john maccoll “aggregating responsibility for research collections”salctg june 2013

Aggregating Responsibility for Research Collections

John A MacCollUniversity of St Andrews

Research Support: New Roles, New RelationshipsScottish Academic Libraries Cooperative Training Group

University of Glasgow Library, 18 June 2013

Have we changed?Our pre-Web mindset

• The Collection• The Catalogue• Cat & Class• Books & journals

The Atkinson View – mid-90s

• The essential selectivity of collections

• A library-controlled zone

• Preserve the authority of the paper library

The Atkinson View – mid-00s

• The challenge of archiving• Need for research libraries to

coordinate print archiving• Need for research libraries to

coordinate digital preservation

The centre cannot hold

• Different approaches to UKRR• What should we be storing?• What should we be preserving?• What is a good repository?

Loss (Authority AND Control)

• ‘Every reader their book-like object’

• Fifty Shades of Grey (literature)

(Yes) we have changed• Journal prices have gone out of

control• Content has rushed in• Student experience has been

revaluated

• Institutions have become more competitive

• Access has become king• Libraries have become divorced

from stewardship• But stewardship has remained

necessary

Collaborative Stewardship

UKRR – US regional print stores – Hathi – Portico – CLOCKSS – JSTOR – EuropePMC – UK OpenMirror …

OCLC/COPAC/TEL …

Passive redundancy (benign neglect)

Active redundancy (the new challenge)

‘In the centre, me’

Governance (who’s got the power?)

The institutionallibrary

Institutional libraries acting collectively can be powerful in directing or creating new

agencies, eg OCLC, JISC Collections, SCONUL Performance Indicators,

Hathi Trust, UKRR, the ILL network, Portico, KB+, new

Jisc

What does it mean for us?• Ask not ‘What can these agencies do for us?’But rather• ‘What do we want?’• ‘How much do we have to spend?’• Organise our buying power!• Cut through the agency competition and poor agenda

coordination• Consider the implications of JISC-Jisc reformation• We have 40 years of best practice

Sneak Preview: a new research library cooperative agenda?

• Shared print• National

Monograph Strategy

• Jisc Collections• COPAC Collections

Management• KB+• A UK Open Mirror

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Thank You!