This international study presents data from 29 colleges and universities about their database licensing practices, including spending data on eBooks, databases, and eJournals. The report looks closely at trends in how staff time is consumed on issues such as invoice-checking, contract examination, training patrons in database use and other tasks. In addition we probe librarian feelings on additions to or subtractions from their current database portfolio and their level of interest in novel database such as those of syllabi, open access course materials, textbooks, classroom video and blogs.
The report looks at the use of free information resources such as Google Scholar, and tracks librarian assessment of the rate of price increases for online information.
The study also probes opinions about the use of file sharing sites that make copyright publications available at no charge without the permission of the publishers.
The study also looks at disputes with vendors providing data on the use of lawyers in contract disputes and the frequency of publisher audits and other behavior designed to
Data is broken out by many variables such as college type, enrollment, tuition level and other factors.
Some of the survey participants are: Johns Hopkins University Welch Medical Library, the Australian National University, the University of Bath, Vanderbilt University, Saskatchewan Polytechnic, University at Buffalo and UCONN Health, among others.
Just a few of the report’s many findings are that:
8.52% of the time spent in database research by librarians sampled was spent on Google Scholar.
Public colleges in the sample spent a mean of $82,600 on eBook licenses in the past year.
Laptops accounted for a mean of 42% of database access for the libraries sampled, fixed workstations for 40.33%.
Research university libraries in the sample spent an average of more than 2,000 staff hours per year reviewing and paying invoices from database vendors.