A Skeptic's View of Patron-Driven Acquisitions: Is it Time to ask the Tough Questions?

Sens, Jean-Mark; Fonseca, Anthony J.

doi:10.1080/07317131.2013.818499

Cited by 12 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…It also corrects the library’s fundamentally inefficient model in which librarians guess at what patrons will need. Demand driven acquisition solves the problem of low circulation: most people viewing the literature will be convinced that this model has proved itself on a number of levels, including cost-effective collection development (Sens and Fonseca, 2013, p. 364).…”

Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

To buy or to borrow? Evaluating the cost of an eBook in TalTech library

Kont

2020

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Purpose The purpose of this paper is to find out how much the purchasing and lending of individual electronic books really cost. Additionally, this paper investigates which kind of approach would be cheaper and less time-consuming for library staff as well as library patrons – purchase or short-term loan. Design/methodology/approach This study was conducted at the Tallinn University of Technology (TalTech) Library. This is the only university library in Estonia where the Ebook Central platform is adapted on a large scale. For background information, all statistical data of expenditures and average prices of purchases and short-term loans during April 2013 and December 2018 were calculated and analysed. Through a case study, the time-driven activity-based costing (TDABC) method was used – all activities related to acquisition and lending of eBooks were identified, recorded in detail and analysed. More specifically, the study concerned eBooks offered in the Ebook Central platform and covered purchasing and short-term loan processes, such as receipt of order request, communication with the patron (if necessary) making a purchase or short-term loan, and feedback to the patron. Findings While analysing the results, it appeared there are many additional activities libraries can avoid during the eBook short-term loan process compared to purchasing. As a normality in TalTech library, purchase is always followed by a cataloguing process which increases the time and cost of this process in turn. On the basis of the current study, it can be said that short-term loan is a cheaper way to use eBooks; many activities related to the short-term loan of eBooks take remarkably less staff time and financial resources than eBooks acquisition/purchasing activities. When analysing the literature reviewed as well as collected statistical data, the problem may arise when the decision-maker librarian is not experienced, professional or long-sighted enough to understand the future behaviour of the patron or the usage of the specific eBook. When the usage reaches a certain point, it becomes an indicator of continuing future usage and so it makes sense to purchase the eBook, as the library pays no further charges once an eBook is owned. Originality/value Most studies reviewed by the author are based on the statistical data collected about expenditure, costs, usage, cost-per-use, etc. of short-term loans and purchases. While acquisitions costs, average cost per acquired item per year and cost per usage are easy to identify, it has been difficult to measure associated costs of acquisition, cataloging and circulation. The TDABC methodology seems to be one of the best tools for understanding cost behaviour and refining a cost system for university libraries. Based on the information known to the author, there is no study carried out using the TDABC methodology for analysing costs of eBook programmes.

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Section: Literature Reviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

To buy or to borrow? Evaluating the cost of an eBook in TalTech library

Kont

2020

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“…The study suggested that patron and librarian book selections were more similar in content than expected, but that patrons tended to select titles that were more popular, supplementary, and specialized than librarians did (212-213). Sens and Fonseca (2013) considered PDA as a business model favoring publishers and creating a personal library based on the Amazon giant book-purchasing model that invalidated librarian mediation. England and Anderson (2019) also inquired to what extent academic libraries could focus on individual requests covering patrons' "here and now" needs in relation to the mission of these libraries as repositories of human knowledge (9).…”

Section: Literature Review From Low Circulation To Patron-initiative mentioning

confidence: 99%

Building Collections through Purchase Suggestions in Academic Libraries

Ibacache

2019

Collection Management

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This research studies the fields contained in "Suggest a Purchase" forms from 100 university libraries, focusing on the data they can provide to subject specialists to make decisions about collection development. The research will consider whether the content of "Suggest a Purchase" forms may be used to aid subject specialists and collection development librarians to make decisions concerning the purchasing of books and other materials. Statistical evidence gathered through the "Suggest a Purchase" forms is analyzed to justify the relevancy of specific fields. The research examines whether patron-initiated purchases may offer data concerning collection gaps and trends in users' needs. The paper concludes with recommendations for best practices in the design and content of patron suggestion forms.

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“…34 Sens and Fonseca echo Walters' concerns and wonder if libraries have leaped onto the demand-driven bandwagon without sufficient consideration of its impact on the long-term collection. 35 Another study, which anticipates our current investigation in some respects, created lists of patron-chosen titles and asked the librarian selectors to indicate which of those same titles they would have chosen. The authors concluded that, in many cases, the patrons and the librarians often chose titles of the same level of sophistication and usefulness.…”

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confidence: 99%

The Past, Present, and Future of Demand-Driven Acquisitions in Academic Libraries

Goedeken

Lawson²

2015

CRL

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Demand-driven acquisitions (DDA) programs have become a wellestablished approach toward integrating user involvement in the process of building academic library collections. However, these programs are in a constant state of evolution. A recent iteration in this evolution of ebook availability is the advent of large ebook collections whose contents libraries can lease, but not own only if they choose to do so. This study includes an investigation of patron usage and librarian ebook selection by comparing call number data generated by usage of three entities: (1) an ebrary PDA; (2) Academic Complete, which is a leased collection of ebooks; and (3) subject librarian selections based on the YPB approval plan at Iowa State University. The context is provided through a description of the development and evolution of demand driven acquisitions programs with an analysis of where libraries have been and where they are going with enhancing the collection development in academic libraries.wenty-five years ago, Futas and Vidor raised the question of what "constitutes a good collection."1 Although more than two decades have passed, creating a collection that effectively meets the needs of its patrons remains a core challenge for any library, academic or public. Since the days of Callimachus and the Alexandrian Library, librarians have often struggled to build collections for not only their contemporaries, but also for those individuals who will explore the collection's contents in decades or centuries to come.2 Over the years, diligent collection development librarians endeavored to create a balance between the exhaustiveness suggested by the seventeenth-century French bibliographer Gabriel Naudé, who observed that there was not a book "whatsoever, be it never so bad or disparaged, but may in time be sought for by someone," and the more modern belief of Yale librarian Andrew Keogh, who averred that the "number of volumes in a library means little more than their cubage or their weight; it is appropriateness, it is quality, that counts." 3To assist with the daunting task of keeping pace with the deluge of publishing that accelerated during the years following the Second World War, librarians sought to manage the selection process through the newly invented approval plan approach. The

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A Skeptic's View of Patron-Driven Acquisitions: Is it Time to ask the Tough Questions?

Cited by 12 publications

References 12 publications

To buy or to borrow? Evaluating the cost of an eBook in TalTech library

To buy or to borrow? Evaluating the cost of an eBook in TalTech library

Building Collections through Purchase Suggestions in Academic Libraries

The Past, Present, and Future of Demand-Driven Acquisitions in Academic Libraries

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