Although I agree with Gary about not wanting to give up collection development decisions wholesale, I decided best thing to do about streamed video was to jump in big, so we're starting with some of the Alexander Street dbs. Packages were selected based on: anticipated interest and therefore likely usage, recognized content, average cost of the included titles if we were to buy the DVDs, how many of those titles would we purchase if money were no option, and a magic 8 ball.
The option to purchase collections got me further than the subscription options because we have a pot of one-time soft money. I was up front that the break-even on purchase vs subscription is about 8 years. (Annual maintenance fees magically don't count.) I find this division a bit outdated, but figure I might as well milk it to benefit the collection. Now I'm working my way through getting approvals to purchase licenses from the other main vendors that we buy from, not because I necessarily want to buy streamed video from them yet, but so that it will make it easy for me to quickly license individual titles when the need arises. Barb Bergman | Media Services & Interlibrary Loan Librarian | Minnesota State University, Mankato | (507) 389-5945 | barbara.berg...@mnsu.edu
VIDEOLIB is intended to encourage the broad and lively discussion of issues relating to the selection, evaluation, acquisition,bibliographic control, preservation, and use of current and evolving video formats in libraries and related institutions. It is hoped that the list will serve as an effective working tool for video librarians, as well as a channel of communication between libraries,educational institutions, and video producers and distributors.
