E-Journal Access through International Cooperation: Library of Congress and the Electronic Journals Library EZB

Abstract

The Library of Congress (LC) in Washington, DC, and the Electronic Journals Library (EZB) at the University of Regensburg (Germany) are building what may be the world's largest database of scholarly electronic journals. The EZB is a consortium of 257 research libraries that have pooled their bibliographic data and other metadata to create a major collection development tool. A three-way exchange of bibliographic metadata among LC, EZB, and the German National Serials Database (Zeitschriftendatenbank or ZDB) will reduce costs of bibliographic metadata by avoiding duplication of efforts. The long-term goal of this project is to further reduce library costs by broadening and deepening international collaboration through which libraries share their workloads and experience.