All posts by brl22

Changes to short term loan e-book access

Following recent publisher price increases and discussions about access to patron-driven (short term loan) e-books, Library Support Services has made some changes to the profile we maintain through EBL. We have removed all titles published up until 2012 that have not been used in the past year. This amounts to just over 20,000 titles which has approximately halved the size of the profile. In addition to this, we have lifted the price cap for mediated short term loans from $US30 to $US40. We also previously autopurchased anything that had been loaned more than 7 times. This limit has been reduced to 5 loans and any decision to purchase outright will be mediated (to allow us the chance of considering other options including non-DRM e-book options instead of EBL). Library Support Services continues to monitor how well patron-driven e-book purchasing is working and welcomes comments at any stage. Tim Stedman.

Changes coming to EBL e-book textbook model

From EBL “We are pleased to inform you that in early August EBL will be moving from the Textbook lending model to a 3-user model.
The 3-user lending model will increase patron access to titles, by reducing the likelihood of turnaways. 3-user titles have a limit of three concurrent users. Concurrent use is determined by time spent in the Online Reader, not by loan length. In addition, libraries are able to permit downloads while preserving online access to popular titles. Upon launch, all existing Textbook titles – including owned titles – will become 3-user titles. Titles previously purchased in the Textbook model will now be more accessible to your patrons with no additional cost to you. Additional information regarding this change will be sent to you in mid-July”

(Note: this change doesn’t affect titles we own/make available through the non-linear lending model; they remain multiple user access)

Training licence requests – change of procedure

As part of discussions about the management and support of our electronic resources, it has been agreed that requesting training licences from vendors will be managed by the Information Resource Coordinators in the Resource Acquisition team (Wendy and Peter) from now on. Please send any requests for training licences to acquisitions@libr.canterbury.ac.nz instead of E-Services. The Electronic Resources SOP has been updated to reflect this change. Thanks, Tim Stedman

New Zealand index – some changes coming

From Knowledge-Basket – An invitation to take a look at the New Zealand Index on the test TKB website/search engine (and the behind-the-scenes-super-servers)

Estimated timeframe is mid March 2014

If you’ve had a look already you will have found that the search system is lightning-fast and provides a few great new features (load more records, exclude records from the results screen, get results in reverse date order…)

The website is clean and modern, happily adapts itself to mobile devices, and provides a lot more flexibility for adding updates/news/blogs. It’s still in development stages but will soon be put out for wider testing before our official launch.

To re-cap, the New Zealand Index:
• is a collection of 16 indexes and bibliographies (and we’re adding new collections as they become available see below)
• includes many gems – from the NZ Science Indexes to the full text of the NZ Herald Classified Personals (updated daily)
• also includes all of the National Library’s INNZ records
• users can select specific collections or search the whole suite in one go
• continues to be a must-have for New Zealand libraries

Next to be added to the New Zealand Index:
• Waikato Index of more than 4,000 records (thanks to Hamilton Libraries this extensive index will be up and running shortly)
• and… the Publications New Zealand collection (the National Library’s record of publications from, or about, New Zealand)
• and… our databases are a collaborative effort – we’re always keen to explore new relationships with suppliers (i.e. libraries, publishers, indexers, authors)

You can go straight to http://test.knowledge-basket.co.nz and take it from there.

Additional e-book choices available for selecting through GOBI

Of interest to Liaison librarians and Acquisitions people – we are adding more e-book suppliers available for purchasing from through our GOBI account. IGI Global E-books has recently been added as a supplier along with Elsevier. More will be added as they become available, we are hoping to add Wiley and Sage soon as options. The publisher versions are often worth checking out as they may have less DRM restrictions you get e.g. with EBL. Where available they should show up when you search on GOBI and you can make selections through GOBI or via EDIFACT ordering. I will put details of the purchase codes necessary for Acquisitions separate to this message on the LSS wiki. An example with Elsevier is given below. Tim Stedman
 GOBI selections