Editorial

Citation

Chalcraft, T. (2007), "Editorial", Reference Reviews, Vol. 21 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/rr.2007.09921aaa.001

Editorial

Twenty-odd years ago, when I first became involved with the fringes of reference and information publishing, the business seemed a sedate and relaxed affair. My initial engagement interview involved politely sipping tea and nibbling cakes in the café of a luxury London hotel. Then there were several follow-up meetings with generous lunches in the splendid premises of a publishing association facing onto one of London’s grandest and leafiest squares. Money seemed no object, either in the hiring process or in subsequent project planning. I cannot recall costs or marketability of the end product being seriously discussed at any point. That the planned volumes would sell was taken for granted. It seemed the pre-eminent concern was what the publisher wanted to produce, not what the market demanded. In this cosy world it felt as though tea and cakes could continue forever.

Now, while I’m sure the upper echelons of reference publishing do not have to exist solely on what the tea trolley or sandwich shop can supply, today’s information industry operates in a dramatically different and far less cosseted environment. Library-orientated reference products are now mainly electronic rather than print-led and compete in a fast moving but restricted market, increasingly dominated by a few major players constantly manoeuvring to maintain and grow market share. There is also a nervous edge to the business brought about by the internet and, more specifically, the prospect of open-access publishing gaining widespread academic acceptance and breaking into the mainstream. The major reference and information publishers, especially those in the science and technology sector, need not only to compete with one another to stay ahead in the library market, but to keep a wary eye on open-access lest it explode out of the academic cage and sweep them aside. The “good old days” of a stable market with slowly evolving products that pliable libraries could be relied upon to buy are gone forever – now there is constant change in which regularly reinventing existing products and bringing forward new ones is critical to survival.

I was reminded of these reference world realities when the editing of two key reviews in this issue of Reference Reviews coincided with delivery of a press release bringing news of the latest enhancements to Elsevier’s mega-project, Scopus. The first review was of Science Full Text Select (RR 2007/33), a relatively new database from H.W. Wilson. This New York based company is not one of the largest in the electronic reference publishing business, but is a highly respected name in traditional library land and has apparently so far managed to retain its market position. Science Full Text Select, in taking full-text content from a number of the company’s existing databases such as Applied Science and Technology Index and General Science Index and combining them in a relatively modestly sized and priced service, is an attractive and versatile package. The other review was of Public Library of Science.org (RR 2007/32), an open-access full-text publishing site available to all. At present relatively restricted in content, like BioMed Central and several others, it has the potential to expand and become a serious competitor to fee-based full text services. Although it sits neatly alongside Science Full Text Select in the pages of Reference Reviews, it is from the opposite end of reference spectrum: Public Library of Science occupies the lofty moral high ground of free access, Science Full Text Select rests in the traditional subscription corner.

Both these products, though, are dwarfed by Elsevier’s behemoth Scopus (RR 2005/47). Although some might see Scopus as an attempt to smother products like Science Full Text Select or more directly take on Thomson’s Web of Science/Web of Knowledge, it is also driven by the threat of services such as Public Library of Science. As the press release that sparked these musings underlines, Elsevier’s strategy in developing the service is both offensive and defensive. Dated 27 September 2006, the announcement from the press office brings news of two new features, PatentCites and WebCites. The latter will enable users to view citations to articles in Scopus from a growing number of selected scientific web sources such as institutional repositories and theses and dissertation databases. In common with other database producers, Elsevier is adding value to an existing product by sifting and sucking up web content. The internet cannot be beaten or ignored, so it is to be integrated and incorporated.

To some extent the degree to which open access publishing will interact with traditional publishing models depends on the approach of libraries, particularly the major academic and national collections. In the UK the British Library has been increasingly innovative in exploiting the internet to make its own holdings more accessible. The day after the Scopus press release arrived, the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) announced that the British Library Archival Sound Recordings database would be available in full to all UK higher and further education libraries. This unique collection of historical and contemporary music, radio drama, oral history and field and locational recordings will be fully searchable by all users, but only those in educational institutions or at the Library’s London and Yorkshire reading rooms will be able to access the full audio content. This service, which we hope to review in a future issue, is part of a longer term British Library project to digitise a large part of the non-copyrighted collections.

In this issue of Reference Reviews we also cover a number of other databases that result from the digitisation of an important collection. Cuban Heritage Collection (RR 2007/49) makes available part of the extensive collection of Cuban and Cuban exile materials in the Otto G. Richter Library at the University of Miami, while Indonesia Maps (RR 2007/54) is sub-section of the much larger Perry-Castañeda digital map collection. These sit alongside a host of reviews of more traditional print reference items ranging from Sage’s massive five-volume Encyclopedia of Disability (RR 2007/11) to the pocket-sized British Field Crops (RR 2007/29). The latter self-published item is an example of one of several non-mainstream reference sources featured in this issue. We will attempt to cover more of these in the future, but for the moment I’ll end by highlighting two especially intriguing and diverting sources, the Skeptic’s Dictionary (RR 2007/03) and Roller Coaster Database (RR 2007/44).

Tony ChalcraftEditor, Reference Reviews, and University Librarian, York St John University, York, UK