The Library is committed to providing increased access to online journals. This web page has been developed to inform you of the issues we face in transitioning from a largely print collection to a largely online collection.

• Journal Cost Trends
  

  Journal print subscription costs have increased at a phenomenal rate between 1992 and 2002. For example, the cost of biology and medicine journals has increased 191% and 196% respectively over this time period. To subscribe to electronic and print versions of a journal puts added pressure on the budget. Electronic journals are in some cases very expensive. Online publications may in time be cheaper to produce, but they are not cheaper now. In fact, they often represent an additional expense for publishers, and this expense is passed along to libraries. The library must constantly evaluate its collections, both print and electronic, to ensure that the transformation from print to online is done in a cost-effective way.

• Selection Criteria for Journal Subscriptions (print +online vs. online)
  

  The library is committed to providing electronic access to its journal collection. All new titles added to the collection are purchased in online format only, if available. We are gradually adding online access to our current print titles or converting them to online format only. The publisher’s pricing model, contract conditions and journal usage statistics determine which option the library selects.

• Publisher Pricing Models
  

  While the conventional pricing model for print journals is the subscription to the individual title, there is no standardized pricing model for online journals; each publisher has a different pricing scheme:

  • A population-based model charges by the number of staff likely to access the publisher’s online titles.
  • There is also a derivative model which is based upon a library’s and/or institutions print subscriptions. It may allow access to all its journal titles for a price set at the prior year’s print subscription revenue from the library and/or institution, plus a premium. At NIH, publishers some times expect the Library to pay a subscription fee that will enable the publisher to recoup the loss of revenue when NIH branches or labs cancel their print subscriptions.
  • In another model, the basis for the pricing of journals is changing from a price for print, with online as part of that price, or for an additional sum, to online as the base price with print at an optional additional cost.

  There are as many pricing and access models as there are publishers.

• Large Publisher Packages/Journal "Aggregators"
  

  The library licenses some of its online journals in large publisher packages such as Elsevier’s ScienceDirect. Large publisher packages can include biomedical and scientific titles as well as journals that are not from the science or biomedical fields. The Library gets all the titles in a package deal, whether or not the titles are relevant to the NIH.

  The Library also licenses online journals from “aggregators” like MD Consult. Aggregators are third-party databases offering online journals from different publishers. Providing access to online journals via “aggregators” may be problematic because publishers can remove their journal titles from the third-party databases with little or no warning, abruptly ending online access to those titles.

• Access
  

  Most online journal titles are available for use at all NIH sites, however some are restricted by the publisher for use in the Bethesda/Rockville area only. Whenever possible, we try to make our journals available through IP addresses. When a publisher requires us to use a user name and password, these are posted on the online journals page.

• Authorized Users
  

  Authorized users at NIH include all employees, contractors, post-doctoral fellows, temporary employees and others that may need research information and facilities.

• Back Issues/Archiving
  

  Most publishers offer archival access for back issues of their publications. These can vary in years of coverage, but generally go back to the mid to late 1990s. When archival access is not obtainable, the library will ensure that the print editions are still available. Generally, there is no guarantee of continued access to a digital resource if the Library stops its subscription. These archival issues will likely be solved in the future, but at present the tenuous nature of preserving digital information is of great concern to both librarians and researchers alike.

• Copyright Issues
  

  Electronic resources provided by the NIH Library to NIH staff are governed by licenses which restrict how you can use the content.

  NIH staff can:

  • make journal article copies or print or download full or partial results of searches for personal or internal business or research use.

  NIH staff cannot:

  • share access with or provide results to non-NIH users.
  • distribute information found in these resources in any form (printed, electronically relayed, posted to public list services or bulletin boards, or magnetically stored) to, or for the benefit of, anyone who is not NIH staff.
  • For more information read the NIH Library Copyright Restrictions. There is a growing movement to foster alternatives to the current practice of researchers surrendering intellectual property rights to publishers; for example, retaining rights to use publications freely in the researchers own place of business, and also to retain the right to share research with colleagues around the world who may not have access through their libraries.

• What Can I As A Researcher Do To Help?
  
  • Support the library’s cancellation of expensive low-use titles.
  • Support your societies electronic publishing program by submitting papers, reviewing, and serving on the editorial board.
  • When you are choosing where to publish articles, which editorial boards to serve on, or what to do with your copyright, consider publisher behavior -- especially in terms of pricing.
  • Support efforts by professional associations and other groups who are attempting to provide sustainable and affordable ways to distribute scholarly information.
  • Consider publishing in open access digital archives. Examples of open access digital archives are:
    • Public Library of Science - The Public Library of Science (PLoS) is a non-profit organization of scientists committed to making the world's scientific and medical literature a public resource. PLoS will begin a new scientific publishing venture in the second half of 2003. Journals will be controlled and run by scientists, and will retain all of the important features of scientific journals, including rigorous peer-review and high editorial and production standards. PLoS will make all published works immediately available online, with no charges for access or restrictions on subsequent redistribution or use.
    • PubMed Central - PubMed Central is a digital archive of life sciences journal literature, developed and managed by the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) at the U.S. National Library of Medicine (NLM). PMC is not a publisher. Participation by publishers in PMC is voluntary, but journals must meet certain editorial standards. PubMed Central (PMC) was launched in February 2000 with content from the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and from Molecular Biology of the Cell. PubMed Central does not include any unreviewed research or preprint articles. Current publishers participating in PubMed Central have delays ranging up to two years, with most releasing their material six months or less after publication.
    • BioMed Central - BioMed Central (BMC) is a commercial publisher of online biomedical journals. They provide free access to an archive of refereed papers on site, and leave copyright in the hands of the authors. BMC also deposits its articles in PubMed Central as they are published.
    • Chemistry PrePrint Server (CPS) – an open archive of chemical preprints launched by Elsevier publishers. The Chemistry Preprint Server is a permanent web archive and distribution medium for research articles in the field of chemistry. CPS allows users to submit their articles to the server where they become accessible to registered users of ChemWeb.com.
    • www.arXiv.org,- a past project of Los Alamos National Laboratory, now at Cornell. ArXiv is an e-print service in the fields of physics, mathematics, non-linear science and computer science.
  • For more information on new systems of scholarly communication, visit these web sites:
    • Create Change
    • Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC)

• How To Suggest We Get A Journal
  
  • From the library’s homepage, http://nihlibrary.nih.gov, select “Library Services”, then complete the “Suggest an Item” form.
  • From the library’s online catalog, http://nih-library.nih.gov, select “Suggestions for Book/Journal Acquisition” and complete the form that is supplied.
  • You may use these forms to request new titles to the library’s collection or to request the electronic version of a journal that we already have in print.

For more information about these issues please contact:
Suzanne Grefsheim
Director, NIH Library
Email: sg8d@nih.gov
Phone: 301-496-2448

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