‐based initiatives to deliver a new generation of e‐learning services to their members.     

E‐citations: actionable identifiers and scholarly referencing

This document discusses the role of ‘actionable’ identifiers such as the Digital Object Identifier (DOI) in enabling scholarly citations in a digital environment. Citation is a subset of the general wider concept of linkage, but an interesting one for two reasons: it is a practical example being worked on today, and it demonstrates that linkage only between digital entities is insufficient for scholarly citation. It also points the way to future extensions of the concept of linkage, with new uses being made of internet resources, and tools which can support these new patterns of citation.     

The use of electronic books in midwifery education: the student perspective

The objectives of this paper are: (i) to illustrate the use of e-books by health studies students at a college of higher education; (ii) to provide a demonstration of how e-books may be facilitated by library and information services staff working across the health and academic sectors; (iii) to comment upon the experiences of health studies students, in using e-books. A focus group of 10 student midwives was used to gain insight into how e-books may be used in an academic context for health professionals. The findings of the student midwives' focus group are reported and discussed. In this instance, the student midwives were encouraged to use e-books as part of a structured information skills programme. The paper concentrates on how the e-books were used within this context and addresses the potential benefits and disadvantages from a student perspective. The results provide evidence of a largely positive experience of using e-books as an electronic information resource. The focus group reveals many benefits and advantages in the facilitation and use of e-books, as well as addressing areas for development. It is concluded that e-books have a place in health library and information resources, but further development of e-books and e-book collections is required and subsequent investigation into their most effective use.     

E‐journals,researchers — and the new librarians

This paper provides the results of a two‐year investigation into the use of e‐journals by the UK research community. Log analysis, questionnaires, interviews, and observation were used to collect the information. The results are presented in a FAQ format to make the key findings accessible. The main findings are that journals have become central to most disciplines, and that the e‐form has become the prime means of access. The results for history suggest that the old scholarly communication mantras (scientists primarily communicate through articles, historians through monographs) are rapidly breaking down. Indeed, all researchers seem addicted to journal content. Research without this resource now seems unthinkable; journals are a researcher's lifeblood. Gateway services, hugely popular in science, are re‐intermediating the broken chain between publisher and reader; they are the new librarians.     

E‐only journals: is it time to drop print?

This article is a revised version of a talk given at the ALPSP seminar of the same name in February 2005. The current state of play with electronic‐only (‘e‐only’) journals is reviewed, along with some data on the different ways print and electronic editions are used. The drivers for and against a move to e‐only journals are discussed, including economic and commercial issues, long‐term access and preservation, and the growing divergence between the capabilities of print and electronic journals.     

Ethics of information giving: the librarian's view*

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Giving new life to out‐of‐print books: when publishers' and libraries' interests meet

The Library of the Université Libre de Bruxelles and Editions de l'Université de Bruxelles (EUB), the University's publishing imprint, have recently agreed to collaborate to provide free online access to recent out‐of‐print books published by EUB. The e‐books are available on the Digithèque website, a collection of digital copies of printed books created by the Library. This initiative is valuable for the scientific community and the general public who can freely access the books online, for the authors whose books have been digitized and widely disseminated, and for the publisher whose collections become more visible on the Internet, thereby generating more traffic on its website and potentially increasing sales of its other books. Around 20 books have been made available online so far. This article describes the context of the agreement, how the collaboration operates, the options of file conversion vs. book scanning, issues relating to copyright and users' rights, how access is provided to the digital copies, and future collaborative projects of the Library and EUB.