Introduced by the Academic Press (AP) in 1996, the Big Deal-in which publishers sell online subscriptions to bundles of electronic journals-is now the principle means by which academics access research literature. The Big Deal was widely seen as a solution to the so-called serials crisis. Today, it is the librarians' biggest bugbear, and it has become the focus of a face-off between U.K. librarians and publishers. How did an initiative that was once viewed so positively become an object of derision?
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