NFAIS Webinar: e-Books and the Future of University Presses: Key Findings from a Three-Year Study 

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Register to View Archived Recording Now!

Featured Experts:  October Ivins, Principal, Ivins eContent Solutions ( Slides ), Alex Holzman, Director, Temple University Press ( Slides ) and Dean Smith, Director, Project MUSE, The Johns Hopkins, University Press ( Slides ).

UPDATE: Dean Smith has been added as a speaker to this 90 minute webinar to address the creation of the University Press Content Consortium. The new consortium was created based on the research funded by the Mellon Foundation as described below.

There is a tremendous drive in the academic library environment to reshape content and service models to deploy technologies in ways that more effectively and efficiently serve the user at the point of information need. One of the hottest topics for libraries in this regard is e-books. This is also an area of rapid development across the publishing industry - with activity to standardize file formats, a proliferation of dedicated devices, and the transformation of purchasing and copyright practices originally developed for print books. For libraries, there are associated issues in terms of both constrained purchasing budgets and the expanding popularity of patron driven selection. Recent key library events such as the ARL Membership meeting, Charleston Conference, and the ALA Midwinter Meeting highlighted the issues and interest seems to grow daily.

Publishers in a university press environment also face these new challenges. At a time when print sales are declining, how should e-books be integrated into production and distribution to demonstrate the ongoing value of a university press in support of academic research? Rising interest in the creation of cooperative branded consortia for purposes of distributing scholarly monographs is evident as several such initiatives that have emerged. (InsideHigherEd, New Models for University Presses, November 22, 2010, http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/11/22/presses.) The Andrew Mellon Foundation has funded one such exploratory initiative involving, among others, NYU Press, Temple University Press, Rutgers University Press, the University of Nebraska Press, and the University of Pennsylvania Press. The 60 presses that are joining the University Press eBook Consortium (UPeC) are focused on satisfying the needs of the scholarly community as they move forward in selecting a platform and planning their collections.This webinar will address key findings from the three year effort, including the following:

• Strategic vision
• Academic library budget developments
• Research about library eBook adoption
• Patron Driven Selection
• Current trends
• New and evolving standards
• Academic publishing in trends
• Exploring technology driven efficiencies in workflow and production
• Determining core competencies: what stays in-house
• Expanding service partner options
• Service level agreements
• New business models

If you want to learn more about the results of this three-year initiative register for the NFAIS webinar today. NFAIS members pay $75 and non-members pay $95. An unlimited number of staff from an NFAIS member organization can participate for a group fee of $225. The group fee for an unlimited number of staff from any non-member organization is $285. The registration form is can be accessed here. 

For more information contact: Jill O'Neill, NFAIS Director, Communication and Planning, 215-893-1561 (phone); 215-893-1564 (fax); mailto:jilloneill@nfais.org or go to http://www.nfais.org.