2013 SCONUL Access contacts annual meeting Walk-in Access to e-resources

Background to the WATER Project The WATER Project arose from the SCONUL Task & Finish Group on Access Issues which published the Fair Share report in April 2012 A survey of library Directors was carried out as part of the T&F Groups work, which included questions on walk-in access A survey of access scheme users was carried out, completed by over 3000 people The key findings of the surveys were that –There is an increasing expectation amongst students using access schemes that they will be able to access e-resources –Access schemes will increasingly lose relevance with the reduction of print and the increasing shift to electronic provision of information if this is not available to visitors –The main obstacles to implementing such access is perceived difficulties around licences and the work involved in licence checking, and around technical issues to allow access, including identity management

Developing the SCONUL WATER Guidelines: Licensing issues The Project team obtained the advice of the Jisc Collections team –there is a large gap between the perceptions of library staff and content providers in most areas as to the seriousness of this issue Publishers main concerns with regard to walk-in access to e-journals, databases and e- books are: unauthorised use by anonymous individuals leading to misuse of the resource and a library with no means of preventing/punishing the misuse losing sales due to members of other academic institutions, public libraries, commercial organisations etc making use of e-resources from one academic institution, allowing other organisations to either cancel or avoid taking out a subscription to the resource.

Developing the SCONUL WATER Guidelines: Licensing issues cont. Provided reasonable steps are taken to ensure that a visitor is bona fide and that you know who they are, there is no need to be concerned about allowing them access to content. If the user is someone you would normally allow access to your print resources, then they can usually be given access to electronic content too All Jisc and NESLi2 licences allow walk-in access, and all of the other large publishers do too, including: Elsevier, Wiley, T&F, Springer, OUP, CUP, RSC, IoP, ProQuest, EBSCO, and Cengage Where it is not mentioned, this can be queried with the publisher, using the Jisc wording to check that they are happy with that. They are free to use the Jisc wording in their own licence if they wish A particular emphasis on licence checking should be given to commercially valuable content, e.g. law, business

Developing the SCONUL WATER Guidelines: Technical issues Barriers were perceived around the following: –Allowing access to JANET –How to provide access – a dedicated PC, any networked PC etc –Identity management –How to limit access to a sub-set of resources

Developing the SCONUL WATER Guidelines: Political & Structural issues Barriers exist around the following: –Who needs to do the work – IT? Library Systems staff? E-resource managers? Customer Services staff? Liaison staff? SCONUL Access contact? –Whose responsibility is it to drive it? –Impact: who will benefit most at any given institution? who will lose the most? –Where is the advocacy needed?

The WATER Guidelines Taking all of these findings into account, the Guidelines document seeks to: –address the key obstacles to implementation: advocacy, licensing and technical issues –cover all levels of staff involved in prioritising and implementing walk-in access –list the benefits in implementing walk-in access –encourage a risk-managed approach to licensing issues –summarise technical approaches that have been taken and provide case study examples with contact details to allow for further investigation with institutions whose approach may be a close fit –encourage a light-touch solution to the technical implementation