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Kelly Oja wondered: <<I have been doing some research on my document
sharing/repository thing, and I was browsing available articles on the
IngentaConnect website, and the prices seem a tad steep. Just wondering
if anyone else with access has seen this. I am not about to pay $71.27
for a 2004 Information Week article.>>
Prices tend to be high because the original publisher wants to
encourage you to subscribe rather than buying only the articles that
interest you, and this is a great way for them to earn additional
profits from an article. Moreover, Ingenta tacks on its own fee to
cover expenses and pay the rent--though I believe the majority of the
price is set by the publisher, not Ingenta. But yes, $71 is a bit
exorbitant even by the standards of other article reprint services. I
believe Tech. Comm. charges only $10, which is a bargain in my
experience.
There are several strategies that can save you considerable money:
- visit the original publisher's Web site; many old articles are
available for free online (e.g., for PC Magazine)
- contact the publisher directly and ask about the price of back issues
of the publication (often more expensive than newstand prices, but much
less expensive than individual articles)--they always print more copies
than they distribute, and are usually glad to get rid of overstock
- visit your local university library and check out their archives; in
Canada and perhaps elsewhere, most have signed up with a copyright
clearance center and pay an annual fee to allow students to make
photocopies
- visit your public library and ask about the costs of interlibrary
loans (sometimes free, sometimes a better price than Ingenta et al.)
- contact the author directly and ask if they have a pre-publication
version of the file they can send you; in academic publishing, authors
frequently purchase "reprints" or "offprints" and are more than happy
to mail you one.
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