Part of my job as the e-resources librarian is to negotiate the language of license agreements for e-resources that my library purchases or subscribes. After you’ve read a few licenses it is easy to pick up on language that is intended to obfuscate or is missing entirely. It falls to me to clarify or make explicit so that our library patrons have the widest possible use of the licensed resource. The most common negotiating point (after indemnification and governing law) is our request for permission to lend a reasonable portion of the materials via interlibrary loan (ILL) and use that content for teaching, via a link through our course management software.
There is a NISO effort called SERU (A Shared Electronic Resource Understanding) which is designed to remove the whole license agreement negotiation practice in favor of a mutually agreeable understanding between a library and a vendor in how the vendor’s resource may be used. In reviewing the revised draft currently under public comment on SERU (http://www.niso.org/apps/group_public/download.php/7842/NISO_RP-7-201X-for_public_comment.pdf) I found the language presented there to be so clear on a topic that is usually so muddied that I’m copying it here for you to admire:
Some of the accepted uses include interlibrary loan and ad hoc sharing of single articles and chapters by individuals for purposes of scholarship and private study. Linking to the content at the provider’s site for use in courses is also acceptable.
If you’d like to read more about SERU to see if it may be appropriate for your library, see http://www.niso.org/workrooms/seru/. To view a list of content providers and libraries that have agreed to consider using SERU when appropriate, see http://www.niso.org/workrooms/seru/registry/ (my institution, Loyola Marymount University, is listed there!).
