Dismantling the Stumbling Blocks that Impede Researchers’ Access to E-Resources | The Scholarly Kitchen

" ... One important dynamic, which is all too frequently ignored, is that content providers operate in the systems ecosystem of the licensing academic library. This ecosystem incorporates a number of services and intermediaries, and, for all the creativity that has gone into it, it nevertheless has real weaknesses. Content providers have been challenged to integrate their offerings as seamlessly into this ecosystem as would benefit researchers. In a recent Ithaka S+R issue brief, I wrote about some of the various stumbling blocks that off-campus users, especially, experience in using licensed e-resources. Even for common research workflows, when off campus, researchers can be required to click through seven or more webpages in order to gain access to an article or book that they have already discovered. Similarly, mobile devices all too often are poorly served by site design and the web apps that have been created for them, surprising given that libraries want to invest in mobile solutions and the strategic opportunities they face to incorporate the sensors and services that these devices offer. These challenges can be found across the range of content providers, libraries, and various intermediary services, and collectively I believe they are driving users away from licensed e-resources and towards open access materials ..."