The members of the
Engineering Libraries Division (ELD) of the American Society for Engineering
Education (ASEE) unanimously endorse the following best practices for
electronic scholarly publishing.
The content, stability, and
accessibility of electronic resources have vastly improved since the early days
of electronic publishing. However, significant outstanding problems persist.
After surveying the field, ELD’s Best Practices for Electronic Resources Task
Force selected and focused on eleven of the most important issues. This list of issues, as well as the best
practices addressing them, was unanimously endorsed by the membership of the
Division, which includes academic engineering librarians from North American
educational institutions of all sizes.
The Punch List of Best
Practices covers issues concerning any information resource that requires a
computer or other electronic device (such as a PDA) for access. Such resources
include books, articles, data, and other electronic content, available either
individually or as part of larger collections, and in a variety of electronic
formats. Although many of the Punch List items use examples specific to
“Web-accessible” content, we use the word electronic in the title to reflect
this broader scope.
The Punch List reflects the
top priority issues in electronic resources, as well as current best
practices. The task force will
periodically review the state of electronic publishing as it pertains to
engineering education and will revise the Punch List when necessary to reflect
progress or changes in the field.
By speaking with one voice
we hope to clarify the message and redirect the focus of discussion to these
top priority issues. The intent of this
document is to inform content providers of practices that are considered best
by a large number of librarians. But
most importantly, the Punch List provides a starting point for conversation
between librarians and content providers, both about the issues detailed in the
punch list and about related issues of importance to both groups. The goal is to effect change that benefits
all parties involved. The Best Practices Task Force welcomes your
communication on this topic. You can email us at ELD-PL@u.washington.edu.
The fine print: In
formulating these best practices many existing guidelines were consulted. The
guidelines from the California Digital
Library, the COUNTER Project, the Digital Library Federation, the International Coalition of
Library Consortia (ICOLC), and the Zwolle
Group were particularly useful. These organizations are to be commended for
their insightful and forward thinking approach to these issues. Content
providers are strongly encouraged to read the guidelines from these
organizations in their entirety for additional and more in-depth coverage of many
of the topics we have addressed.
Issues Addressed in the Punch List:
4.
Cover-to-Cover Digitization (Updated)
6.
Interlibrary Loan/Electronic Reserves (Updated)
8.
Perpetual Access (Updated)
9.
Purchase
Models (Updated)
10.
Retractions and Corrections (Errata and Corrigenda) (Updated)
11.
Statistics
Statement:
Access must be available to all authorized users—both affiliates of the
library and walk-ins. Affiliates (e.g. full- and part-time students and
employees, including all faculty, staff, and other researchers working on
grants administered by the institution) must have access to the licensed
content regardless of their physical location. Walk-ins include affiliates as
defined above and in addition any persons not affiliated with the library who
are physically present at any of the library’s site(s).
The
authorization system must allow affiliates access to the resource from anywhere
with a minimum of effort on the part of the library and the authorized user.
The current preferred method of authentication uses IP addresses. Authorization
systems should handle access via campus proxy servers, and special requirements
for access via campus proxy servers should be well documented.
Individual
passwords are not acceptable. Though not yet a replacement for
IP/proxy access, password access via inter-institutional, open source
middleware solutions is rapidly becoming important to larger institutions. As
an example, Shibboleth offers a mechanism for querying the status of a
potential user seeking access to a resource (see appendix). Strong preference is given to content
providers who are willing to simultaneously provide IP-based access and
implement access authorization through the use of such mechanisms. Further,
authorized users must never be challenged with a login/password prompt when
non-personalized access is controlled by IP or other means. A login/password
requirement for the purpose of allowing personalization of the interaction with
the licensed content (e.g., saving favorite documents, an individual profile,
etc.) is acceptable, but must not be a requirement for an authorized user to
have access to the licensed content.
Rationale:
The electronic environment does not fundamentally change rights related
to access and use of licensed content. Affiliated users should have the
right to easy access to licensed content regardless of their physical
location. Where access to print is open to on-site users regardless of
their affiliation, access to electronic equivalents must be open as well.
Statement: It is vital for
libraries to have the ability to co-brand products with the content provider.
It is important to have the ability to name individual campuses within
consortia separately, and to use wording of the institution's choice. Strong preference is
given to including the concept of payment, as in “Access to this product paid
for by [campus library name].”
Rationale:
Co-branding is vital to ensure that users understand the role the
library plays in securing access to research material. Without
co-branding users may assume the resource is "free." This undermines
the library's ability to make a strong case for future funding and the library's
continuing support of the product. Libraries also do a considerable amount of
marketing for the content provider's products within our respective
institutions. In addition to providing access to the product, we initiate new
users to the benefits of the product and we provide training and ongoing
support of the product to our faculty, students, and other researchers.
Statement: Copyrights
are sets of agreements between authors and content providers that govern the
use of works of scholarship. Management of copyrights is a complex proposition
as the agreements vary by country and by content provider, and can be altered
by means of amendment or grant by the parties.
This document seeks to highlight for content providers some attributes
of copyright agreements that support libraries’ ability to promote access to
scholarship.
In general, libraries require agreements that support
educational uses of scholarly works, and the principle of Fair Use for both
authors and licensees of the content, including but not limited to:
·
Right to post published
article on websites (personal or institutional) or to deposit article in open
access institutional repository
·
Right to post
pre-publications of article on websites (personal or institutional) or to
deposit article in open access institutional repository
·
Right to make copies
for interlibrary loan (from print or electronic format original)
·
Right to use copies for
reserves and/or e-reserves
Efforts are ongoing to identify and articulate basic
principles to guide the development of copyright agreements that address the
interests and concerns of authors, content providers, libraries, and other
individuals and institutions.
In particular the Zwolle Group, an international collaboration
of stakeholders in scholarly publishing, presents key issues and suggestions
related to copyrights in the context of electronic publishing. Their guidelines are presented at http://www.surf.nl/copyright/ and reflect ongoing international discussions on
this topic.
Rationale: It is
important for authors, content providers, and users to have a clear
understanding of each other’s rights and responsibilities regarding electronic scholarly
publishing. Myriad and nuanced copyright agreements that require
individualized attention impede dissemination of scholarship. Outdated
agreements that were not created for the digital environment make common,
modern practices for dissemination technically illegal. Due to the
increasingly global arena for electronic scholarly communication, international
agreement on basic copyrights and responsibilities for all stakeholders is
imperative.
Statement: Electronic
content should be cover-to-cover. Each print edition should have an electronic
equivalent that contains all the content found in that specific edition of the
print version. This includes all
content issued as supplements or special issues in print or in other formats
such as CD-ROM. Supplements should be made available online at the same time as
the main issue. Electronic versions may include additional content not possible
in the print media (e.g. interactive features, video) but not less content than
the print. Cover-to-cover content includes, but is not limited to:
Abstracts; Addendums; Advertisements; Announcements;
Author Biographies; Award Announcements; Book Reviews; Books Received; Brief
Communications; Calendars; Case Reports; Classic Papers; Clinical Practice
Reports; Conference Contents Lists; Correspondence; Cover Art; Debates;
Directories; Discussions; Editorial Board Members; Editorials; Education Notes;
Errata/Erratum; Forewords; Forthcoming articles; Forum Articles; Full-Length
Articles; In Memoriam/Memorials; Instructions To Authors; Introductions; Legal
Notes; Letters To The Editor And Replies; Literature Alerts; Masthead
Information; Miscellaneous; News/News Items; Obituaries; Other Contents; Papers
accepted for publication; Patent Abstracts; Patent Reports; Personal Reports;
Previews; Product News/Review; Publisher’s Notes; Requests For Assistance;
Research Notes; Research Papers; Review Articles; Schedule of Issues;
Sequencing Reports; Short Communication; Short Surveys; Software Reviews;
Supplementary Materials; Table Of Contents; Test Reviews.
Rationale: Libraries require a complete, cover-to-cover, accurate digital replica of the original print resource. This is particularly important as the electronic version becomes the de facto copy of record and the print version becomes a seldom seen and increasingly difficult to access archive.
Statement: Producers of electronic content should
adhere; at a minimum; to the specifications for page image and machine-readable
text masters outlined in the Digital Library Federation (DLF) document Benchmark for Faithful Digital
Reproductions of Monographs and Serials. If those benchmarks are updated in the
future, content producers should adjust their processes to meet those revised
benchmarks.
Rationale: Libraries
and their users have a right to expect a certain minimum level of quality in
all products they buy, whether print or electronic. For an electronic product, this means text and graphics must be
sharp and legible in electronic form, and if a paper copy is produced from the
electronic, that copy should be comparable to the quality of a print original.
Statement:
Interlibrary
Loan: Licenses
should permit fair use of all information for non-commercial, educational,
instructional, and scientific purposes by authorized users.
Content providers must allow electronic information to be
used for non-commercial interlibrary loan between two libraries in support of
their teaching, learning, or research missions. The library agrees to
fulfill all interlibrary loan requests in compliance with section 108 of the
U.S. Copyright Law and the Guidelines for Proviso of Subsection
108(2g)(2) prepared by the National Commission on New
Technological Uses of Copyrighted Works. There should be no additional
record keeping beyond that required for copyright compliance by
borrowing/lending libraries. Restrictions on the version or release of
ILL software a library may use should not be part of a license agreement. Libraries should be allowed to update their
software as needed to best serve their clientele or improve/streamline their
internal procedures.
Electronic Reserves and Course Packs: The library and authorized users must be able to use a
reasonable portion of the licensed materials for use in connection with
specific courses provided by the respective institution in compliance with the
fair use policies.
Rationale: The electronic
environment does not fundamentally change the concept of fair use.
Prohibiting the use of electronic material for non-commercial interlibrary loan
and electronic reserves is unacceptable.
Statement: All documents contained in
licensed electronic resources should be easily discovered and located by a
library’s users, regardless of whether those documents are available in a
different electronic product licensed by the library, freely available
elsewhere in electronic form, available only in print (via a link to/from the
library’s online catalog record), or available in some other way (e.g. via
interlibrary loan or document delivery).
All links should resolve at the appropriate level of specificity (e.g. a
request for an article should not result in a link at the journal title
level). The preferred method of linking
to/from electronic content is to use the metadata commonly found in an
OpenURL. For information on OpenURL,
see the pending National Information Standards Organization standard
Z39.88-200X and the associated key/encoded-value (KEV) format
implementation guidelines. While other
methods are possible (e.g. using Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs), as CrossRef
does), OpenURL is preferred.
Rationale: A uniform linking solution should be used by
all content providers and libraries and should be based upon an industry
standard. The emerging NISO OpenURL
standard meets these requirements and offers significant advantages to content
providers, libraries and users.
Advantages for content providers:
·
A URL for any link can
be generated dynamically via a single formatting criterion, with no need to
vary the format depending on the source of the material.
·
A content provider need
not offer highly customized linking options for individual licensors, since the
licensor’s local service can now perform that function.
Advantages for libraries:
·
The library does not
need to upload its local data to a variety of different systems, since it can
develop and maintain its own link server to handle all customized linking.
Advantages for users:
·
Users gain direct
access to electronic resources licensed for a particular community by the
library, to local print holdings, and to other services provided by the
library, such as interlibrary loan or document delivery.
Statement: The content provider must guarantee the library
perpetual access to all licensed content and use of that content in accordance
with the terms of the existing or, in the case of cancellation of an agreement; the most
recently signed license agreement, for so long as the content provider is
solvent.
In the case of a
current license agreement, the content provider must guarantee electronic
access to all material currently or previously licensed by the library, in a
format mutually agreed upon.
In the case where
a current license agreement no longer exists, the content provider must
continue to guarantee access to all electronic content previously licensed to
the library, or to provide the source files for the content to the
library so that the library may provide its own access to the licensed content.
If the
content provider’s choice is to offer access on their site to the previously
purchased content, it remains the content provider’s responsibility to make the
content available in the same manner and format that it offers to current
subscribers. If the source files are
provided to the library, it becomes the library’s responsibility to address
access and format migration issues.
The content provider
must make arrangements to electronically archive all licensed content in a
secure manner. The LOCKSS model should be
considered for such archiving.
Rationale:
In the print environment, a library subscribes to a
journal, encyclopedia, or book knowing that one of the values it receives
is perpetual access to the content being purchased. Licensing access to a journal, encyclopedia, book, or other
resource in electronic form should provide those same perpetual access
guarantees. The cost of archiving and
migration of formats is understood to be part of the purchase price already
paid by the library.
Statement: When a resource is available in multiple formats (e.g.
print and online), subscription options should be available for any single
option or any combination of options.
The option to purchase access to multiple titles from a
single content provider for a single cost should be available as an option, but
is unacceptable when individual titles cannot also be purchased separately.
Rationale: The needs and
financial means of individual libraries vary greatly. Content providers should
offer libraries multiple purchase options for electronic resources.
Libraries should not be unduly penalized for maintaining access to resources in
multiple formats or for not wishing to purchase access to bundled collections
of resources from content providers.
Statement: Currently there
are a number of purchase models in use for subject-specific electronic
resources, ranging from one price for all customers to models based on
counts of full-time equivalent (FTE) members of an institution.
In our estimation a single “best practice” pricing model
that would fit all resources and all libraries has not emerged. However,
we believe that if an FTE model is offered that it is a much better
practice to base the pricing on an FTE count of institutional
members whose primary subject affiliations are directly related to the content
of the resource and not on the total number of institutional FTEs.
Rationale: Subject specific
electronic resources are most often used by a limited number of users at a
given institution. Libraries and
content providers should be able to negotiate an approximate number of FTE
users likely to use a specific resource and arrive at a cost based on that
number rather than the total number of FTE users at the institution.
Statement: Campus wide site licenses for electronic resources should
include at no extra charge users at institutionally owned remote locations that
are not identified as separate campuses of the institution.
Rationale: Libraries at many institutions must provide
access to electronic resources for users at numerous remote locations operated
by the home institution. In many cases
the number of users at a remote location is small and should not be considered
a separate campus by the content provider.
10.
In the case of material that is known to be
erroneous or controversial:
1.
Items under dispute and retracted items must not be removed from the
system. They must remain online and be
clearly identified as disputed or retracted.
2.
The statement of the dispute or retraction must provide an explanation
of why the item is being disputed or retracted and must include the complete
citation of the original item.
3.