NEWS
Support for international digital lending campaign
CILIP and CILIP in Scotland have signed an international statement backing calls for changes to the cur- rent digital lending model. The joint statement from US-based Library Futures and the UK’s eBookSOS campaign seeks to find new ways to deliver access to digital content through libraries. The aims of the two organisations are to create fairer licensing agreements, deliver copyright laws that meet the needs of the digital age and to be able to deliver access to informa- tion and knowledge however it is held. The statement reads: “Libraries have historically been society’s great equaliser, providing free access to knowledge to all citizens, regardless of their ability to pay, education, identity, or physical ability. But today libraries are being challenged: as we transition from physical media to digital, the rights of libraries to provide digital access to information and preserve materials for the future is under attack. “Proprietary publishers do not respect
the balance provided by copyright law, as they refuse to sell ebooks and audio- books to libraries, sue to halt the common library practice of controlled digital lend- ing, and charge exorbitant prices for ebooks and e-resources in the education, health services, and public library markets. This is affecting researchers and our economy in turn, as access to digital material has iron- ically become more difficult than access to the analogue.” It also sets out seven principles that it believes should be implemented to ensure sustainable access to knowledge and infor- mation. These are:
l Copyright must be updated for the digital age and exceptions and limitations must be made for libraries to best serve the public;
l Controlled Digital Lending and other innovative lending practices should be legally protected;
l Digital first sale, the principle of exhaustion in intellectual property law,
and ownership of digital objects is the only way to ensure full access to information by libraries and cultural institutions;
l Libraries should be able to purchase and lend all e-resources at reasonable prices;
l Licensing has created a pervasive market failure that must be investigated by regulators and governments to ensure that the public has access to relevant, timely, published information to support education, research and economic growth;
l Libraries have a responsibility to advocate for policies that will affect their communities;
l We must achieve ideal, universal access to knowledge for all patrons regardless of socioeconomic status, identity, or ability.
Individuals or organisations can sign the International Statement of Solidarity by visiting
https://bit.ly/31ML3eu.
Pearson short-notice hike in ebook price
UNIVERSITY libraries and campaigners have criticised a huge across-the-board rise in ebook prices, announced at short notice by the textbook publisher Pear- son.
In a press statement Pearson said:
“As of December, we will be launching revised library pricing and access mod- els to align with the new realities of the ebook market,” saying this was based on “feedback from the market” which “indicates that many university libraries
are now purchasing limited quantities of ebook user licenses to fulfil entire course adoption requirements.” It said “a perpetual single concurrent user licence for a £50 print book will be priced at £225” and that Three and Five Concurrent User Access would be “priced at a multiple of 2.75 times and 5CU at a multiple of 4.5.” A Tweet from the University of York Library said: “This morning we’re franti- cally trying to process an unexplained 500 per cent (you read that right: five hundred
per cent) rise from a publisher who pro- vides over 5,000 ebooks. We have one week’s notice for the increase.” Johanna Anderson from the Academic ebook Investigation, or #ebooksos, said: “Pearson were one of the few publishers with ebook prices that mirrored their hard- copy prices… With many libraries having budgeted for the year ahead already, the timing of this increase pulls the rug from under the feet of those ever more thinly spread budgets.”
Save the date for Conference 2022
THE date has been set for 2022’s CILIP Conference and Expo, which returns as an in-person event. Taking place in Liverpool on 7 and 8
July, the conference will be an opportu- nity to network with colleagues and hear from some of the leading voices from
December 2021
the information, Knowledge management and library sector. Every year CILIP confer- ence brings together delegates and speakers from every sector of the profession, provid- ing an opportunity to share knowledge and discover the latest insights. More details on speakers, sessions and
events for the two-day conference will be revealed in the new year. Look out for interviews and the latest conference news in Information Professional. Tickets will go on sale next year, but anyone wanting to attend can register now for updates by visiting
https://bit.ly/3oAvNdu.
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