Wiley-Blackwell Experience from the community Acceptable conditions for consortia are not enough … or why consortia administrators should care for site licensing policies for pick & choose single-title subscriptions Bernd-Christoph Kämper, Stuttgart University Library, Konsortium Baden-Württemberg

An internal EZB mailing list dialogue sets things in motion … At the end of August 2008 Wiley-Blackwell circulated a policy document entitled „Wiley-Blackwell 2009 Journal Sales Model Briefing”. It had a clear vision and seemed committed to help develop and offer sales and access models that were designed to preserve some of the better features of the present models and to avoid their shortcomings and limitations, esp. the deficiencies of the Basic Access License (Wiley) and Blackwell’s “Standard Subscription”. In response to a query on our internal EZB mailing list, I commented rather favourably upon the new WB policies. One site however, Bonn University Library, replied that the messages given to them by Wiley-Blackwell directly were quite different from the impression given in the policy document. I checked the facts, spoke to both Bonn University and our local Wiley Account Manager, and could’nt believe it: Wiley obviously tried to re-instate restrictions we had thought to be history since long.

Bonn University - a multi-site?! Wiley: „We define a single site as a geographically contiguous office building, complex, or campus location. It is not just a mailing address and may include more than one library as well as remote access via the licensee's secure network. If you have any questions regarding your institution, please ask your Account Manager „Account Manager Unwritten Wiley Policy: Basic Access Licenses (BALs) restricted to a single site and class C subnets; to serve larger networks or multiple „sites“ (in the narrow definition of Wiley) you needed a „managed account“ (former Enhanced Access License (EAL), at extra costs) => Single title „pick & choose“ subscriptions cannot be networked across the university Wiley ties managed accounts to multi-year agreements and non- cancellation clauses, even outside consortia that provide cross access/additional access

200 years of tradition (founded in 1818 by King Friedrich Wilhelm III.) Personnel: 513 professors, 1632 other academic staff, 4407 non-academic staff (incl. university hospital) 27,500 students (incl. 4,100 international students) University premises: 140 institutes and seminars in 2 castles and 371 other buildings spread throughout the city Bonn University Library System: University and State Library (ULB Bonn, main library), Branch library for medicine, science and agricultural sciences (MNL), 100+ decentralized libraries located in hospitals, institutes and departments A brief look at Bonn University

A city within the city …

Bonn University - a multi-site?! When Bonn Univ in 2002 as a result of a budget cut had to drop out of the Northrhine Westfalian Wiley consortium, titles previously networked across the campus were blocked by Wiley later in 2003 for campuswide access. As registering BALs restricted to institute and departmental libraries would have meant a huge administrative workload and the library would have to do without campuswide access even for the journals paid and licensed by the main library on behalf of the university, BALs could not be used. The library had to renegotiate and, reluctantly, closed an EAL deal again, however, w/o the benefit of a price cap and the cross access of the consortium.

The University‘s complaint … Expressed disappointment about WB‘s sales strategy and lack of flexibility in new licensing options. It is end of September, and we have neither a price list nor a verified subscription list for our Blackwell journals. It is near impossible to get a consensus for a multi-year core collection deal in the short time remaining. Our institutes are holding the majority of subscriptions at Bonn University, not the main library. Cannot ask them to keep non- relevant and/or expensive subscriptions (of which they don‘t even know the price yet). As a result, the cost development for the main library as the publisher‘s contract partner who would have to compensate any cancellations is quite incalculable. As price caps do not apply to print subscriptions via an agent, the financial advantages of a multi-year agreement become largely obsolete [at least for the institutes subscribing].

The University‘s complaint (2) … At Bonn University we have claimed campuswide access for single title „pick & choose“ subscriptions since years, as our situation makes EAL agreements more than difficult. Instead we hear now that it is planned to apply the restriction to class C subnets now even to Blackwell titles, that did not have any such restriction before. We ask urgently to offer universities without reservations the „Pick & Choose“ option with campuswide access, as an alternative to the core collection and package licenses with their specific advantages. This would give us the opportunity to calculate the options, communicate them in university, and finally come to a reasonable and acceptable license agreement for Bonn University. We would regret if Bonn University should have to abandon online access to your well-used and renowned journals.

A listserv complaint from Germany* … Please consider the environment before printing The wording of the Policy document seemed clear enough … Wiley-Blackwell 2009 Journal Sales Model Briefing (Aug 26, 2008 version) - Fair, flexible licensing options - Freedom of Choice (Pick & Choose, Core Titles / Core Collection, Custom Collections / Shared access, Fixed Collection or Subject Bundles) - Unified Wiley-Blackwell License (for academic institutions), offering unlimited access with no restrictions on concurrent users nor the number of sites - All subscribers with online access are entitled to access COUNTER compliant usage data, gain access to content dating back to 1997 (where available) and benefit from perpetual access to paid for years. *) Wiley-Blackwell 2009 Journal Sales Models – Promises and Hidden Agendas / posted to liblicense-l and lis-e-resources on Sep 22, 2008, with follow-ups on Oct 1 and Oct 7, 2008

Promises and Hidden Agendas … Despite the circulated policy paper of Aug 26 and its clear wording, in talking to librarians who sought to clarify the new policy and its implications, WB insisted that former restrictions of single-title subscriptions to class C subnets would continue to apply. University-wide „multi-site“ access would only be available for „managed accounts“. The consequence: => Present Blackwell Premium subscriptions renewed for 2009 would no longer provide campus-wide access, if the library does not choose to bring in all its subscriptions into a multi-year deal, with usually no or very limited cancellation allowance. If that is not deception, what is it? “The least we can expect from Wiley-Blackwell is that they stick to the promises made in that policy paper. If Wiley-Blackwell instead choses to continue to pursue hidden agendas that fundamentally limit their customers' freedom of choice, it's time for libraries to stand together and just say no.”

A chaotic transition … The migration of Blackwell Synergy => Wiley Interscience … ignored librarians request to maintain Synergy in parallel for some time after the transition … for many curtailed access to part of their subs for a full week … broke OpenURL linking to Blackwell content for nearly two weeks … left articles missing, 1 mo later still 48000, 3 mo later still (WB claimed at the Frankfurt Bookfair that reloading is now complete) … made (Jan 2006 – June 2008) COUNTER usage stats for Blackwell titles on Synergy unavailable for an indeterminate period of time … abandoned the superior Synergy platform in favor of the deficient, poorly performing software on Wiley Interscience (introduction of a replacement in form of a promised „next generation online service“ has already been postponed to mid 2009) … disbanded Shibboleth authentification that had already been implemented at Synergy in May 2007 (it won‘t come back before mid 2009)

Chaos reigns … Our letter made it into the ASA newswire and made the agencies aware that fundamental questions had not been sufficiently addressed by WB. WB reacted with a hectic update of their „transition website“ and published a revised version of their policy document making far reaching last minute changes: –„no restrictions on the number of sites“ – removed –old BAL single site definition: re-introduced –„multi-site access“: tied to multi-year core title deals Instead of the former well accepted „Blackwell Publishing Site License“ (originally developed for NESLI) they offer us as „sample license“ the old Wiley BAL, unaltered, with all the former allegedly removed restrictions on access, post termination access and concurrent users still in place. WB did its best to claim on liblicense-l that the restriction to a single site were "consistent with both Wiley and Blackwell's earlier policies“, but from our time on the Blackwell Library Advisory Board we knew better and proved them wrong.

Comes the Frankfurt Book Fair … … and the hour of truth: Just a day before the opening of the Book Fair the regional account managers were finally informed „what interpretation to follow“ On Wednesday I met with Jackie Cahoon, and she informed me –that the site definition is the same as used by Wiley before … –however, it will be interpreted differently … –The restriction of „campus-wide single-site access“ for single-title subscriptions on unmanaged accounts to class C subnets is gone –A site like Bonn University will no longer be regarded as „multi-site“ … –… and they will be able to freely choose between single-title „pick & choose“ campuswide subscriptions and core title and/or collection deals, for both the former Wiley and Blackwell titles I did not get a satisfactory answer how it is possible to leave the wording unchanged and still draw the opposite conclusions from it …

So, we have a stage win … Clarification so far has happened on an informal level, only. Expect that cases with a remote site in another city will remain contentious and probably be regarded as multi-site. Libraries expectations and claims should herein be oriented at what was granted formerly under the Blackwell Site License. The Wiley-Blackwell Library Advisory Board should continue to provide input for better licensing policies Lessons learned: –A critical success factor was the free exchange of information through the EZB administrators internal mailing list. Otherwise I would not have learned of the difficulties of Bonn University –It seems effective to combine the direct complaint of a high profile local customer (through the university librarian) with a comprehensive discussion of the publisher‘s policies and the contentious issues at hand via listservs. –Serials agents took the critique serious because it was sufficiently detailed to merit consideration –Treat your local account manager well, he might turn out to be your best allay

On a positive note: Euro pricing 2009 … Wiley-Blackwell introduced a new EUR price list. They did NOT use the chance for „exchange rate profiteering“ by setting arbitrary high conversion rates. Instead they used the exchange rates of June 16 to convert GBP and USD to EUR (1,27 EUR/GBP, and ca. 0,648 EUR/USD). EAL Site Licenses will be calculated as previously at the US domestic rate and converted at the above mentioned fixed rate (?) to EUR. => check again whether this is true! For EUR customers this gives a gain of about 9% for titles formerly calculated on a USD basis and of 11…13% for titles formerly calculated on a GBP basis. Therefore, additional costs incurred by converting former Blackwell Standard Subscriptions to P+O resp. E-only (in Germany both ca. 10% after taxes) are compensated in part. (The median „normal“ list price increase for WB titles is this year around 9%, similar to the increase at Wiley the year before; for Blackwell titles, it was considerably lower last year, around 6,5…7%.)

Finally: Why should we care? Acceptable conditions for consortia are not enough … Most of us can get into financial difficulties that may not allow us to continue our subscriptions, in particular multi-year consortial and package deals We need exit strategies and freedom of choice Publishers should offer positive incentives to choose more comprehensive deals (consortial or not) in form of price caps for multi year deals, shared access and additional access such as adding titles from Subject Bundles or other collection deals, not use coercive means by imposing restrictive and dysfunctional conditions for "pick and choose" licensing of individual titles. Solidarity pays off. If such concerns are voiced by consortia administrators and informed by feedback from the local level, they are more likely to be heard, than if they come only from local libraries. Concerted action is even more effective. In a transition period, a consortium administrator may be able to informally negotiate a compromise or moratorium on contentious issues to apply to all academic libraries in his or her domain, especially if these might become future consortium members.

Thank you for listening!