Modes of Acquisition and Models of Licensing: The Electronic Sources of Information

Objectives

The main objectives of the study are as under:

• 1.

  To identify and explain newly emerging means of acquiring the electronic information resources (EIRs);

• 2.

  To enlist and different licensing models used for acquisition of EIRs; and

• 3.

  To consolidate a minimal assessment framework with regard to acquisition of EIRs.

Background

The electronic information resources or e-resources originated rather gained momentum by 1970’s, when the optical storage devices i.e. CDROMs were devised and used for storage of audio, visual, textual and multimedia content or information. Experts in the field and concerned agencies started to carve out definition for this new format of information resources and a few definitions among the same are given as under:

Joint Steering Committee for Revision of AACR (2005) stated that an electronic resource is the “material (data and/or program(s)) encoded for manipulation by a computerized device. This material may require the use of a peripheral directly connected to a computerized device (e.g., CD-ROM drive) or a connection to a computer network (e.g., the Internet).”

According to Gibson D. Lewis Health Science Library (n.d.), e-Resources is a “term used to describe all of the information products that a library provides through a computer network. This includes electronic books and journals, bibliographic databases, and library website pages.”