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Value Statements to Which Emory Subscribes
(Borrowed from NCSU)
- Portability between devices, with publishers and aggregator platforms using non-proprietary formats for their ebooks.
- Consistency of content across the print and electronic format and the incorporation of corresponding supplementary material sometimes available in the print version (i.e CDs, web access).
- Working jointly with publishers and aggregator platform vendors to develop standards for printing, copy/paste, and saving of ebook content.
- Quality Full-level MARC bibliographic records that meet current national cataloging standards and practice.
- The Interlibrary Loan process or comparable way to lend and borrow ebooks between libraries.
- Perpetual access to purchased and/or subscribed content.
- ADA compliance.
- COUNTER compliant usage statistics.
- Licensing terms which do not limit fair use and first sale doctrines under US copyright law. Adopting SERU as a standard for ebooks would ensure this.
- Simultaneous format availability of frontlist titles.
- Alerts that new books have been added to existing collections.
- Pricing models that are reasonable, flexible and reflect the broad needs of the library market. Restricting ebook access to subscription-only, bundled databases of "all or nothing" content is in direct conflict with reasonable, flexible pricing models.
- The ability to migrate purchased and/or subscribed content between platforms in the event of the end of life of a platform.
- The ability to coordinate discovery with third party services such as SFX.
- The ability to incorporate ebook search, discovery, access and purchase into existing workflows.
EBook Considerations
- What digital rights management software, if any being used, i.e., limitations on downloading, copying, pasting, etc. (e.g., several require installation of free Adobe Digital Editions to moderate use, or access through a third-party such as iLibrary)? DRM often limits the length of the checkout period.
- What is the downloadable formats for titles? (e.g., epub, etc.)—most ebooks are (still) only available in PDF, but there seems to be more of a move to an XML basis
- Can titles be accessed and downloaded on an iPad? What about a Kindle?
- Can titles be read across different platforms or is there a proprietary platform? What are the pros/cons of this platform?
- What does the platform allow users to do with the content?
- Almost all vendors allow for chapter downloads, but not all allow downloads for entire books.
- Is there an ability to purchase through third party vendors, such as YBP (e.g., libraries can purchase Springer packages through YBP)?
- Are these static or dynamic collections? Is there a fee for adding new content as it appears? Can we purchase specific titles, specific months, or are these set collections with no options?
- Are there implications for duplication of already existing print materials in our collections? What about existing ecollections? Have we already purchased individual titles via EBL or EBrary (through GOBI)? Can we receive discounts for already purchased print titles?
- There will definitely be implications with DDA; omitting/excluding titles from packages. Can we work with YBP on this issue?
- Can we obtain/manage robust collection use stats from these vendors (at the title level)?
- What is the reserves policy for e-book content?
- Can the e-book(s) be loaned to other libraries? Are there restrictions on how much content?