The University of Toronto library's decision to cancel print subscriptions for up to 300 journals in favour of online versions is shortsighted, a physics researcher and 20-year employee of the library's serials section says. “E-journals are less readable, less browsable and of uncertain shelf life,” complains Matthew Edwards of the Gerstein Science Information Centre, the library serving all science and health science disciplines at the university.
Edwards told CMAJ that the e-journal archive may not be secure because it is unproven. “The possibility exists that sometime down the road chunks of the e-journal archive will become corrupted or lost, and not be replaceable.”
The library began cancelling print subscriptions in 2001 after it became 10% to 15% cheaper to buy only their electronic versions. This year print versions of journals such as Cancer, the Journal of Pediatrics and the Journal of Neurophysiology will be cancelled.
Edwards laments the loss of the “art of research” as browsing through stacks becomes a thing of the past. “People should realize what they are losing,” he says.
And science may be the ultimate loser. “Because e-journals are less browsable, researchers in the future may tend to concentrate on just a few core titles … and this narrowing of perspective could have a negative impact on science,” he warned in a letter to the University of Toronto Bulletin. — Barbara Sibbald, CMAJ