Eliminating All Journal Subscriptions Has Freed Our Customers to Seek the Information They Really Want and Need

Abstract

A famous movie scene portrays desperados Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid chased to the edge of a cliff high above a river ravine. Faced with capture or almost certain death, that leap screaming into the river and live to escape their pursuers, at least for this instance, In somewhat as dramatic a plunge, the Stevens Institute Library (123 years old) has begun serving its faculty, researchers and students with almost no journal titles on the shelves. Arriving in 1993 with ostensibly no periodical subscriptions in open stacks this service model has evolved over more than 20 years of research and experimentation. The academic outcome of having no journals in the library is not yet fully known. It should be noted, however, that there are several safety nets for this new service model. Not only is Stevens located in a place with very easy access to major libraries, publishers and bookstores, its faculty and graduate students are often associated with large New Jersey corporations not the least of which is A...