RE: Nature's new "post cancellation policy"

["Daniel Jones" <djones@sfbr.org>]

I was contacted by our NPG representative earlier this year 
telling me about their new license and encouraging me to sign and 
return it soon.  In addition, I've received numerous glossy 
mailings announcing the change in policy.  They don't need a 
signed license until the end of 2006, so I have not signed it 
yet.  In the meantime, I'm hoping they will reconsider their 
policy, and I'm glad to see some discussion beginning about this 
issue.

As I understand it, the new policy will apply to new 
subscriptions started with 2007, and subscriptions in place 
before the end of 2006 will be grandfathered under the old 
policy.  I was encouraged to consider ordering new subscriptions 
before the end of the year to get the best value.  This sounds 
like marketing hype to me (Have you noticed how much more and 
aggressive marketing NPG has been doing over the past two 
years?), but it also suggests to me that they have doubts about 
their own new policy.

Again, as I understand the policy on new subscriptions, you get a 
rolling 4 years + the current year, and if you want more than 
that, you will need to license the backfile for the title, AND 
each year purchase the one year to be added to the archive that 
rolled off of your current subscription to that title.  (I.e., 
you purchase a new title to begin with vol. 1, 2007, then 5 years 
later you remember to order the archive so you continue to have 
access to vol. 1, then every year you remember to purchase the 
year that rolled off to be added to the archive.  Imagine the 
record keeping on all sides - library:vendor:publisher - and the 
opportunities for system failure.)  As I pointed out to my NPG 
representative, this is very similar to the model that was 
abandoned by the American Chemical Society after 2005, and I 
recommended they contact Adam Chesler at ACS for more details 
about the ACS decision to change its subscription model. 
According to my NPG representative, they reviewed the proposed 
changes with the NPG library advisory council, and no one pointed 
out any problems with it.

In my experience over the last few years, Nature has had problems 
with the quality of their PDFs, accurate information about 
subscription start/end dates, and access to current 
subscriptions, and I have doubts about their ability to handle 
two subscription models for as many institutional subscribers as 
they have.  There are just too many IFs in their proposed new 
policy to believe that access will be unaffected.

I have not signed the license yet, nor have I ordered any new 
Nature journals.

=======================
Daniel H. Jones, M.L.S.
Librarian
Preston G. Northrup Memorial Library
Southwest Foundation for Biomedical Research
Tel:  210-258-9426
Fax:  210-670-3313
Email:  djones@sfbr.org
=======================