Changes in the academic environment: Threat or opportunity?

Economic and technological changes converge on the connection between publishers and libraries. Arguing that the current library budget crisis is clearly different from previous crises, Paula Kaufman describes changes in university environments and in libraries' strategies for coping with higher prices and strained budgets. Shifts in spending patterns from books to serials, gaining access to materials by means other than purchasing them, overpublishing, technological transformations, and the entry of new players into the scholarly publishing arena will all affect the ways that publishers publish and libraries acquire.