Re: electronic storage

Let me restate where I'm coming from on this. I run a large reserves operation in the area of graduate level social sciences (sociology, anthropology, political science, economics, etc), International Affairs, and Social Work. The variety of materials that the professors I deal with want on reserve is enormous. There is often a window of only 4-6 weeks (sometimes only days!) between the time a professor's reserve list is received and the time that items need to be available to students.

Others I've talked to have very different situations that lend much better to using electronic technologies- lots of exams and students' papers to put on reserve, or public domain materials.

So far, however, I have not been convinced that any entity can satisfactorily deliver copyright permissions on a scale and in a time frame that serve the needs of an operation like mine. This is certainly not to say that putting materials required for a single course on reserve electronically is impossible. But from an operational standpoint, achieving gains in efficiency and cost as well as service enhancement from utilizing electronic technology for reserves on a larger scale is what I desire- and that is the elusive vision I alluded to.

		--Jeff Rosedale
	Columbia University Libraries