Unit 14: Perpetual Access

This unit deals with two unfortunate facts using electronic journal subscriptions and digital information to fill library collections. First, the material is not owned by libraries, so libraries may not continue to have access to material they subscribed to in the past. Second, information stored in digital form can be difficult to preserve. Digital archiving is faced with problems of breakdown and obsolescence of storage media. In addition, some forms of digital information can be very difficult to archive. This includes large multi-faceted objects, e.g. databases, and digital communications, such as blogs.

The Watson chapter in this week's readings observed that many libraries do not make selections based on whether perpetual access will be part of the licensed rights to the material, or inclusion of a print counterpart. Patrons are not as interested in problems of preservation as they are in electronic access to current content. Tight budgets may dictate giving up print+electronic resources in favor of electronic-only resources, if that is less expensive. The chapter gave the example of choosing to subscribe from an aggregator for budgetary reasons, even though aggregators often do not offer perpetual access. Because libraries are under pressure from patron needs and budgets that can interfere with their mission of preservation, third parties are stepping in to fill the gap. Here are some of the organizations that are working to preserve digital information and heritage:

• JSTOR: On its website, JSTOR describes itself as a "not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers and students discover use and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive of over one thousand academic journals and other scholarly content." Libraries subscribe to archived collections held in JSTOR.
• LOCKSS (Lots of Copies Keeps Stuff Safe): LOCKSS is an open source software that libraries can use to store content from publishers. Permission needs to be written into the license by the publisher before the library can deposit content. The LOCKSS software crawls the publisher site to pull in content. Libraries have perpetual access to content, and the presence of multiple copies helps with preservation.
  
• Portico: A centralized storage service. Participating libraries and publishers pay a fee to deposit content. Access terms are vague. Is better as a preservation model than a perptual access model
  
• Google Book Search: Massive digitization project through Google. Preservation librarians do not necessarily feel that relying on Google Books is good preservation practice, because G-digitized books have been seen to have digitization errors. Also, Google is a for-profit company which may have long-term drawbacks for preservation issues.
• PubMed Central (PMC): From its website, PMC is "The U.S. National Institutes of Health free digital archive of biomedical and life sciences journal literature. Archives content from some online journals and provides it free of change
  

The Stemper & Barribeau article talked about the difference between perpetual access rights and archiving rights. Perpetual access means that you can continue to access a copy of the item, but not necessarily make and store your own copy. Archiving rights allow you to make your own copy.
The article spends time talking about the difference between Portico and LOCKSS, which I am still a little unclear on. Both provide the means to archive material, and both are founded by the Mellon Foundation. LOCKSS is a distributed system, while Portico is a centralized system. Libraries can use either. LOCKSS has looser control, and is less expensive. Publishers and libraries must pay annual fee to deposit into Portico. Portico restricts access to material, unless there is a trigger event, such as a natural disaster. I guess I would say that LOCKSS represents perpetual access/archiving, while Portico is archiving/conditional access.
Through surveys, the authors found that the majority of libraries do ask for perpetual access, but are willing to subscribe without it. The goal of the paper was to find out how many licenses included clauses for perpetual access. The UW-Madison and University of Minnesota have a policy of asking for perpetual access if it is not included in the license. (Note--just these two? Why does the study mention UW-Madison, when it used data from U of Minnesota?) The study of licenses signed by University of Minnesota. It found that the majority of publishers will offer perpetual access, and commercial publishers are more likely than scholarly publishers to offer it.


The lessons that I take from the readings are that librarians that work with electronic resources should be aware of access and preservation issues, and what the difference is between access and preservation. Publishers are not naturally interested in either, unless there are dollar signs or useful services attached. It falls to libraries to push for perpetual access to subscribed material, putting pressure on publishers to provide it. Third party programs like LOCKSS are good way to combine issues of preservation and perpetual access, while programs like Portico are a good way to lure publishers into depositing their material for archival, by providing a backup to their material and a secure location to keep it in.


References:
Jennifer Watson (2008) “Preservation Concerns in the E-Resources Environment” in Maria D.D. Collins and Patrick L. Carr (Eds) Managing the Transition from Print to Electronic Journals and Resources. New York: Routledge, pp 45-63.
2. Library of Congress Speaker Series: Eileen Fenton “Portico: An Electronic Archiving Service” 45 minute video http://www.loc.gov/today/cyberlc/feature_wdesc.php?rec=3863
3. Stemper, J. & Barribeau, S. (2006). “Perpetual Access to Electronic Journals: A Survey of One Academic Research Library‟s Licenses.” Library Resources & Technical Services, 50(2), 91-109.
4. Seadle, Michael1 (2006). “A Social Model for Archiving Digital Serials: LOCKSS.” Serials Review, 32(2), 73-77.