We had an interesting meeting between eLib on demand projects (mainly)
and publishers last week. There was much of interest that came from it,
and perhaps we will get some sort of report mounted soon.
However, the most urgent result from me was a comment from a couple of
publishers (well, one comment and another agreed) that some eLib projects
have not helped themselves when asking for rights. One at least has just
sent a short request asking for rights for certain electronic copying of
materials. They suggested that it would be very helpful to them if a
reasonable amount of background material is included, at least at first
contact, giving information on issues like insitutions involved, the
nature of the project, details of protection for the information etc. I
think this approach might help to overcome some of the suspicion with
which requests have been viewed.
Only a week or so ago I was contacted by a publishers rights person who
wanted to know about a project. She was not well informed or
technologically aware, and so would have needed a lot of information
before she would have felt comfortable clearing rights.
No doubt we are gradually educating the community, but I think it only
fair and courteous that we provide information like this wherever possible.
--
Chris Rusbridge
Programme Director, Electronic Libraries Programme
The Library, University of Warwick, Coventry CV4 7AL, UK
Phone 01203 524979 Fax 01203 524981
Email [log in to unmask]
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