National Licensing Forum

DRAFT Minutes of the meeting held 8 December 2004

Conference Room, National Library of Australia

Present:
Jan Fullerton National Library (Chair)
Warwick Cathro National Library
Jasmine Cameron National Library
Evelyn Woodberry Council of Australian University Librarians
Anne-Marie Schwirtlich Council of Australian State Libraries
Lynn Fletcher TAFE Libraries Australia
Susan Magnay ALIA
Moyra McAllister ALIA
John Binnion Gulliver
Karen Vitullo Australian Government Libraries Information Network
Pru Mitchell Australian School Libraries Association
Anne Baly Department of Education, Science and Training
Diane Costello CAUL
Lindsay Harris Health Libraries Australia
Jerelynn Brown NSW.net/State Library of NSW
Tania Paull PLAIN
Roxanne Missingham National Library
Julie Whiting National Library
Sandra Henderson National Library (minutes)
Fiona Rigby EPIC
John Arfield WAGUL
Sally-Anne Leigh CSIRO
Steve O'Connor CAVAL
Jill More ARLIS/ANZ
Rob Wooding Department of Health and Ageing
Fran Wilson National Library

Apologies: Public Libraries Australia; Department of Communications, Information Technology and the Arts.

Introductory remarks
Jan Fullerton opened the meeting, explaining that this meeting on site licensing was proposed at the 2003 Peak Bodies meeting. The ultimate aim of the meeting is to improve access to resources by all Australians who wish to use them. The Senate report on the Role of Libraries in the Online Environment included a recommendation that the National Library be funded to implement some national site licensing, but the Government has indicated this is not on their agenda (see the Government response to the Senate report).

There is some level of confusion about the term 'national site licensing'. It is unlikely that there are many products for which a national site license would be appropriate. The needs of various library sectors differ considerably, and a range of approaches will be needed to achieve the best outcome. This may mean broadening the base of some existing consortia, so that smaller libraries not covered by consortia can gain access to resources.

EPIC
Fiona Rigby, Manager of the EPIC service led by the National Library of New Zealand, gave a presentation on the history, operations and future of the service. The EPIC service was preceded by the PER:NA proof of concept project. Following the Request for Proposal stage, a team which included representatives of each user sector negotiated licences for Gale and EBSCO products. Any New Zealander is able to make use of these products, through their academic, public, special or school library. There are currently 176 libraries registered to use the service, with the lowest registration rate (around 30%) in the special library sector.

The service is self-funding. The costing model has 10 bands, each determined on varying mixes of collection budget and population base factors. The model will be reviewed at the end of 12 months.

Governance is the responsibility of the EPIC Governance Group (EGG), which represents the various types of libraries in the service. The National Library is the host agency, and maintains the contracts with libraries and with vendors. The partnership with vendors is seen as very important, and performance clauses in the vendor contracts have ensured a high level of responsiveness to users' needs.

Training is a high priority task, to build the skills base around the country.

In response to a query from Diane Costello about non-participants, Fiona said a variety of factors can be identified, including a lack of suitable technology and funding.

Pru Mitchell commented that for schools the situation is much more complex here in Australia, with public, Catholic and independent schools, administered at state or local levels.

ALIA
Moyra McAllister introduced ALIA's paper for the meeting, indicating that ALIA has been active in this area. The Purchasing and Consortia Reference Group has been running for two years, and their forums bring libraries and suppliers together. CIPS (Co-operative Information Purchasing Services) was launched to achieve favourable purchasing arrangements for ALIA institutional members, especially smaller libraries, but has not been very successful, with very poor take-up. The user base is a diverse one, and it is difficult to find products that suit everyone.

Many Australians already have access to a wide range of electronic resources, but few are aware of this. Many people, for example, do not know what is available through their local public library. Not enough resources are invested in awareness and training programs for librarians and users. ALIA is also active in lobbying for improved infrastructure, particularly in regional areas, and is putting effort into ensuring the needs of libraries and their users are taken into account in the National Broadband Strategy.

While some present at the meeting believed interlibrary loan is declining because so much is now available online, Moyra said the issue keeps coming up in the ALIA forums, and many smaller libraries cannnot afford to access electronic resources.

There is an issue with the availability of interlibrary loans from electronic resources. While most licences permit such use, institutional practices or a lack of awareness by relevant staff often prevent such copying. Eve Woodberry asked if the smaller libraries make use of commercial document suppliers.

Moyra replied that some do, but many don't, and very urgent requests are not well catered for. Jill More said many small libraries would know little if anything about commercial suppliers. Fiona Rigby was asked about promotion of EPIC in New Zealand, and replied that there was only limited promotion, which was aimed at libraries, not users.

Jan Fullerton asked about infrastructure issues. Karen Vitullo said that the Australian Bureau of Statistics is looking at different ways of releasing data from the 2006 Census, because of the improved availability of broadband. Eve Woodberry said the availability of adequate infrastructure was still very patchy. The University of New England has set up a number of access centres in a number of very small centres, to assist its students in those areas.M

There appeared to be widespread agreement that any national licensing should focus on Australian resources.

AGLIN
Karen Vitullo spoke about the consortium being set up by AGLIN. They are examining models for its operation, and regard key products as those with Australian content. It is important that CEOs of the organisations in AGLIN see any investment in electronic library resources as good value.

A slide outlining the issues pointed to:

  • What are areas of national priority and common interest? - products, lobbying vendors
  • What are the options for a national site licence or nationally brokered deals?
  • How can we demonstrate return on investment for a NSL to our CEOs?
  • How can we improve availability and access to Australian content?
  • What opportunities are there for funding a NSL?

There is a high degree of overlap between the products being considered by the AGLIN consortium and those available through the CASL consortium. The AGLIN list is:

  • the INFORMIT suite;
  • Management information;
  • News content (particularly Australian);
  • Australian statistics (e.g., AusStats);
  • Business directories;
  • Kinetica end-user access;
  • General reference sources (e.g., Crown Content, xreferplus); and
  • Australian Standards.

In response to a question about the inclusion of agencies which do not have a library, Karen responded that AGLIN represents Australian government libraries, as well as parent departments and agencies. The question of funding models was raised. In CAUL self funding has proved to be a sustainable model. Gulliver is self funding, with all libraries paying a base fee, with additional payments based on population size and usage., although there is a cap on total payments. Steve O'Connor commented that consortia funding which relies on members taking up offers, rather than compulsory payments by all members, may not always be successful.

The nature of the relationships with vendors was mentioned. In EPIC, the need for increased New Zealand content is important, and the local vendor representatives find that with the high level of commitment to EPIC shown by the library sector, they are in a better position to ask parent companies in the US to add more New Zealand content.

In the university sector, paying up-front has not been so successful. The UK and Canada have both moved to opt-in models, and CAUL operates successfully in this way. CAUL's negotiating position with vendors tends to be to agree a price for an agreed number of subscribers.

A discussion about the "big deal" journal arrangements noted that the selection process for individual/selected titles, as opposed to a package, is expensive for both libraries and vendors, and no vendors can supply all titles on a given wish list, as evidenced by the trial conducted by the California State University. There may, however, be some need for publishers to provide further breakdown of large packages.

Eve Woodberry said that the final model could well be a national licence for a limited range of content, and other arrangements by various groups sitting under that.

Health Libraries Australia
Lindsay Harris spoke about the situation in health. In all states except South Australia health consortia were formed which were not library-based, and which were preceded by little or no user consultation. Some of these have proved unsustainable. An opt-in/opt-out model in South Australia, with a strong library base, is more sustainable. Australian content is not such a high priority in the health sector, although it is still important. In the past the sharing of ideas and consultation between the states has not been high. A national forum allowing regular consultation between users and vendors, about such matters as licence conditions, is essential. This need not be as formal as an Australian arm of ICOLC.

ARLIS/ANZ
Jill More spoke about the situation faced by many small libraries. In the art sector, art museums and independent researchers are particularly disadvantaged. The 2003 survey of visual arts libraries revealed that the cost of electronic resources is beyond the means of smaller libraries. Possible options suggested at the Visual Arts Forums included joining larger consortia, or organising a multi-site licence. Following the Visual Arts Forum, the library of the Art Gallery of South Australia joined the CASL Consortium on a trial basis, to make use of Grove Art Online. The experiment was discontinued because the Gallery could not afford the reduced subscription available through the CASL Consortium.

A national site licence for Informit would be useful, but for subject-specific resources a user-pays model may be the way to go. For important electronic resources, the cost should be included in the core budget, not regarded as an add-on. Diane Costello said that the university libraries are continuing to work on the issue of walk-in access to electronic resources. In some cases where walk-in access is permitted in licence conditions, individual institutions still require authentication, and remote access remains a problem in many cases.

John Arfield commented that the vendors must also look at this issue - if they want to sell products to small libraries they must develop models which facilitate this.

Lindsay Harris said that there are some alternate models emerging. The recent US proposal requiring National Institutes of Health-funded research to be made available on free sites after six months is an example. However, the open access sites are not always user-friendly or easy to navigate. There is still strong demand in academia for research to appear in peer-reviewed journals, although the situation is changing slowly.

Jerelynn Brown added that the State Library of New South Wales offers pay-for-use services through ILANET. Moyra McAllister said her company uses these for subject areas where they do not need to always have information at hand, such as medicine. Roxanne Missingham pointed out that many vendors are not willing to consider pay-per-search access models, although Diane Costello pointed out that some vendors have such a facility on their own site, even if it is not available to subscribers.

Gulliver
In the absence of a Public Libraries Australia representative, John Binnion from Gulliver was invited to give a brief outline of how that consortium operated.

Gulliver is not and opt-in service - all 44 Victorian public library services belong to the consortium, and are charged a base fee with a further payment based on population and usage. There is a maximum charge of $16,000, and total fees paid are $350,000. There is an opt-in service (BRUCE) which members can subscribe to separately.

The ACT Library and Information Service has approached Gulliver about joining, and WA is investigating a partnership arrangement. Gulliver is also willing to explore opportunities for collaboration with NSW.

CASL
Anne-Marie Schwirtlich put forward three ideas about how to move forward:
1. in the short term, the formation of an Australian ICOLC;
2. in the medium term, working with successful sectoral models to come up with a broader model which might work across sectors; and
3. longer term, development of a business case to support further lobbying on the ECITA report.

CAUL
Eve Woodberry explained that CAUL has been organising cooperative deals for its members for about ten years. There are now a number of non-university organisations covered by the CEIRC arrangements, and subscribing to the datasets list to exchange information.

Eve stated that one of the initial tasks must be to define what is meant by national site licensing, who the audience it, and what the requirements might be for negotiating a licence. Diane Costello attends meetings of ICOLC, which sometimes brings a vendor in for an intensive session about products and business models. Vendors are also occasionally invited to CEIRC meetings, to provide information about their products and proposals. Diane added that CEIRC doesn't always get everything it wants from vendors.

Jan Fullerton asked if the meeting wanted to recommend that a regular forum be set up, as a means of exchanging information and interacting with vendors. Lindsay Harris said it was essential such a forum not be along similar lines to the ALIA forums - the new body must not be seen as a professional development opportunity open to all, but rather, organisations must be called on to nominate representatives.

ACTIONS
1. The National Library of Australia will convene a meeting of existing consortia in mid-2005 to consider the establishment of an annual forum for the exchange of information and discussion of issues of mutual concern at the national level.
2. The meeting in mid-2005 will consider the establishment of an annual roundtable between consortia, vendors and publishers to discuss issues such as licensing, access levels, copyright and pricing structures.

Anne Baly raised the issue of support for national site licensing at a government level. Jan Fullerton responded that the National Library is very aware of the realities. Anne-Marie Schwirtlich said the government must realise that such initiatives are essential if Australia's population is to be informed and educated. John Arfield proposed that a self-funded project be put in place, and Anne Baly agreed that demonstrated demand is the way to bring the issue to the attention of government. Jan Fullerton said that a group needed to be convened to look at possible content and audience for a national site licence.

ACTION
3. The Australian Government Libraries Information Network will facilitate a reference group of existing consortia who will develop a proposal for a core set of Australian electronic resources for a self-funded national site license, to be provided through the library sector to its users. The reference group will also define the audience for this core dataset.

Pru Mitchell reminded the meeting that it is also important that existing arrangements for access to electronic resources be promoted.

ACTION
4. The Australian Library and Information Association will develop a strategy for promotion to the public of the availability of electronic resources in libraries.

Warwick Cathro gave a brief explanation of the reasons for the recent CASL information access forum in Adelaide. Eric Wainwright (with assistance from some other attendees) was given the task of preparing an action plan based on the discussions at that meeting.

ALIA was encouraged to continue to pursue the goal of ensuring library concerns are addressed in the National Broadband Strategy.

ACTION
5. The Australian Library and Information Association will continue to pursue the inclusion of library interests in the National Broadband Strategy as recommended in the Senate ECITA report Libraries in the online environment (Recommendation 7).

The issue of awareness of existing electronic resource availability was discussed further. AskNow is a good way of promoting electronic resources, although it is limited by the lack of access by schools to the subscription resources. Lynn Fletcher said it is TAFE students as well as school students who are unable to access these resources. There is a very wide range of interests and literacy levels among VET students, and it is a challenge to provide appropriate resources.

ACTION
6. The Australian Library and Information Association will develop a strategy for increasing the awareness amongst library staff of electronic resources and for providing training to support library staff in the use of these resources.

Jan Fullerton asked whether the needs of smaller libraries such as those represented by Jill More from ARLIS/ANZ had been addressed. Jill said that there needs to be further exploration of the possibilities of collaboration between state libraries and state art gallery libraries. Eve Woodberry said it would also be useful for those smaller libraries to talk to CEIRC.

Some further work on "pay-per-search" options needs to be done. One of the great benefits of a true national site licence would be school student access - which would make students more informed users into the future, but could also be used in literacy programs.

There was a brief discussion of the issue of budgets, which in small libraries in particular often don't allow for electronic subscriptions. Jan Fullerton said that there needs to be some clear thinking about what expenditure achieves the best outcomes for the users, rather than the librarians.

Sally-Anne Leigh indicated that within CSIRO there is interest in the issue of archiving and preservation of electronic resources, to assure access into the future, and this issue will be considered for the agenda of the next meeting, which will be in about six months.

Summary of Action Items.

1. The National Library of Australia will convene a meeting of existing consortia in mid-2005 to consider the establishment of an annual forum for the exchange of information and discussion of issues of mutual concern at the national level.

2. The meeting in mid-2005 will consider the establishment of an annual roundtable between consortia, vendors and publishers to discuss issues such as licensing, access levels, copyright and pricing structures.

3. The Australian Government Libraries Information Network will facilitate a reference group of existing consortia who will develop a proposal for a core set of Australian electronic resources for a self-funded national site license, to be provided through the library sector to its users. The reference group will also define the audience for this core dataset.

4. The Australian Library and Information Association will develop a strategy for promotion to the public of the availability of electronic resources in libraries.

5. The Australian Library and Information Association will continue to pursue the inclusion of library interests in the National Broadband Strategy as recommended in the Senate ECITA report Libraries in the online environment (Recommendation 7).

6. The Australian Library and Information Association will develop a strategy for increasing the awareness amongst library staff of electronic resources and for providing training to support library staff in the use of these resources.

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