What is HERON?
What does HERON do?
How does HERON work?
If I want to use material where there is no copyright agreement with the publisher can HERON handle this request?
What about Illustrations?
Do HERON subscribers have to provide the original document for digitisation?
How is the digitised material made available to the requesting organisation?
How long does it take from the initial request being made to HERON until the material becomes available?
What size of server will I need if I am using digitised materials?
What are the charges for using HERON?
What must a university or college do in order to subscribe to HERON?
What support does HERON Provide?

What is HERON?

HERON was initially a phase three eLib project funded by the JISC and the three HE Partners who developed the service. University of Stirling (lead site), Napier University (Edinburgh) and South Bank University (London). More information about HERON's background can be found here.

In March 2002 HERON was acquired by Ingenta, guaranteeing the service's future after its project phase.

What does HERON do?

HERON offers a national service to the UK academic community for copyright clearance, digitisation and delivery of book extracts and journal articles. It has also developed a resource bank of digitised materials for rapid re-use (subject to copyright permissions). HERON also brings experience and strength in negotiations with publishers and other rightsholders.

HERON is also a designated Trusted Repository. This means that it may hold copies of CLA-cleared digitised texts. These texts form the basis of HERON's resource bank of archived pre-digitised material. It also includes copies of material requested through HERON plus texts from some of the most frequently requested subject areas which have been digitised on a speculative basis available for rapid re-use. Permission to store these items has been given by the rightsholders concerned.

How does HERON work?

• Institutions which subscribe to HERON are provided with user names and passwords to the HERONweb system (a web-based interface for handling users’ requests).
• Users enter the bibliographic details of the material they are requesting and the details of the courses for which the material is to be provided, using a series of forms on the HERON system.
• When users submit their requests, HERON staff approach the rightsholders for permission to digitise and store the material in the HERON Resource Bank. When permission is granted, HERON staff provide the requester with an estimate of the final costs.
• Once the estimate is accepted HERON will digitise the extracts and provide the requesting Institution with a copy of the file.

If I want to use material where there is no copyright agreement with the publisher, can HERON handle this request?

Yes, this is a major part of the service that HERON provides. HERON does use agreements where they exist - but where they do not, HERON undertakes the time consuming and complex business of tracking down rightsholders and obtaining agreement on your behalf.

What about illustrations?

HERON will use best endeavours to include all illustrations within requested materials, but users should be aware that there are several problems associated with their inclusion:

• Due to the technical processes used in scanning, images are displayed in black and white only, there is no gray scale. Therefore most illustrations using gray scale are not suitable for inclusion.
• The CLA cannot yet grant clearance for illustrations (graphs, diagrams, photos etc.) to be digitised. Therefore, HERON must approach each publisher for permission to include illustration where the rights are not held by a third party. Some publishers have given HERON a blanket permission for this, but others require an approach to be made ever time an illustration is included. This can add to the time taken to clear a request.
• Illustrations frequently belong to a third party, other than the publisher. In these cases the third party must be approached for permission. These rightsholders can be difficult to trace and this can add significant delays to the clearance process.

Do HERON subscribers have to provide the original document for digitisation?

HERON usually works from copies supplied by the British Library Document Supply Centre. HERON does, however, ask each institution whether it holds a copy of the material. If a copy is not available from other suppliers, we will ask the home institution to provide a good quality, clean photocopy for us to use for digitisation - we do not ask for the book or journal itself.

How is the digitised material made available to the requesting organisation?

Copies of cleared and digitised material are made available to subscribers via the HERONweb interface. Each institution may deal with the material as suits their needs. The only constraints are that it must be held on a secure network and may only be publicised to students for whom it has been cleared (if cleared under the "Textbook"/"Bookshop" model.

How long does it take from the initial request being made to HERON until the material becomes available?

Times can vary from as little as three weeks to as much as two months. As increasing numbers of publishers sign up with HERON and/or the CLA, the number of requests that take more than a month will diminish rapidly.

What size of server will I need if I am using digitised materials?

In setting up your server to give access to HERON materials, there are no hard and fast rules. Virtually any modern server will do the job fairly easily. Unless you are considering digitising your entire short-loan collection, storage space isn't really an issue. If you are going to use an elderly machine as a server, the speed and storage capacity may need to be reviewed. You would ideally want to use something with a fairly fast clock speed.

You must make sure that only authorised users gain access to the material cleared for you by HERON, so you need a set up for intranet rather than internet. You may also chose to set up some form of monitoring so that you can evaluate actual usage on a regular basis. The tools for these activities depend largely on your choice of equipment, operating system and software, and HERON cannot offer advice on how to set this up.
 

What are the charges for using HERON?

There are several parts to HERON costs:

• Institutional Subscription: For the academic year 2001/02, the Higher Education institutional subscription rate is £1250. This covers the period of Aug 1st 2002 - July 31st 2003 and allows access to the HERON service by unlimited numbers of users from within the subscribing university or college.
• Copyright clearance:

The payment mechanism is dictated by the rightsholder:
The majority of requests are calculated on a 'per student per page' basis for use by students on a specific course. Only those students on the specified course can be directed to the material (although other students may use the material should they come across it during their own private study/research. See Para. 4.7 of Schedule 3 in the CLA's HEI Digitisation licence for more details on 'recommended reading'.) 5p is the most common rate but charges can still vary quite a lot.
Some requests (especially for journals articles) are charged on a flat fee basis which allows any student registered at the university to be directed to the material.
• Supply fee: Where digitisation is required there will be a cost of £25 per item. This fee has been carefully worked out as the average fee for supply and digitisation costs across all requests. Where material can be supplied from existing Ingenta and HERON Resource Banks, the cost per item will be £7.50.
• HERON costs: HERON adds an administrative charge of £15 on extracts for carrying out this work and to cover the development of the HERON service.
• N.B. Copyright, supply and administrative costs are only charged on those items which are accepted by and successfully delivered to the requesting institution. Once a price estimate for a requested item has been accepted, the request cannot be withdrawn unless HERON fails to meet its target of making items "ready to download" within 28 days of your acceptance date. There is also a 14 day approval period during which the file can be returned and no fee incurred, if the quality of the digitisation should be unacceptable.

What must a university or college do in order to join HERON?
 

Each institution must:	Sign the HERON terms and conditions, Sign the CLA HEI digitisation licence  (this licence is now available to Further Education Colleges to sign, free of charge); Pay the institutional subscription fee
Each user must:	Sign the HERON forms which entitle him/her to use the HERON service

What support does HERON provide?

HERON provides:

• Free Induction and Training days for new subscribers, including a manual for the HERON system.
• The HERON Technical Unit offers guidance and support on any technical issues related to the mounting and use of HERON materials.
• HERON Copyright staff can provide guidance and advice to subscribers
• HERON has a closed discussion list ‘lis-hug’, which is used largely for dissemination of information and news by HERON to its subscribers but which can also be used by members for requests for advice and for discussion of related matters.
• User Group meetings are held throughout the year, to which representatives of all member universities and colleges are invited.
• HERONweb has an online helpdesk function for subscribers.
• HERON subscribers are also invited to email or phone the HERON team if they have any problems or queries.

Web pages maintained by Tricia Davey
Email: p.a.davey@stir.ac.uk
Last updated: 28 February 2003