The Accessing and Archiving of Electronic Journals

Abstract

ABSTRACT This dissertation focuses upon the challenges and problems that libraries face relating to the accessing and archiving of electronic journals (EJs) and considers the implications these issues will have on those involved in the information profession. This topic is becoming an increasingly important issue for libraries, which can no longer be ignored, as the usage of EJs has increased radically. The problems associated with the archiving of EJs are great. If archiving continues to be ignored, much information will be lost. This must be prevented at all costs. The dissertation is broken down into 10 chapters. The introduction gives an overview and details the methodology and layout. This is followed by a discussion on the background and current context that EJs operate in. The following chapters then consider the main problems associated with the accessing and archiving of EJs. This involves topics such as what should be archived, who should be responsible for the archiving process, how the materials should be archived and where they should be archived. This requires the study of numerous technical, economic, business, organisational and legal models. The focus is predominantly on libraries but the study would be incomplete without looking at others involved in the information profession, namely publishers and trusted third party archives. The argument is that although technically the archiving process is feasible, poor relations between libraries and publishers make this difficult to achieve. It is hard to reach a consensus on how the process should be carried out and the lack of developed standards exacerbates this problem. Economic, legal, business and organisational models must be considered before the archiving of EJs can be facilitated effectively. The dissertation looks at how these can be achieved and highlights the importance of further detailed research in this field.