If you don't know the 5% rule, that doesn't mean it doesn’t have a profound effect on you. You may call it something else - the standing order rule, or the law of cumulative consequences - but here is how it works.

You are a librarian. You subscribe to 100 databases. They cost $100,000 per year. You and your faculty have made some wonderful decision selecting the databases and now all your needs are met. Then the next year rolls around and you discover that all your databases have increased in price by 5%. Luckily so did your database budget, so you pay the bill in full. Then the next year rolls around… and the next, and the next… each with a 5% increase.

Even if you are lucky enough to have a matching 5% budget increase every year, you will never be able to afford an additional database. And if your budget only grows by 3%, or not at all, or heaven forbid, it gets cut, then you either have to eliminate some of your databases or allow the database budget’s percentage of the overall budget to grow and grow. After all, you cannot subscribe to 95% of a database. It is all or nothing.

Here is how the 5% rule will eat you out of house and home in 25 years.

The following charts are based on a 1 million dollar library budget growing at a rate of 3% per year for 25 years and a database budget growing at a rate of 5% per year.

Note that in 25 years the database budget has grown from 10% of the overall budget to 16%. That extra 6% may not look like much in a pie chart, so let’s translate it into “books”. Let’s say the book budget bears the full brunt of the 6% that is lost from the remaining budget and that book costs, like database costs, continue to rise at 5% per year.

In 25 years the cost of your 100 databases would more than triple to $322,510, as would the cost of books – up to $323 per book. Even worse, the amount of money available to purchase books would go down to $84,040 as the database budget gobbles up a greater and greater percentage of the book budget. Instead of buying 25,000 books over 25 years, the library would only be able to purchase 15,079.

The moral of the story is to beware subscriptions, standing orders, and monthly fees, whether you are a librarian or a consumer. If you still have your cell phones, Internet, and cable plans in 25 years, you may be dining out less and eating a lot more peanut butter.

1. Where is the best place to find the library’s eBooks?

The Library Catalog. While many eBook vendors provide their own web pages, searching for eBooks in dozens of places can be tedious.

2. Why would I want to use a vendor’s webpage instead of the library’s?

Some resources provide platforms with added functionality not available through the Library Catalog. NetLibrary and Credo Reference, for instance, allow you to search word-for-word across every book in their collection. This method finds content that would be invisible using your typical author, title, subject search in the Library Catalog.

3. Do we own our eBooks?

Yes and no. Some vendors sell their eBooks. Some lease access. Some give you a choice. And so we might both lease and own books from the same vendor, or even for two copies of the same book.

4. Can all eBooks be read on all devices?

Most devices can read most eBooks. Keep in mind that "reading" an eBook is not the same as "downloading" an eBook. It is a lot easier to read than to download.

5. On what devices can the library's eBooks be downloaded?

Not all of the library's eBooks can be downloaded, but of those that can, almost any device that can open a PDF works. An exception to this is the iPad which does not play well with NetLibrary, the library's largest eBook platform. The iPad will accept eBooks from SpringerLink, the library's second largest eBook platform. 

6. How long may eBooks be “checked out” (downloaded)?

The checkout of eBooks varies from vendor to vendor, and sometimes within vendor, so the answer could be Never, 3 days, 7 days, or Forever. The easiest way to find out is to simply try.

7. What is the difference between the library purchasing Books individually and in a collection?

eBooks tend to cost less when bought en mass, sometimes much less; but not always. Some collections might charge more to provide extra functionality or content. In this case they see themselves as selling a value–added “product” whose cost is not directly related to the eBooks themselves.

8. Does it take long to add an eBook to the library collection?

If the library already has an account with the vendor, the eBook can be obtained very quickly, and if the vendor provides cataloging records, the eBook can be added to the Library Catalog very quickly. If not, the process takes longer. So, best case scenario – 1 day. Worst case scenario – one week. Average scenario – 3 days.

9. Can eBooks be borrowed through Interlibrary Loan?

Most cannot, though that is changing. At least one vendor already allows interlibrary loan.

10. Are eBooks more expensive than books?

Yes and no. Some eBooks bought as part of a large collection cost less than a $1.00 a title. Usually this is possible because these collections are, in turn, bought through a large consortium. Individual libraries in these type of purchases have no say in what titles to include and what titles to exclude. When you go shopping for specific titles you pay a premium and that premium may include a hosting fee that can increase costs up to 50% above the cost of a normal book.

11. Where are the library's eBooks?

All of our eBooks are hosted by our vendors. They can be found using either the LIbrary Catalog or the vendor's web pages.

12. What is the difference between an eBook and a database?

While some eBooks are intended to be read “cover to cover”, some eBooks behave like databases. You type in a topic and it retrieves only the relevant information. You never see the whole eBook. An example of this would be Britannica Online.

13. What is the difference between an eBook and an eTextbook?

Textbook publishers, while keen to get into the eBook market, are also keen to make a profit, so they don’t like to sell to libraries. Typically, eTextbooks either exist online – protected by a user name and password – or are downloaded directly to the end user. Some downloads are permanent. Some expire at the end of the term.

NOTE: The library does not buy eTextbooks.

14. Are multiple copies needed?

Normally, no. eBooks are LESS likely to need extra copies than books. If you haven’t used eBooks much you may be surprised to learn that typical eBook users don’t checkout (download) eBooks. Instead, they go online, view the eBook, and get off. And when they do check them out, it is usually for a shorter time.

15. Are all books available as eBooks?

No. The great majority of books, past, present, and near future – are not available as eBooks.

16. Why should I buy an eBook when I can get it for free on the internet?

Although Google's Book Search can find an enormous number of eBooks, most are not complete. Also, some of the free eBook providers such as the Project Gutenberg and the Internet Archive, frequently provide only the text and leave out the original images. Furthermore, to avoid copyright issues, the great majority of "free" eBooks are at least 70 years old. Thus you can read Mark Twain, Homer, and Augustine, but not Maya Angelou.

17. Can an eBook be placed on Reserve?

Not at this time. However, most eBooks can be placed on “Hold” if already in use. An email is automatically sent to the requestor when the eBook becomes available.

18. What “bells and whistles” come with eBook websites?

Note taking. Note sharing. Highlighting. Click to Chapter, Index term, or Key word. Copy and Paste. Printing. Dictionary. Translation. Read-Aloud. Etc.

19. If readers “check out” a book, how do they bring them back?

They don’t. Most of the library's eBooks either “expire” on your computer or mobile device, or you can keep them forever. Once an eBook “expires” it becomes unreadable and should be deleted.

20. How do I get the library to order an eBook?

Just send in the standard bibliographic information and specify format. We will let you know if it is not available or unusually expensive. If you don't have a particular title in mind, just a topic, we can search on your behalf or direct you to a likely source.

A “Click-Through” is invisible to the average database user, but incredibly useful. A “Click-Through” is where a user finds a citation to an article in one database and “clicks through” to the full text article located either in another database or on the publisher’s website.

That’s a little like reaching into your freezer and pulling out a steak – from someone else’s freezer.

If both databases are provided by the same vendor, then the click-through is transparent. You won’t even know you’ve left the database in which you conducted the search.

If the article is in the database of another vendor, or on the publisher’s website, then the transaction may require one or more additional clicks, each one requiring a decision on the user’s part. It may also involve logging into the university’s proxy server.

Not all click-throughs lead to a database. Many of the library’s current periodical subscriptions come with free access to back issues via the publisher’s website. In some cases back issues are limited to five, ten or 15 years. In other cases, they go all the way back to volume one. This is an important fact that must be taken into consideration when evaluating current periodical subscriptions. Even if students are not using the current periodical, the subscription may be worthwhile if they are using the free back issues made available through the click-through process.

Click-throughs sometimes take the user to databases they might not otherwise use. For instance, about one fourth of the circulations in the New York Times Database are the result of click-throughs from other databases.

Ever since the creation of online information, the holy grail of libraries has been a single Google-like” search engine that can find all of the library’s resources. Much progress has happened this year with the introduction of EhIS (EBSCOhost Integrated Search), which currently searches 28 databases and soon will search twenty more. But that’s not all! It will also be adding - the Library Catalog!

In the meantime, the new Library Catalog has expanded its purview to include not only the library’s books, ebooks, and media, but also all EBSCO databases, Britannica Online, and current online newsfeeds, such as Google News and Greenville Online.

So now our databases search our library catalog and our library catalog searches our databases!

Everything is getting bigger and better!

The Thrift Library’s Knowledge Base,
by Kent Millwood

When people constantly ask you the same questions - What are your hours? Where is the bathroom? How much are photocopies?  - I have learned to create a sign and post it near the point of use.

Some questions require instructions - How do I log onto wireless in the library? How do I find a specific journal? What is plagiarism? These tend to require documents of varying length, sometimes even manuals.

With the creation of the digital library, all of the library’s signs and documents moved online. We now have both Student and Faculty FAQs, Policies, How-Tos, research Pathfinders, countless Point of Use Instructions,  Maps and Directions, the Library’s Hours and Calendar, and even Library Orientations, Tutorials, and Self Help Quizzes – all accessible 24/7, from anywhere in the world.

With over 100 documents added, just this semester, the library home page is getting a little crowded, and is now in the process of a redesign.

The first step in this redesign was the creation of a “Knowledge Base” – a sort of online manual to the digital library and miscellaneous other topics of interest to faculty. The Knowledge Base is simply a topics page containing hyperlinks to answers, instructions, and supporting documents - even websites.

Although still under construction, over two dozen topics are now available. If you look carefully, you will notice a strong correlation between the content of the Thrift Library Knowledge Base and this blog. The blog and the Knowledge Base are the library’s attempt to promote and assist faculty in the Mobile Learning Initiative.

Want to know how to keep up on educational technology? Use the Knowledge Base’s introductory article on Keeping Up, and then explore the accompanying hyperlinks.  Want to know how to find free digital classroom materials, including lectures? Use the Knowledge Base.

You are invited to not only use the Knowledge Base, but also help create it. There may be topics you are more knowledgeable about than we are. If so, submit a page on your topic of interest, and we will post it. Got a good web link? Send it on. Looking for a topic, but can’t find it? Let us know and we will research it and post the results for you, and everyone else, to use.

Podcasts, eTextbooks, and Podcasts About eTextbooks

by Kent Millwood

Last month while listening to a National Public Radio story about eTextbooks during my drive home, I thought to myself, “Wow! That’s exactly what Anderson University's Mobile Learning Committee was talking about at their meeting Friday, Sept. 3. Wouldn’t be nice if everyone interested in eTextbooks could hear the same radio story!”

And you can.

The E-Textbook Experiment Turns A Page, by Lynn Neary, Sept. 17, 2010

Link to Audio – 5 min. 38 sec.

Link to Text

NPR is one of many websites providing free podcasts suitable for classroom use or support. While the emphasis is upon subscribing to their podcasts as you would to a newspaper, much of their archival content can be found via a key word search at the home page. There you will find a hodgepodge of content – not just in audio, but also in print, graphics and video as well. Warning, though, their search engine is primitive compared to a typical library database.

News outlets like NPR are increasingly disseminating their product in multiple formats, through multiple means of access - podcasts, blogs, newsletters, Twitter, Facebook, RSS Feeds, live feeds, etc. – providing readers/viewers/listeners what they want, when they want it, in whatever form they want it.

Not bad for a radio network.

Read more about Podcasting at the Thrift Library’s Knowledge Base.

Podcasting encompasses both audio and video content that may be downloaded onto a computer or mobile device for later use. Podcasts may or may not be free. Viewers/listeners usually subscribe to podcasts in the same way they do blogs. In fact, blogs can be delivered as podcasts.

Here are several Educause articles on Podcasting.

·         7 Things You Should Know About Podcasting

·         ELI Discovery Tool: Guide to Podcasting

·         Making the Case for Podcasting | EDUCAUSE

·         There’s Something in the Air: Podcasting in Education

A link to Educause Podcasts - http://www.educause.edu/podcasts  

Despite over 200,000 apps created so far for the iPhone and iPad, many of which are free, most libraries are still woefully under supported. If the goal is to allow mobile users access to the library’s catalog, databases, and all other resources and services, then we still have a long way to go in 2010.

Sometimes apps provide value-added features. In many cases, though, users have to settle for a url link to a portal designed for use on a mobile device. In most cases this provides a much less user-friendly experience than that found on laptops or PCs.

Part of the problem is that most libraries lack the technical support to write their own apps. Vendors have been slow to react to react as well, though that is changing and the environment could reverse itself during 2011.

Here are some “library” apps that are available right now:

    EBSCO Databases – The Thrift Library now subscribes to over 30 popular EBSCO databases including the mega-database Academic Search Premier.  Together, these databases provide indexing to almost 60,000 periodicals and full text to over 13,000.

    Google Books for Mobile http://books.google.com/m  Also good for other PDF collections such as Project Guttenberg.

    H.W. Wilson Databases – The Thrift library subscribes to 6 H.W. Wilson databases indexing over 8,000 periodicals with full text access to almost 5,000 titles.

    NAXOS This music database containing almost 700,000 tracks allows play back of “play lists” on mobile devices. The catch is that you cannot search the database for recordings not already saved to a playlist, and only faculty can create playlists.

    NetLibrary – NetLibrary is a collection of up to 200,000 eBooks found in many libraries across the world. Most title are in the user friendly PDF format and may be accessed by the nook from Barnes & Noble, Sony Digital Readers (PRS-300, 505, 600, 700 and 900), as well as the COOL-ER. – not to mention any PC or Mac with Adobe Acrobat Reader on it. However, iPhones and iPads, and the very popular Kindle are not currently supported.

    OCLC – This grand old institution has been at the cutting edge of library technology since its inception in 1967. Here are some free library/library-like apps:

·         CampusBooks – Find free textbooks (iPhone or Android)

·         BookMinder – Create a personalized list of books that interest you (Android)

·         iRecommend – See which books you should be reading (iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad)

·         iBookshelf – Create your personal portable book database (iPhone and iPad)

·         MyLibrary – Organize your personal media collection (iPhone and iPad)

·         MyBox Office – Keep track of your DVD and VHS movies (iPhone and iPad)

·         Disc Tracker – View your CD collection (iPhone and iPad)

    More information on the apps and links mentioned here can be found on the Thrift library’s Knowledge Base.  

- Read EDUCAUSE Review Magazine, view a cutting edge video lecture, or find a brief on a specific topic of interest at Educause.

Educause - Anderson University is a member of Educause, "a nonprofit association whose mission is to advance higher education by promoting the intelligent use of information technology." Educause monitors and evaluates the effect of new technologies on higher education and even attempts to predict the future. It places supportive information online - evaluations, articles, video lectures, blogs, etc. - to help faculty, librarians, administrators, etc., embrace information technology.

Note that while Anderson University is a member of Educause, almost all of the information produced there is freely available online. Here are some important links. About    Resources     Professional Development 

One of the most important of Educause’s publications is the annual Horizon Report which highlights five to six technologies each year that are predicted to have significant impact on higher education in the next one to five years.  Topics covered in the 2010 issue included: Mobile Computing, Open Content, Electronic Books, Simple Augmented Reality, Gesture-based Computing, and Visual Data Analysis. You can check out the 2009 and 2010 issue at the library or find the following online:2010     2009     2008     2007     2006     2005

Of further interest is their Learning Technology Briefs, a series of over 60 diverse titles called “7 Things You Should Know About…”

Topics include those covered in the Horizon Reports, and many more including:

• 7 Things You Should Know About Google Wave (Oct 2009)
• 7 Things You Should Know About Collaborative Annotation (Oct 2009)
• 7 Things You Should Know About Telepresence (Sep 2009)
• 7 Things You Should Know About Data Visualization II (Aug 2009)
• 7 Things You Should Know About Microblogging (Jul 2009)
• 7 Things You Should Know About VoiceThread (Jun 2009)
• 7 Things You Should Know About Personal Learning Environments (May 2009)
• 7 Things You Should Know About Live Question Tool (Apr 2009)

Educause is both a great way to keep up with educational technology AND a great resource to find out more about a particular topic. The sheer volume of reflective content is astounding.

Changing Times: The Impact of Technology on Libraries and Classrooms
-       By Kent Millwood

I remember my first computer. Many years ago as the director of a different library I unpacked my brand new Tandy TRS-80 with combined B&W monitor and keyboard, and two 5 ½” floppy drives and marveled at all the wonderful things my library would now be able to do.

I couldn’t wait to create catalog cards by computer. Oh, Brave New World!

Just then my assistant walked in the room and informed me in an angry (and I now realize) frightened voice, that if she had to use “it”, she would quit. Welcome to the new age of technology.

Change can be frightening at any time, but when it is overwhelming, it can leave us feeling incompetent, irrelevant, and lost. So how do you handle what is quickly becoming a sea change in educational technology when you don’t even have time to master all the bells and whistles on your cell phone?

How does the old joke go? How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time.

To help faculty, staff, and administration keep up with educational technology, its gadgets, its techniques, its principles, and how it is changing  libraries and classrooms, the library has created a webpage to cull the best articles, blogs, and websites, and organize them for your use. Over time, this annotated bibliography, will grow into a clearing house of information on topics such as open content, RSS feeds, eBooks, video lectures and podcasts, Teacher Tube, mobile devices, cloud computing, Millennials, and digital teaching and learning.

It will identify the big players in educational technology such as EDUCAUSE, Connexions, MIT, Carnegie Mellon, Creative Commons, OCLC, and, yes, Google. It will direct you to free educational materials and software, tips and techniques, free online conferences, workshops, and tutorials, and seminal discussions.

Moreover, you are invited to suggest topics of personal interest and even to guest blog. So, if for instance, you know a lot about iPads or Moodle, here is a chance to share your experience.

Kent Millwood

kmillwood@andersonuniversity.edu

864-231-2049