Building an Electronic Resource Collection: A Practical Guide

Citation

Martin, C. (2005), "Building an Electronic Resource Collection: A Practical Guide", Library Review, Vol. 54 No. 6, pp. 386-387. https://doi.org/10.1108/00242530510605520

Caught between rapacious publishers who sell the same data to us twice over at eye‐watering prices, and academics needing more e‐resources for themselves and their students, we operate in crisis mode. Mid‐year we suddenly have to scrabble together an extra few thousand because a publisher has decided to raise prices by 30 per cent, or a previously free resource is cut off without warning. Budgeting for such events seems impossible. This is a chance to read something measured and sane which re‐introduces the idea of collection management and shows that you can budget for the unexpected.

It's a fast‐moving field and additions to the previous [2002] edition include new sections on Virtual Learning Environments/Learning Management Systems and e‐reading lists. References and suggestions for further reading have been revised and added to. The book went to press too early to incorporate findings from the House of Commons’ Science and Technology Committee's call for radical changes in the publishing process, but is sufficiently up‐to‐date to refer to the Committee's establishment.

The authors start by outlining the differences between print and electronic in terms of acquisition and delivery. They move on to describe the electronic resources “landscape” – the range of available types of e‐resource and the main concerns which the digital collection‐developer must take into account: bundled deals, interfaces, linkage services, archiving and institutional repositories. Useful examples are given to illustrate concepts like push/pull technology and authentication. A glossary at the back of the book helps when you can’t remember what those acronyms mean.

Chapter 3 looks at e‐journals and e‐books in more detail. Both are still to some extent still linked to their print versions and present their own problems. E‐journals are important partly because they cost so much – consuming 90 per cent of an academic library's budget. They also provide unique complications – the “big deals”, lack of archiving and the no‐cancellation clauses. For e‐books the complexities lie more in the myriad of delivery methods from web or e‐book reader to PDA.

The two final chapters run through the collection life‐cycle: formulating a collection policy, budget, assessment (including a very useful evaluation checklist), negotiating licences, delivering the e‐resource and how to manage this process. Completing the circle involves continual assessment of the e‐resource – do you still need it? How far can you trust usage statistics? What's the best way to collect feedback from users and suggestions for new acquisitions?

The book aims to act as a guide to the purchasing of e‐resources as part of overall collection development, for the collection‐developer who wishes to take e‐resources into account. It would be fine for students because it's well structured and written so simply, but it would also be valuable for those more involved in this area, again because of its simplicity – the way it manages to lay out the most complicated of matters so succinctly. The many and complex issues around open access publishing are summed up in just four pages but for those who want more detailed information there are plenty of references to books, websites and journal articles for further reading. I would wholeheartedly recommend this to anyone who works in collection development whether digital or print.