College Libraries Push Back as Publishers Raise Some Ebook Prices

Academic librarians have long decried the prices commercial publishers charge for access to serial publications, particularly electronic journals in the sciences. With journal packages taking up increasingly large chunks of library budgets, the prospect of publishers' ramping up prices on another digital format has spooked some librarians.

"I think the fear here is that we got burned by locking into journal contracts that we should have never locked ourselves into," says Bryn I. Geffert, librarian of Amherst College. "Once burned, twice cautious."