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Cory Rockliff wrote: > Do libraries opt for these commercial 'pre-indexed' services simply > because they're a good value proposition compared to all the work of > indexing multiple resources from multiple vendors into one local index, > or is it that companies like iii and Ex Libris are the only ones with > enough clout to negotiate access to otherwise-unavailable database > vendors' content? > A little bit of both, I think. A library probably _could_ negotiate access to that content... but it would be a heck of a lot of work. When the staff time to negotiations come in, it becomes a good value proposition, regardless of how much the licensing would cost you. And yeah, then the staff time to actually ingest and normalize and troubleshoot data-flows for all that stuff on the regular basis -- I've heard stories of libraries that tried to do that in the early 90s and it was nightmarish. So, actually, I guess i've arrived at convincing myself it's mostly "good value proposition", in that a library probably can't afford to do that on their own, with or without licensing issues. But I'd really love to see you try anyway, maybe I'm wrong. :) > Can I assume that if a database vendor has exposed their content to me > as a subscriber, whether via z39.50 or a web service or whatever, that > I'm free to cache and index all that metadata locally if I so choose? Is > this something to be negotiated on a vendor-by-vendor basis, or is it an > impossibility? > I doubt you can assume that. I don't think it's an impossibility. Jonathan