RE: FTE-based pricing

["Audrey Bondar" <abondar1@sladen.hfhs.org>]

I agree.  So many times I receive a quote for an electronic 
journal based on FTE and the amount is ridiculous.  Hundreds of 
people included in the number will never ever look at the site 
and yet we're supposed to pay for them?  It seems that a few 
publishers are changing this by requesting a total based on the 
number of potential user groups.  At least this is a step in the 
right direction.

Audrey Bondar
Senior Information Resource Specialist
Henry Ford Hospital
Sladen Library
Detroit, MI  48202

-----Original Message-----
[mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of Stefanie Wittenbach
Sent: Thursday, October 12, 2006 2:47 PM
To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
Subject: RE: FTE-based pricing

I personally believe that FTE-based pricing is quite harmful to 
the library community for the following reasons:

Use is not necessarily tied to the institution's FTE. Growing 
campuses are penalized because the price continues to increase, 
but the users of the resource may not be growing in the same way.

If anything, I think database pricing should be a flat rate or 
flat rate plus some factor for high use.

Stefanie

Stefanie Wittenbach
Assistant Dean, Collections
John Peace Library
The University of Texas at San Antonio
San Antonio, TX  78249-0671
stefanie.wittenbach@utsa.edu