During the 2003-2004 fiscal year, approximately $600,000 was spent on around 16,000 books, according to Min-Huei Lu, the head of monographic acquisitions. However, for the 2005-2006 fiscal year, which ends on Apr. 1st, approximately $400,000 was allocated for new monographic acquisitions, all but $15,000 of which has been spent, Lu said. This reflects an approximate one-third drop in the actual acquisitions budget. This means simply that as E-journal costs go up, the budget for new materials goes down. The reason for this shrinking budget is the rise in cost of electronic resources, Lu said. While printed materials are still being acquired on behalf of the humanities and social sciences at Stony Brook University, the sciences prefer the electronic journals and databases that are becoming more prevalent in their fields, she said. The problem is that the subscription rates don’t always match the rate of inflation. E-journal prices rise an estimated 10 percent faster than budget adjustments, Nathan Baum, the assistant director for electronic resources and services, said...."Our first commitment is to the serials," said [Dean and Director of Libraries Christian Filstrup].
Posted by
Peter Suber at 4/22/2006 09:52:00 AM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
