Symposium "Towards the Reform of Scholarly Information Distribution 4 : New contract models of some major publishers after the Big Deal" held

picture of sysmposium
The Japan Association of National University Libraries held their forth symposium on "Towards the Reform of Scholarly Information Distribution" under the title of "New contract models of some major publishers after the Big Deal" at Tetsumon Memorial Hall, University of Tokyo on January 18, 2011. This forth symposium aimed to know the trend of publishers about new models for the electronic journal contract, and to discuss on the policy and future of the contract which national university libraries will be able to adopt. About 120 library directors and senior administrators participated.

After the opening address by President Furuta Motoo (University Librarian of University of Tokyo Library), Mr. Ojiro Koichi (Director of Information Management Division, University of Tokyo Library) reported the activity of the AdHoc Committee for the Reform of Scholarly Information Distribution and outlined the new consortium which will be set up in April, 2011 based on the cooperation between the library associations of the national, public and private university libraries, and the National Institute of Informatics.

Afterwards, the persons in charge of the three major scientific publishers (Elsevier, Springer and Wiley) explained their "future concept of the electronic journal contract model". They emphasized the flexibility to respond to customers' needs that their planning new model would have, but added that it would take time for completion.

In the discussion, some participants expressed an anxiety to that the publishers still held the initiative for the scholarly information distribution and a doubt about that the new contract model would truly fulfill customers' needs, and some reported a severe situation of the university that would reduce the contract from the coming year. The necessity for the cooperation between all university libraries and the researchers to continue an effort centering on the activity by the new consortium that aimed at the construction of the scholarly information distribution system that would not be led by commercial publishers was confirmed again through this symposium.