In message <[log in to unmask]> on Wed, 23 Apr
1997, Mr C A Rusbridge <[log in to unmask]> writes
>Pay per view is deprecated by some and eagerly sought by others. It seems
>to depend on whether your budget can easily accommodate the (possibly
>large) subscription. One wonders how much more use there might be of some
>of the datasets which the Data Centres run on CHEST subscriptions for us,
>if there was an option for 'pay per view' pricing. This debate is going on
>within CEI on aspects of pricing policy; contact Mike Tedd if you have
>comments.
It's also worth remembering that there is an increasing number of people
like us who no longer work for academic organisations. We need to use
these databases from time to time, but not often enough to justify an
annual subscription (even if CHEST were to allow us to subscribe). I'm
sure that the same must apply to many academic institutions which cannot
justify annual subscriptions to every database.
I could go to a broker, but the time and additional cost would be
substantial. More importantly, I would lose the opportunity to do a
search at the moment when the need arose and to develop it interactively
in the light of what is found.
"Pay per view" would seem to be the answer, and I hope that this will
develop as a publicly-available service. It already works for services
like "Uncover" for delivery of full text, so I hope that work on making
small payments electronically will allow more information to be made
available on this basis.
Naturally, though, I don't look forward to having to pay for what is
currently available free!
Leonard Will
--
Willpower Information (Partners: Dr Leonard D Will, Sheena E Will)
Information Management Consultants Tel: +44 181 372 0092
27 Calshot Way, Enfield, Middlesex, EN2 7BQ, UK Fax: +44 181 372 0094
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