Re: Snooze/lose (Was: Academics and coursepacks)

On 8/26/98, Albert Henderson <noblestation[_at_]compuserve.com> wrote:
>
> The trend of academic books and journals since the proliferation of the
> Xerox 914 in the 1960s has been falling sales balanced by rising prices.
> Typical printings of learned monographs once ranged between 1500 and
> 2500 copies sold primarily to libraries. Today editions are half or
> less that number in spite of a doubling of people with advanced degrees.
> Interlibrary (photocopying)loan, coursepacks, individuals substituting
> copies for purchases, and loss of library purchasing power all
> contribute. Underlying the degenerative cycle is the administrative
> preference for copy machines over books.

     I have a problem with this analysis, although the numbers are close enough. As I see it, and certainly as things are going in LSU Libraries, we don't buy many books anymore because the whole acquisition budget goes to trying to keep up with the skyrocketing cost of the academic journal and in access charges to organizations like UNCOVER for journal articles to which we can no longer afford to subscribe. Holes in a journal run may never be recovered, there is some chance of getting books a year or so after publication if demand develops. Thus journals get priority. We aren't copying books; we don't have them to copy.

                          BRB

Bert R. Boyce, Professor & Dean
School of Library & Information Science
Louisiana State University
267 Coates Hall
Baton Rouge, LA 70803

     (504)388-3158
FAX: (504)388-4581
LSBOYC[_at_]LSUVM.sncc.lsu.edu Received on Thu Aug 27 1998 - 14:56:26 GMT