Electronic Pubs Pricing in the Web Era

A workshop given at the 1998 thirteenth Annual Conference of the North American Serials Interest Group created the ideal venue to discuss the most effective pricing models in the market today. To gather information on pricing models being used today for electronic publications, a number of publishers, vendors, and agents were interviewed. Sixteen pricing models are identified. Among the more favored pricing models are: 1. print plus add-on surcharge for the 3-version, 2. electronic plus add-on surcharge for the print, 3. electronic is free with the print subscription, 4. group purchasing, 5. certain categories of users get a cheaper price, and 6. subscription plus transaction. The pros and cons of each of these models are presented.