How do independent scholars get access to databases?

[AvidReader]

Everything Parasauropholus said.

• Also ask your local public library. I was surprised to learn once that my public library in a rural Southern town had an ILL agreement with the major research university two hours away.
• Most CCs at which I have taught have had reciprocal borrowing agreements with the larger schools to which we sent our students. Yours may not, but it's worth asking.
• Some small private libraries are offering offsite access to digital resources during the pandemic. If you are a member at any of these, it's worth asking.
• This is a long shot, but post-pandemic it might be worth applying to library fellowships. If you are lucky enough to get one, they will usually cover a period of time on-site. Some have reciprocal agreements with local universities; some are affiliated with universities and will give you access to library resources with the fellowship.

AR.

[Hibush]

I think maybe on the old fora there was once a thread where some forumites offered to get articles for those who needed them. It is hazy in my memory, but I vaguely remember someone offering to get me an article.

In the olden days we had these postcards that we'd send to authors requesting reprints. They would send the article to us for free even through a subscription to the journal was really expensive and even though the reprints cost the author a bundle.

Remarkably, reprint requests still work and are totally compliant with copyright. The request is an email and the reprint is a PDF.

[polly_mer]

Remarkably, reprint requests still work and are totally compliant with copyright. The request is an email and the reprint is a PDF.

That depends on the exact publishing agreement.  I still have stacks of paper reprints from decades ago for which money was paid.

  I have also read the copyright agreement on my more recent PDFs.  Many of them can't be further distributed without paying a fee, although I retain rights to distribute previous versions that aren't in the nice, final format.

[Vkw10]

Public university libraries are often open to the public. Databases are typically licensed for employees, students, and walk-in users. Our librarians tell me that it costs extra to provide access to alumni, which is why our library doesn't.

Network access is often a barrier for walk-in users. Call, email, or text during the day, M-F, and ask the library staff about access. Contact them during weekday, because evenings and weekends often have limited staffing. When you ask, be sure to say that you will be driving in for the day and want to know if it's possible for a visitor to use computers or connect laptop to network. You may learn that there are several designated community user computers on 3rd floor, that the 2nd floor info tech desk can give you the visitor password for the day, or that visitor logon instructions are available at URL. There's usually a way to get walk-in access, if you ask.

FYI, legal databases often don't allow walk-in users. Some business databases do, but others don't.

[jerseyjay]

Remarkably, reprint requests still work and are totally compliant with copyright. The request is an email and the reprint is a PDF.

That depends on the exact publishing agreement.  I still have stacks of paper reprints from decades ago for which money was paid.

  I have also read the copyright agreement on my more recent PDFs.  Many of them can't be further distributed without paying a fee, although I retain rights to distribute previous versions that aren't in the nice, final format.

The last several articles I have published all came with a certain amount of free copies. Some actually send me offprints of the article, and some give me a special code that I can give to people that allows them to download it, which expires after a certain number of people use it. Some do a combination.

I am not sure if my giving a PDF that I legally obtain from my university to a friend violates copyright or, more likely, the rules of the library. Of course systematically providing PDFs to people all over the world probably would do both.

[Hibush]

Remarkably, reprint requests still work and are totally compliant with copyright. The request is an email and the reprint is a PDF.

That depends on the exact publishing agreement.  I still have stacks of paper reprints from decades ago for which money was paid.

  I have also read the copyright agreement on my more recent PDFs.  Many of them can't be further distributed without paying a fee, although I retain rights to distribute previous versions that aren't in the nice, final format.

I am not sure if my giving a PDF that I legally obtain from my university to a friend violates copyright or, more likely, the rules of the library. Of course systematically providing PDFs to people all over the world probably would do both.

If sharing your work matters, do check the agreement before you choose where to publish. A publisher that does not allow you to email a pdf of your work to interested colleagues is pretty predatory in my view.

If you see that restriction, change it when you sign the publishing agreement--that is a negotiable point, one that many overlook. I did that with Springer a couple times back when PDFs were a new thing.

As I have opined elsewhere, this issue will be moot once libraries stop subscribing to journals that are not open-access.

[Vkw10]

As I have opined elsewhere, this issue will be moot once libraries stop subscribing to journals that are not open-access.

Are you suggesting that you'll stop needing articles from subscription journals? Or that you and everyone in your field are able to pay APC charges to have everything published open access?

The issue will be moot when researchers stop publishing in journals that are not open access. And that will happen when we all stop evaluating job candidates, tenure candidates, promotion candidates, based on the journals where they publish OR we all start giving priority to candidates who publish OA.

The scholarly publishing system is broken. I'm happy to see alternatives being tested. But OA publishing isn't  free, so it's not just a matter of libraries changing their subscription practices. The faculty need to change our publishing practices, too. And universities need to change hiring and promotion practices to incentivize change.

[Hibush]

As I have opined elsewhere, this issue will be moot once libraries stop subscribing to journals that are not open-access.

Are you suggesting that you'll stop needing articles from subscription journals? Or that you and everyone in your field are able to pay APC charges to have everything published open access?

The issue will be moot when researchers stop publishing in journals that are not open access. And that will happen when we all stop evaluating job candidates, tenure candidates, promotion candidates, based on the journals where they publish OR we all start giving priority to candidates who publish OA.

The scholarly publishing system is broken. I'm happy to see alternatives being tested. But OA publishing isn't  free, so it's not just a matter of libraries changing their subscription practices. The faculty need to change our publishing practices, too. And universities need to change hiring and promotion practices to incentivize change.

Once a large enough proportion of the scholarship in a field is published OA, the paywall to other literature will make it less widely read. Then libraries will stop subscribing to those expensive low-utilization journals, and scholars hoping to be read will publish less in them. Then even fewer people will read the non-OA journals.

This phenomenon is well on its way in my part of biology. I belong to two professional scientific societies that each publish leading journals in the field. One went OA in 2017, the other in 2019. In both cases they projected that their subscription base would hit zero by about 2024 or 25.

No biology research is free. The cost of doing the research that goes into one article is over $100,000, so the OA fee is a reasonable part of the budget. This is a good thing for those who want to keep up with research, but has a limited library.

We were talking reprints up above. I just looked at my bill for reprints for an article published in 1992. Corrected for inflation, that little stack of reprints cost nearly what the OA fee is today. So getting your research know has always cost money.

[Charlotte]

Thank you all so much for your help! You've posted some good ideas and things I had not thought of before.