NERL Principles for Electronic Journal Licenses

[Ann Okerson <ann.okerson@yale.edu>]

Readers of this list may be interested in the latest draft of NERL
negotiating principles that our consortium has begun using with our
publishers and vendors. These principles can be found at:

<http://www.library.yale.edu/NERLpublic/EJrnlPrinciples.html>

which is on our NERL public web site:

<http://www.library.yale.edu/NERLpublic/>

The plain text version follows below.  We hope these may be of use to
other licensing groups.  Please feel free to share this message widely. 

Ann Okerson/for NERL

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NERL Principles for Electronic Journal Licenses


June 12, 2003 Printer Friendly Version 

RIGHT TO COLLECTIONS MANAGEMENT. NERL members need the flexibility to 
manage collections and individual holdings within a package offering. 
Specifically, it should be possible to cancel individual subscriptions or 
shift to e-only over a period of time with a graduated series of price 
adjustments. Rather than a blanket rule that any attrition causes large 
increases in all remaining subscriptions, different levels of attrition 
should result in proportionate fee increases while still allowing the 
subscribing institution to reduce its overall expenditure level. Members 
may need to select somewhat different plans while still being accepted as 
participants in the overall agreement, and should be able to change plans 
in any year of a multi-year agreement.

NO TAKE-BACKS. Subscribers need assurance that key elements of a contract 
can be expected to remain available in future offerings. Examples of such 
features include (but are not limited to) access to non-subscribed 
content, the waiver of fees for certain categories of holdings, and grants 
of perpetual rights.

PRICE CONTROL. Cost containment is a pressing need for NERL members. In 
order for our libraries to weather the current budgetary downturn with as 
few cancellations as possible, prices should be kept to a minimum for the 
foreseeable future. Level pricing in 2004 and annual increases of no more 
than 5% thereafter are recommended. Multi-year contracts should also 
include an early termination clause that can be exercised by a consortium 
member if its materials budget cannot sustain the required level of 
increase. In addition, we urge publishers of titles that are priced 
significantly higher than similar publications in the marketplace to seek 
especially to moderate, and where possible lower, those prices to more 
competitive and affordable levels.

SERVICE. Subscribers should be able to rely on uninterrupted access to 
licensed materials, with the exception of announced downtime for service 
or update purposes. Such service interruptions should be minimal and 
announced in advance. Each NERL member library should be assigned a 
designated publisher service representative who will respond to all 
inquiries from designated NERL contacts in a timely way. If the service 
inquiry involves the loss of access to the material or portions of the 
material, a pro-rated reimbursement to the subscribing institution should 
be made. Publishers should also be able to provide accurate subscription 
reports for license verification purposes and accurate and timely usage 
and invoice information.

USE OF AGENTS. NERL member libraries may elect to use subscription agents 
or vendors to manage their print subscriptions. NERL member libraries may 
also elect to manage their digital subscriptions with an agent or vendor. 
The agent or vendor may provide any of the following services: claiming, 
payment, cancellation, new orders, IP address registration, and management 
reports.

PERPETUAL ACCESS/ARCHIVAL RIGHTS. All licenses for electronic journals 
should include perpetual and archival rights for subscribed years of 
content in the same format and access method with which the publisher 
provides current content. Additional perpetual rights may also be 
negotiated. Any grant of perpetual rights included in a contract must be 
guaranteed to be permanent without regard to contingencies such as mergers 
and acquisitions, insolvency, or transfers of ownership to another 
publisher.

ILL/Ariel. NERL members must be free to use all of the licensed content to 
fulfill their interlibrary loan responsibilities in the most expeditious 
way available, in conformance with existing ILL guidelines. 

CROSS-ACCESS to titles owned by other NERL libraries should be an option 
available to any participating member for a nominal fee. 

ALL OF NERL. Any arrangement we make should be open to any NERL library 
and should constitute a better deal as a consortium than members could 
obtain individually. During negotiations, NERL will speak with one voice. 
Publishers are asked not to approach separately those NERL libraries 
during the negotiations that have expressed an interest in possibly 
participating in a NERL arrangement.

--end--