Harvard Business School Publishing crosses the ‘evil’ academic line
Last Friday, we received an email from the Dean of the Rotman School asking us to think more carefully about HBR articles we put in our reading lists and asked students to read. Why? Because HBSP would now charge by the student for each of those articles that we use for ‘teaching purposes.’ And a teaching purpose arises when we require a student to read an article, we suggest a student reads an article or we describe a means by which students may come by an article. To be sure, HBSP will only be charging for 500 ‘classic’ articles — that is, articles that are most put in reading lists (including those by Professor Porter) — but it has the apparent right to charge for any of them.
How can this be? Well, it turns out that the libraries subscribe to articles through a bundle provided by EBSCO. However, unlike what appears to be every other article provided in that bundle, HBR articles are different. Here is the EBSCO clause from another school but my guess it is the same for the University of Toronto.
Harvard Business Review Notice of Use Restrictions, May 2009 Harvard Business Review and Harvard Business Publishing Newsletter content on EBSCOhost is licensed for the private individual use of authorized EBSCOhost users. It is not intended for use as assigned course material in academic institutions nor as corporate learning or training materials in businesses. Academic licensees may not use this content in electronic reserves, electronic course packs, persistent linking from syllabi or by any other means of incorporating the content into course resources. Business licensees may not host this content on learning management systems or use persistent linking or other means to incorporate the content into learning management systems. Harvard Business Publishing will be pleased to grant permission to make this content available through such means. For rates and permission, contact permissions@harvardbusiness.org.
“Not intended for use as assigned course material in academic institutions”! No “persistent linking”! For what purpose would a University library subscribe to this other than that?
Michael Sauers is currently the Director of Technology for Do Space in Omaha, NE. Michael has been training librarians in technology for the past twenty years and has also been a public library trustee, a bookstore manager for a library friends group, a reference librarian, serials cataloger, technology consultant, and bookseller since earning his MLS in 1995 from the University at Albany’s School of Information Science and Policy. Michael has also written dozens of articles for various journals and magazines and his fourteenth book, Emerging Technologies: A Primer for Librarians (w/ Jennifer Koerber) was published in May 2015 and more books are on the way. In his spare time he blogs at travelinlibrarian.info, runs The Collector’s Guide to Dean Koontz Web site, takes many, many photos, and typically reads more than 100 books a year.
View all posts by Michael Sauers
Last Friday, we received an email from the Dean of the Rotman School asking us to think more carefully about HBR articles we put in our reading lists and asked students to read. Why? Because HBSP would now charge by the student for each of those articles that we use for ‘teaching purposes.’ And a teaching purpose arises when we require a student to read an article, we suggest a student reads an article or we describe a means by which students may come by an article. To be sure, HBSP will only be charging for 500 ‘classic’ articles — that is, articles that are most put in reading lists (including those by Professor Porter) — but it has the apparent right to charge for any of them.
