Vision Statement
Mission
To provide advice on collecting priorities and development priorities for
e-books through a process which identifies and responds to user needs and
supports the execution of the JISC Strategic Framework (incorporating the
JISC Collections Strategy and the JISC Development Strategy).
Background
The JISC E-books Working Group was founded in 2001 to advise the JISC about
content, developing technologies and licensing issues relevant to e-books.
The Group has had some considerable successes particularly in the area of
e-reference books which are now well embedded in education. The Group also
steered the agreement with Taylor and Francis, an early and pioneering
model for licensing. However, the e-book market place has developed
considerably in recent years with the emergence of e-book aggregators and
the demand from the education community for e-textbooks and core reading
materials.
The Group commissioned the Higher Education Consultancy group to undertake
a feasibility study of the acquisition of e-books in HE libraries and the
future role of the JISC and JISC Collections. The report is available at:
http://www.jisc-collections.ac.uk/projects_and_reports.html
Building upon this report the Group has identified the following areas
where JISC can support institutions in extending the range and access to
collections of relevant e-books.
The Vision
The Libraries and their users - access, platforms and resource
discovery
Changing and developing technologies mean that it is not always easy to
define an e-book. Depending on the nature of the book and the needs of its
users, JISC will need to take a broad view of the definition of an e-book,
while recognising that all formats must adhere to some common standards.
These include:
• Accessibility
• Robust metadata
• Licensing terms and conditions that ensure the e-book can be full
utilised in education and that provision is included for archival access
• Functionality that provides good navigation and usability
• Platform independence where possible
There is a clear role for the JISC in ensuring that the benefits of
complying with these standards are communicated to publishers and
aggregators and to ensure that libraries have information to help inform
decisions. The PALS Interoperability and Metadata Group provides a good
forum for the discussion and development of these emerging standards and
the E-books working group has representation on this group.
Libraries, publishers and aggregators would all benefit by understanding
more about user needs and behaviour across the various disciplines. This
knowledge will inform the development of business models, technologies and
licensing. An aspiration of the Group is to undertake work in this area.
The library community needs reliable information about the availability of
both freely available and subscription based e-books:
• The digitisation and development of e-book resources that are currently
freely available on the web adds a layer of complexity. There is a role for
the JISC in keeping a watching brief on these developments and sharing
findings and knowledge with the education community.
• It is often difficult for libraries to know which books are available in
e-format, which publishers are offering them and on which platforms they
are available. JISC should highlight this paucity of information to
publishers and encourage the development of a comprehensive information
source for e-books.
Emerging technologies which allow for the creation of customised e-books,
sometimes incorporating course specific material raises issues around
intellectual property. There is a role for the JISC and its services in
keeping a watching brief on these developments and advising the community
accordingly.
The E-book Market Place
The market for e-books is immature and there are a wide variety of business
models and conflicting information about user demand. Nonetheless, the
demand for resources to enable effective e-learning to users who are
increasingly distributed is unlikely to decrease. Therefore, the UK
academic community is a potentially large market place for providers of
e-books. JISC Collections must ensure that libraries are able to acquire
the critical mass of relevant books they are going to need at sustainable
prices.
The term remote access is becoming increasingly irrelevant; licensing must
be focused on the users needs. Its not where you are, it's who you are
and how you learn. There is a need to define a new vocabulary and to
develop new business models that are not print based but are relevant to
the digital world.
There will always be a place for the book, but increasingly the divisions
between formats are blurring. There is a need for JISC Collections to work
in the context of the wider JISC strategy and to collaborate with JISC
programmes and the other Working Groups as the format becomes less relevant
in the digital world.
The current market place for e-books is very different to the market place
that saw the emergence of e-journals. Journal publishers had direct
relationship with libraries and this structure enabled initiatives such as
the PSLI. This possibly had the effect of stimulating demand and embedding
the use of e-journals. Although publishers do sell to libraries, in the
context of textbooks and core reading materials, the primary customer is
the academic or student. Many lessons can be learned by looking at how the
e-journal market has developed. The JISC Journals Working group for
example, is experimenting with alternative models such as 'pay per view
converting to subscription' and 'core plus peripheral'. The
findings from these experiments may also have relevance to the e-book
market place.
Libraries want flexibility and choice when building collections of e-books
and do not require material that is not relevant to their users. Just as
academics wish to deposit e-prints in an institutional and subject based
repository, they will also want to deposit teaching materials in
repositories both local and national such as JORUM.
There is development work being undertaken by the JISC which will enhance
access to information for the academic community, enable robust
repositories and cross searching for e-books and associated information
across platforms.
The different routes to market for e-books means that JISC Collections has
a role in talking to publishers, e-book aggregators, book sellers and
subscription agents to facilitate flexible deals and encourage best
practice in the market place. This could include encouraging providers of
e-books to develop metadata and services which allow for chapter level
purchases and appropriate payment models.
The UK academic libraries would like to be able to provide users with core
reading materials. Understandably, publishers have been reluctant to risk
established markets by providing this type of material in e-format.
Consequently, many of the e-books currently available are of low relevance
in education. Capital funding will allow JISC Collections to fund an e-book
project to enable publishers and libraries to experiment and to measure
user behaviour and impacts on traditional publisher revenue streams. Such a
core collection will be limited to a small number of disciplines to ensure
that a critical mass of e-books is available so that user behaviours and
market impact can be fully tested. Such a core collection might include
whole books and chapters.
Further Education
Although focused on HE, the Higher Education Consultancy report identifies
issues that are also relevant to the FE sector. Indeed, the FE sector
perhaps even more requires books that are of high relevance to the
curriculum and support its teaching. There is a need for JISC Collections
to provide the community with a list of e-book publishers and then to
engage with those publishers to negotiate agreements suitable to the needs
of FE. In addition, JISC Collections, through its model licences could
ensure that e-books could be disaggregated into personalised learning
environments.
The FE sector has potential to be a significant purchaser of e-books as it
seeks to support distributed learners, part time learners and those that
require resource that meet accessibility standards. However, as in the HE
sector, there is currently a lack of relevant e-books. Those that are
available are often not focused on the UK curriculum or are out of date.
Should funds permit, the FE sector would warmly welcome a nationally
procured collection of e-books which would allow for experimentation and
have the potential to stimulate demand.
There is a need also for a parallel forum which will enable representatives
from FE to meet with e-book publishers in addition to any such forum for
HE. JISC Collections also needs to develop electronic forums where FE
practitioners can share best practice. Such a forum might well link to the
Intute database where free e-book collections are catalogued (check with
Intute).
Realising the Vision and Role for the JISC and JISC
Collections
• In both sectors librarians struggle to find out about which books are
available in e-format. The JISC can take a lead in discussing with
commercial bibliographic and metadata providers about the need for a
standard catalogue for e-books.
• The demand for e-books and understanding of their potential is uneven
across the sector. JISC Collections can establish a forum for raising
awareness, sharing best practice and liaison with other bodies such as the
HEA. A study of user behaviour will potentially provide empirical evidence
which will raise awareness and shape best practice.
• Libraries require e-books of high relevance which support reading lists
in HE and the core curriculum in FE. There is a clear role for JISC
Collections in coordinating regular meetings that will enable publishers to
better understand the needs of the academic sector both in terms of
content, licensing standards and technology.
• There is also a role for JISC Collections to negotiate with aggregators
and publishers to realise agreements that provide the required content
recognising discipline and sector differences.
• As proposed in the Higher Education Consultancy report, there is a
vicious circle that prevents the supply of up to date e-textbooks and JISC
will sponsor a project. The project will enable libraries to measure the
benefits and potential cost of providing core reading material online to
students; and will enable publishers and aggregators to measure the effect
of such freely available content on the buying behaviours of students.
• JISC Collections will aim to develop pricing models for e-books which are
grounded in the digital world and not based on historical print models.
Such models will be based on providing libraries with the flexibility they
need in order to meet the specific needs of their users.
• JISC should monitor the progress and impact of institutional repositories
on e-books use and the requirements of libraries for archival e-books.