Hi Laura, Renee, and all –

 

I’m going to throw in two cents, and then ask a question, without taking time to look back at the invoices.

 

I know that I got a notice or letter specifically about the ILL/WorldShare increase, and Laura and Renee’s statements about the increase to $250 this year, which will be doubled to $500 next year, sound like the same amounts I read in that notice to my library. I agree that those increases, particularly for next year, are very concerning.

 

This discussion also brings to mind the spreadsheets that pooled fund members used to get, showing everyone’s OCLC costs – or at least including them if the pooled fund was paying for them, which they did for KDOT. I recall that the numbers were all over the place, in large part because there were several different arrangements: some DOTs pairing with their state libraries, other members working with WiLS or Minitex or ILLINET, or somebody else. The KDOT Library was set up as an “independent” library for its OCLC services before I got here. In any case, I remember looking at the pooled fund spreadsheets, and seeing that KDOT’s OCLC expenses were among the highest. In the time since the pooled fund ended, KDOT has had to pay the OCLC bills directly, and I feel a pinch whenever I have to email my boss and ask for permission to forward the invoice to the admin person who processes it.

 

The timing of Laura’s initial email couldn’t have been more perfect, for me. I had sent the email earlier in the day to my boss, telling him I’d received the invoice for our cataloging and ILL services. When he replied, he said, “I thought this was already taken care of…” and he attached the email from early March, when I’d asked for permission to pay the invoice for WorldCat Discovery and FirstSearch. I quietly fumed (yes, it was an overreaction), because when we had the pooled fund, I worked with other librarians, and I didn’t need to explain that these different invoices were for different services. I eventually replied to him, explaining what the bill was, and of course he gave me the okay to get it paid. And shortly after, Laura’s first email arrived, and I can’t help agreeing, it is all too expensive, especially for the solos and small outfits who might be questioning whether OCLC is worth it for us.

 

 

Okay, my two cents was a bit rambling and longer than I’d planned. Here’s my question:

How many of you are also paying for FirstSearch and/or WorldCat Discovery?

 

 

KDOT added OCLC FirstSearch (FS) around 2004, with the launch of TLCat, because we had to have FS to be part of TLCat. FS is supposedly going away and being replaced with Discovery, but Discovery still has issues, and lots of librarians (raises hand) love the search capabilities of FS. Discovery makes KDOT’s OCLC holdings available to search on the open web, for anyone anywhere, and since I don’t have my own ILS, Discovery seems like a game-changer. FS is great for librarians, but probably too complex for a lot of library users. So far, both services continue to exist, and to be available to KDOT under just the one invoice, which I get in early March.

 

By the way, my Discovery (and FirstSearch) invoice is significantly more than my cataloging and ILL invoice. This year, it was $2850. The cataloging and ILL invoice is about $1640. (Yes, I looked at the actual numbers. $250 for ILL, the rest for cataloging and metadata.)

 

When I think about all the other costs in government, and in the transportation industry, and the real value that we and our customers get from the amazing resource that is WorldCat, even a few thousand dollars might be called a drop in the bucket. But the ILL increase to $250, which will quickly double to $500, and the extra cost of WorldCat Discovery (does this somehow also fund the free-for-everyone worldcat.org???), has definitely got me wondering if there are any money-saving alternatives.

 

Sorry so long, but thank heavens it’s Friday. Thanks, Laura, for starting this conversation.

 

Marie

 

 

 

The same thing happened to me. Paid around $56 last year for Resource Sharing; will be $250 this year.

 

Back in March, I tried to see if I could be included in the Missouri State Library contract which negotiates with OCLC for Missouri public libraries as a whole. My catalog holdings are part of the Missouri State Library's so I could be considered a type of branch or departmental library. The ILL cost would have been about the same but the cataloging price was identical to what I'm being charged now (no difference). So being part of a consortium does lower the price (at least for ILL). I could be wrong but somehow I don't think credits work like they used to.

 

My problem then became how and when this invoice would be paid which ultimately scuttled doing it through the State Library. It was also problematic if we split up how we paid the OCLC bill (ILL through the State Library and cataloging direct with OCLC). So we decided to handle the OCLC expenses through my contract (more flexible for the time being).

 

That said, $250, much less $500, is a lot for a small library operation which doesn't handle many borrowing or lending requests (even though I lend every chance I get).

 

Maybe we could revisit the TKN interlibrary loan agreements for member cooperative resource sharing to include those who catalog in OCLC but don't subscribe to WorldShare? 

 

 

To unsubscribe from the TRANLIB list, click the following link:
https://LISTSERV.IT.NORTHWESTERN.EDU/cgi-bin/wa.exe?TICKET=NzM2NTgyIE1hcmllLk1hbnRoZUBLUy5HT1YgVFJBTkxJQhS7zw%2BEMrha&c=SIGNOFF