UKSG TRANSFER Supplementary Information
This document is not part of the TRANSFER Code of Practice and will be revised on an ongoing
basis. The information provided in this document has supplementary information to aid in
understanding the Code and to help make journal transfer more efficient. The most current
version of this document will be available at http://www.uksg.org/transfer/papers.
1. ALPSP and STM Information
ALPSP and STM have each produced useful documents that address aspects of journals changing
ownership.
When a society changes publisher: ALPSP guidelines (2009)
http://www.alpsp.org/Ebusiness/Information/HotTopics/StandardsProtocolsTechnology.aspx
STM Position Paper “ENSURING QUALITY CUSTOMER ACCESS TO ONLINE CONTENT WHEN
SOCIETY JOURNALS CHANGE PUBLISHERS” (http://www.stm-assoc.org/documents-statementspublic-co/2003-2007-documents-statements-public-correspondence/2006-documentsstatements-public-correspondence/stm%20journal%20transfers.doc – 65Kb, Word)
2. Additional ISSN Information
The Transferring Publisher should communicate the ISSN of all versions (e.g., print, electronic,
CD-ROM, etc.) to the Receiving Publisher. The Transferring Publisher will also communicate
contact information for the ISSN centre from which the ISSN was obtained.
The Receiving Publisher will contact the ISSN center from which the ISSN was obtained (if known
or communicated from the Transferring Publisher), or the ISSN center in the country of
publication of the Receiving Publisher to confirm the ISSN communicated by the Transferring
Publisher and to inform the ISSN center of the transfer.
The responsible ISSN centre for a given publication is determined by the first named place of
publication on the journal or, in the case of journals published by multinational publishers,
according to a list maintained by the ISSN International Centre on their Web site:
http://www.issn.org/en/node/331
Transfer of publishers, even if no country change is apparently involved, may require transfer of
responsibility from one ISSN centre to another because of the way ISSN responsibility for
multinational publishers is allocated. Receiving publishers should always inform the ISSN center
in the receiving country of publication about the transfer and seek confirmation of all ISSN that
have been transferred. The Receiving Publisher should also seek determination of which ISSN
center will be responsible for their ISSN assignments.
Since ISSN can be assigned at the request of parties other than the publisher, the Transferring
Publisher may not be aware of all the ISSN that have been assigned.
3.
DEFINITIONS OF TERMS IN CODE OF PRACTICE
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Archive: a third party organization that preserves scholarly literature published in electronic
form. The organization’s mission is to ensure that these materials remain accessible to future
scholars, researchers, and students. Current examples of archive services are: Portico, LOCKSS,
CLOCKSS and the KB in the Netherlands.
Digital Content Files: full text of journal articles and other journal content in XML, SGML, HTML
and PDF formats.
Effective Transfer Date: date specified in the legal contract for the transfer to take place and
when the Receiving Publisher assumes responsibility from the Transferring Publisher for the
journal.
Perpetual Access Rights: ongoing access rights to electronic content that continue even when a
subscription or licensing term ends. This enables continued access to content. Such rights are
negotiated between publishers and libraries and other licensees/subscribers. Publishers have
an ongoing obligation to ensure access to content where perpetual access rights have been
granted and such obligation is commonly backed up by an agreement between the publisher
and an archive service.
Receiving Publisher: Publisher buying, or receiving publishing rights from a Third Party for the
journal.
Subscription Lists: complete list of current and lapsed subscribers, including individuals,
institutions, organizations, consortia, and the like, of the journal being transferred.
TRANSFER Compliant: Organizations that publicly sign up to the TRANSFER Code of Practice via
the procedures outlined on the UKSG TRANSFER website and who then follow the Code in
subsequent journal transfers will be considered TRANSFER Compliant. The TRANSFER
Committee will keep the list of TRANSFER Compliant publishers up-to-date on the TRANSFER
website.
Third Party: organization, for example a society, owning or part-owning the journal other
than the Transferring or Receiving publisher.
Transferring Publisher: Publisher currently owning, or responsible for publishing the journal on
behalf of a Third Party
4.
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON CODE OF PRACTICE
Section 1 – The goals of this section are to ensure that customers do not lose access to content
during a journal transfer and that any perpetual access rights that have been granted are
honoured. If a problem occurs during a transfer the Transferring Publisher has an obligation to
“provide access” to the content to existing customers. In this context “provide access” means
keeping the journal content on the Transferring Publisher’s journal hosting system and
continuing to make the content available after the Effective Transfer Date in the same manner it
was doing prior to the Effective Transfer Date. The Transferring Publisher will continue to do
this until the Receiving Publisher makes the content available on its own site. If the Receiving
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Publisher hasn’t yet made the files available six months after the Effective Transfer Date then
the Transferring Publisher is not required to continue to provide access to the content but is
encouraged to so that customers do not lose access to content.
The obligation for the Transferring Publisher to continue to provide access to content in Section
2 of the Code takes into account the fact that the Transferring Publisher will be incurring costs in
keeping the content available online after the Effective Transfer Date so there is a limit of 6
months. The TRANSFER Working Group does not expect there to be many cases where the
Receiving Publisher is not able to provide access six months after the Effective Transfer Date but
will monitor the situation during 2008 and 2009.
Grace Period - the Working Group recommends that the Receiving Publisher consider a grace
period after a journal transfer for existing customers to allow time for negotiation of new
licenses and updating of subscription and access systems.
Usage Statistics – the Working Group recommends that the Transferring Publisher make
COUNTER statistics available for the transferred content for at least 12 months after the
Effective Transfer Date so customers have access to this information.
Section 2 – Please see the “Format” section in “Publisher Information Exchange” below.
Publishers should consider using the NLM DTD (http://dtd.nlm.nih.gov/) as an interchange
format for Digital Content Files. Providing as much information as possible will make transfers
smoother for all parties.
Section 3 – Please see the “Subscription Information” section in “Publisher Information
Exchange” below. This provides more details on the information to be exchanged.
Subscriptions agents will be involved as appropriate in providing this information.
Section 4 – Refer to the “Location Information” section in “Publisher Information Exchange”
below. If backfile content is to remain exclusively on the Transferring Publisher’s site after the
Effective Transfer Date then both the Receiving and Transferring Publishers should provide
permanent URL links between the journal sites.
Section 5 – Successful journal transfers are highly dependent on accurate and timely
communication to all parties. Publishers should also make sure that sales representatives and
other internal staff are notified of journal ownership changes.
The TRANSFER Working Group is planning to create a TRANSFER Alerting Service during 2008
that will aid effective dissemination of information about journal transfers.
Section 6 – Please refer any questions on CrossRef DOI Ownership Transfer to CrossRef at
support@crossref.org.
Section 7 – as for Section 1.
Section 8 – as for Section 5.
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Section 9 – as for Section 3.
Section 10 – as for Section 6.
5.
PUBLISHER INFORMATION EXCHANGE
OVERVIEW
To support the aims described in the TRANSFER Code of Practice, the Working Group has
developed guidelines on information that could be exchanged between publishers to improve
the transfer process. The details of exchanges will be subject to contract between the parties
involved in the transfer but the Working Group has tried to provide guidance on the information
items likely to be useful during the course of such transfers. The tables below can be used as
checklists of what information to exchange during a transfer but whether to use this information
or not is entirely up to each publisher.
TYPES OF INFORMATION NEEDED
Bibliographic information describes the journal itself, in both its online and printed forms.
Starting from the journal’s title, the information covers journal identifiers like the ISSN or DOI,
the frequency of publication, publication ranges available and URLs at which the journal can be
accessed. Where possible it should this also contain all known previous titles, ISSN changes, etc.
Format information focuses primarily on online version(s) of the journal and any supplementary
information, describing which publication ranges are available in various formats such as PDF,
HTML or XML/SGML, as well as showing whether DOIs are assigned at article level, at journal
level or both.
Location information covers both online and printed versions of the journal. It provides
information on hosting platforms, aggregators offering the content concerned, knowledge bases
containing the information, link-resolver and COUNTER compliancy and physical distribution
arrangements for print.
Subscription information pertains to individual or institutional subscription records, and is
exchanged to ensure that continued service and commercial arrangements are possible at the
customer level. Typically this information will be commercially confidential between the
publishers, societies or other third parties involved in specific journal transfers.
BIBLIOGRAPHIC INFORMATION
This comprises a set of 34 detailed data elements, designed to convey information on the
following:
Data Element
Details
Frequency and pattern of
publication
Issues per year, months of
publication. Include any past
frequencies if known.
DOI at the title level, ISSNs for
Identifiers for the journal
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Responsibility and
preferred deadline
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List prices
Publication ranges, both online
and print
Publisher and imprint
URLs
print, online, and any other
formats (e.g., CD-ROM), journal
title, and any intended changes
in title at the point of transfer.
For print and online versions,
for various sales
territories/currencies, for
various customer types
First and last volumes, issues or
dates of publication
For both Transferring and
Receiving Publishers
Where to find the journal,
before and after the transfer
FORMAT INFORMATION
This comprises a set of 24 detailed data elements, designed to convey information on the
following:
Data Element
Details
CrossRef compliancy
Whether CrossRef procedures
followed
Whether assigned at article
level and where lists can be
obtained
Full text, abstracts, references
or combinations of same.
Whether online is released
ahead of print.
And usage examples
HTML, PDF, SGML, XML for
text and explanation of image
or other text formats used
Such as DTDs or schemas
used, PDF conventions
regarding embedded fonts
First and last volumes, issues
or dates of publication
Formats used and how/where
available
DOI rules and assignments
Extent of content
Filename conventions
Format of online content
Format details
Publication ranges, in each
format
Supplementary content
Responsibility and
preferred deadline
LOCATION INFORMATION
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This comprises a set of 55 detailed data elements, designed to convey information on the
following:
Data Element
Details
Aggregator information
Who holds which content for
both Transferring and
Receiving Publishers,
embargoes involved
For both Transferring and
Receiving Publishers, for
backfile and new content
And whether this will change at
the point of transfer
Whether and how customers
will be informed of the transfer
And whether these will change
at the point of transfer
And whether these will change
at the point of transfer
For both Transferring and
Receiving Publishers, for
regular subs and for single
issues
Defined in both date and
volume/issue ranges
Will this be required, and how
to go about this
Whether the new platform will
be open to this
Where to go, how this may
change at the point of transfer
and how customers will be
alerted
Archiving arrangements
COUNTER compliancy
Customer alerts
Hosting platform details
Link resolvers and Z39.50
compliancy
Print distribution arrangements
Publication ranges on old and
new online platforms
Re-registration on new
platform
Search engine indexing
URLs and Open URL details
Responsibility and
preferred deadline
SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION
This comprises a set of 85 detailed data elements, designed to convey information on the
following:
Data Element
Details
Agent information
Where subscription agents are
involved
To support billing, collection
and other commercial aspects
Bill-to details
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Responsibility and
preferred deadline
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Consortium details
Customer access details for
online journals
Deferred revenue amounts
End-user details
Gratis/comp information
Order and payment
information
Renewal profile
Ship-to details
Society details
Subscription term and type
Which consortium
IP range(s),
username/password
combinations or other keys
Supporting the accurate
transfer of revenues and
liabilities between Transferring
and Receiving Publishers
To convey accurate information
about the end customer when
consolidation arrangements are
in place
Including gratis reasons where
appropriate and term of gratis
subs
Currencies, amounts and
methods of payment
Lifetime subscription history if
available, number of times
renewed to date
For print subscriptions
Which society, any associated
membership information
Defined in either date or
volume/issue range, any time
start or calendar/volume
arrangement
TECHNICAL DETAIL
For those requiring more technical detail, Project TRANSFER has listed a comprehensive set of
data elements in a document entitled Consolidated TRANSFER Data, which is available at
http://www.uksg.org/transfer/papers. This spreadsheet offers guidance on each of the
elements and could be used as a template for publishers involved in journal transfers.
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