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Working Groups

eBooks working group meeting

Start date: 16 March 2005 12:00

Location: Regents College, London

Apologies

  • Jo Rowley – LRC Manager, Warwickshire College
  • Rachel Bruce - JISC Programme Director, Development Group
  • Jo Harrison – JISC Committee Secretary
  • Paul Richardson - ILT Champion, Coleg Harlech WEA
  • John Byford - The British Library
  • Caren Milloy – JISC Collections Manager
  • Anthony Watkinson – Independent Consultant

Minutes of the last meeting and matters arising

Members agreed the minutes of the last meeting as an accurate record.

 

Matters arising:

Dr Woodward informed the group that she and the Collections Team Manager gave a presentation at the Publishers Association at which they asked publishers what they were doing about training authors to create ebooks. There was no response from the publishers to this question, indicating that e-development in publishing is very patchy.

 

Chair’s Report on recent meetings with publishers

Hazel Woodward reported on recent meetings with the Oxford University Press (OUP) and Springer Publishing regarding business models for e-books.  Both meetings were held to discuss with the publishers business models for e-text books. Both meetings were positive, however a considerable amount of work needs still to be done to develop a model which is attractive to the library community and which does not threaten publisher revenue.

 

The meetings have also made clear that closer dialogue is needed between the library community and the text book publishers.

 Collections: A report on current activity and discussions with publishers

The Collections Team provided the group with a verbal update of the agreement concluded in August which provides the FE community with 21 core reference books. The JISC has funded the content which is freely available to FE, however colleges have to pay the publisher an access fee of £65, this has proved very popular and already 200 colleges have taken up the offer.

 

The Collection Team also reported on a number of other proposals from publishers of Ebooks. The Working Group endorsed the Collections Team’s efforts in these negotiations.

 Developing a dialogue with the publishing industry

The Working Group agreed that it needs to continue meeting with publishers to continue the dialogue about business models and with a special focus on e-text books. The Working Group identified a list of publishers that it would like to approach and to invite to forthcoming meetings.

Any other business

The Working Group discussed how they might make their activities more transparent and at the same time raise awareness of the issues around Ebooks. Mr Hoyle suggested that the JISC executive could provide a generic PowerPoint presentation about the Working Groups which members could use when given presentations.

Action: JISC Collections Team

 

Date of next meeting  

Members agreed the proposed date of the 6th July but the location is to be confirmed. 

 

Members agreed that it would be good to have a meeting at an FE college; Warwick and the Belfast Institution for Further and Higher Education were suggested.