Electronic books: a call for effective business models
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to assert that, in an effort to more effectively match users' needs to purchases and extend the buying power of library budgets for e‐books, libraries should use a profiled purchase on demand option to supplement their current practices.Design/methodology/approach – The paper reviews usage patterns for print and e‐books, business models for e‐books and comments on the benefits of using a patron‐driven acquisitions model.Findings – Circulation of the print collection is slowly declining, with only 20 per cent of the collection circulating in 2009. Large purchased collections of e‐books statistics are roughly the same but those purchased through Patron‐Driven Acquisitions are assured use.Originality/value – The discussion of current business models for e‐books illustrates some challenges libraries face in transitioning from print to electronic. Patron‐driven models allow libraries to help users at point of need and manage scarce resources.
Patron-Driven Acquisitions (PDA) of E-books: New Life for the Library Catalog?
This paper highlights an overview of the conceptual approach to e-resource discoverability in academic libraries with a focus on research on the assessment of library catalog performance in the Patron-Driven Acquisitions (PDA) model for e-book collection development. Although the published literature stresses the key role of the library catalog in the PDA model for e-book acquisitions, the findings in this paper show that, until now, there has been a lack of research on users’ e-resources searching behavior and PDA. As a conclusion, the authors think that in such a large universe of digital information on the Web, a new branded local catalog could be the way to visualize a more “tangible” experience between users and e-book collections
Shaping Digital Library Content
This article explores issues related to the selection and purchase of digital content, both from vendors and creation in house, and the degree to which standard collection management principles apply.