[pd-discuss] Communia condems the privatisation of the public domain by the BnF

Tue Jan 22 15:07:30 UTC 2013

Paul, Peter, & Javier - thanks for the data points.  That's helpful in
understanding the shape of the market.

On Mon, Jan 21, 2013 at 2:44 PM, Peter B. Hirtle <pbh6 at cornell.edu> wrote:

In practice, we have allowed contracts that were longer than 5 years if we
> had no plans on digitizing the material ourselves within the contractual
> period. And as someone who also buys digitized resources, I am willing to
> concede that 5 years might be too short for the vendor to recoup its
> expense.  It often takes three years after publication for me to decide
> that a resource is worth purchasing and to find the money to pay for it.
>  If I could get it for free in two more years, I might wait.
>
> Thus I don't have a problem with a vendor being able to have a period of
> exclusive access to the product of its digitization efforts.  I do think,
> though, that the repository has to be willing to let anyone else digitize
> the material during the exclusive period; exclusivity should extend only to
> the digital images and not to access to the original works.

I absolutely agree that materials need to continue to be available, but if
I were negotiating on behalf of a vendor, I'd consider the possibility for
someone else to come in and digitize the same works as a threat to my
revenue stream and I'd want to discount that somehow in the negotiations.

On Tue, Jan 22, 2013 at 5:05 AM, Javier Ruiz <javier at openrightsgroup.org>
 wrote:

> Costs should be coming down and you are killing off the potential
> advantage of competitive tendering, if you believe in such things.
>
Declining digitization costs is one of the things that makes this all a
tricky balancing act.  It'll be cheaper to delay the digitization, but that
also delays availability.  The fact that a work is public domain doesn't
make it any more accessible if it's locked in a dusty vault somewhere.

I think declining costs and shifting business models are a good argument to
use with vendors when negotiating these contracts.  I'd say "Look, you have
no idea what the market will look like in 5 years, let alone 10 years, so
that extra 5 years isn't giving you any real benefit.  It's just a safety
blanket that you'll get no financial advantage from."

The vendors have a desire for a continuous stream of new offerings while
the libraries have a desire to make materials widely available at minimal
cost to themselves and their funders.  It doesn't benefit anyone if they
can't find common ground to benefit each other, but where the balance point
is and what is valued in each agreement is going to vary based on the
priorities of the negotiating parties.

Tom
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