Transcript Slide 1

User/Patron Driven Ebook Collection
Development
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Tony Ferguson, Gayle
Chan, and Janny Lai
University of Hong
Kong Libraries
http://www.thelessonfilm.com/images/st
udent_driver.jpg
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What is user-driven ebook collection
development?
A library or consortia buys only those books
which readers read, not those which
someone else thinks they will want to read.
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Motivation for Libraries Using User Driven
Model for Selecting E-books Same as for
Libraries Not Using this Technique
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Surveys show students prefer web based
information
Students are on the web, e-books are there too
Allows libraries in a consortia to leverage their
buying power – share costs
Allows libraries to share monographs with other
libraries in ways printed books cannot be shared
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Case Study: European Organization
for Nuclear Research
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Why did they employ this technique?
They wanted books from multiple publishers,
only those read by their physics, math,
engineering and computing researchers, and
to pay only for what was read.
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Case Study: European Organization
for Nuclear Research (Cont’d)
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How did they do it?
Contracted with EBL, loaded records for likely
titles, reader gets to read free for five minutes,
upon hitting that mark they borrow the book,
after two borrows CERN buys the book.
They buy books for a year at a time.
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Case Study: European Organization
for Nuclear Research (Cont’d)
Results:
They are pleased and amazed with the
range of books bought and the amount of
use.
http://doc.cern.ch/archive/electronic/cern/preprints/open/open-2007001.doc
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Case Study: OCLC Corporate
Library, USA
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Why did they employ use this technique?
85% of the materials added to their corporate
library are the result of direct user requests: “if
one person wanted it, others might also.”
How did they do it?
Loaded management, computer science,
technology and library science bibliographic
entries in catalogue and bought them when
read.
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Case Study: OCLC Corporate
(Cont’d)
Library, USA
Results:
Books read multiple times – not just once.
Staff continued to go into NetLibrary through
other channels for non work related
reasons – more than for work related
reasons – very difficult to predict what
readers will want to read.
E-books case study: The OCLC Library. Lawrence Olszewski, Director
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Case Study: Marion County Multitype Library Consortium, USA
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Why use this technique?
“most of the use of a book collections is generated
by a small percentage of the collection – the 80/20
rule”
“that the best predictor of the future use of a title is
past use”
“the ability to purchase only needed books at the
time of need should be more efficient that selecting
titles in the traditional manner”
How did they do it?
Loaded NetLibrary records, bought what was
needed.
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Case Study: Marion County Multitype Library Consortium, USA(Cont’d)
Results:
Readers bought too much, adjusted buying trigger,
went along successfully until NetLibrary changed
policy and required multiple copies, consortium
couldn’t afford this model and stopped in 2006.
Only about 50% of titles read resulted in a purchase.
Books continue to be read. Many purchased out-ofprofile books, e.g., 355 Complete Idiots Guides.
David W. Lewis. The Marion County Internet Library and E-Books: The Experience of a Multi-type Library
Consortium
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Case Study: Swinburne University
of Technology, Australia
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Why this technique:
“. . . Scarce monograph materials budgets are
wasted on materials for which our predictors or
instincts filed us – books which no one will read.
We will spend a not insignificant amount of time
and effort in adding them to our collections, and
after however many years of inactivity, removing
them again.”
How did they do it:
Loaded records, paid borrowing charge for first
and second uses but then bought at 3rd use.
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Case Study: Swinburne University
(Cont’d)
of Technology, Australia
Results:
75% of purchased books have been
subsequently read. By way of contrast, of 24
titles manually purchased have been
subsequently read at least 3 times.
Gary Hardy, Tony Davies. Letting the patrons choose – using EBK
as a method for unmediated acquisition of ebook materials.
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Case Study: HKU libraries and the
CCDM Consortia
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Why this technique employed?
Less expensive to purchase only that which
is read and cheaper to split costs with 4
other libraries than to go it alone.
How did they do it?
Libraries loaded all NetLibrary records and
paid after two free uses.
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Case Study: HKU libraries and the
(Cont’d)
CCDM Consortia
Results:
Too successful. Readers read too much and
other library partners unwilling to pay the bills
plus some libraries saw this as abrogating
selection responsibility.
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The Results of Patron Driven VS Librarian
Driven Selection Compared
Subjects
Pre 06
CCDM
Titles
Access
Per Title
Taiwan/H
K Titles
Access
Per Title
Difference
Business,
Economics and
Management
3,487
2.87
9,034
1.72
1.16
Medicine
1,336
2.97
4,125
2.34
0.63
Biology and Life
Sciences
330
2.60
1,103
1.43
1.17
Social Sciences:
General
2,497
2.04
3,617
2.24
-0.20
Literature
1,411
1.31
4,312
0.62
0.69
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What does this data tell us?
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Not all subjects result in the same use
patterns
User selected e-books generally out
circulate librarian selected ones
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The Future of the User Driven Model:
Issues
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Publisher pressures to get back to one
library, one copy, way of doing
business (It killed the printed scholarly
monograph, let’s see how fast it can kill
the scholarly e-monograph).
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The Future of the User Driven Model:
(Cont’d)
Issues
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Desire of libraries to buy new imprints,
once they get beyond the initial
decision to buy a few thousand (for
Chinese e-books, a few tens of
thousands) stage of building an e-book
collection. Can publishers and
vendors produce?
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The Future of the User Driven Model:
(Cont’d)
Issues
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Can libraries get away from buying
books, a high percentage of which won’t
be read, and move money to the userdriven model? – They can’t do both at
the same time.
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