[NHC list] Alarming Jrnl Pricing

[Eileen Mathias]

To add another point of view:

The systematics scientists on our staff prefer paper copies, and so does the library, for a couple of reasons.  This applies to taxonomy journals, rather than biology journals generally:

1)  They feel illustrations, graphs, photographs, etc. are clearer in the paper copies.  This is not generally true anymore, since current reproductions, largely pdf, are very good in quality, but this has certainly been a concern until recently.  Although some electronic journals are of better quality than others.

2)  The main concern is longevity.  Our library includes paper materials (books) from the 1500's that are still very legible and useable, and our scientists use them constantly.  What will JSTOR or BioOne look like in 500 years?  Will the electronic publications of today still be accessible?  It's hard to know without a crystal ball, but I know the paper copy will still be here.  In regards to taxonomy, more so than other sciences, longevity is of utmost importance.

Fortunately, most, but not all, of the taxonomy journals are fairly inexpensive compared to others.  However, we are struggling financially and cut our periodicals budget by 40% last year.  Although our library is a magnificent repository of older materials, it has become more and more difficult for us to maintain the completeness of our collections.

Eileen Mathias

  






Eileen C. Mathias
Information Services Librarian &
Coordinator, Albert M Greenfield Digital
  Imaging Center for Collections
Ewell Sale Stewart Library
The Academy of Natural Sciences
1900 Benjamin Franklin Parkway
Philadelphia, PA  19103
215-299-1140
215-299-1144 FAX
mathias at acnatsci.org