Re: Electric Library

[Shannon Acedo <acedos@MARLBOROUGH.LA.CA.US>]

I am sending this out to the list because we are also in the process
of reviewing Electric Library, and are unsure about it's reliability.
 For example, they claim something like "3000 books", but it turns
out to be really 3000 CHAPTERS of books, or scenes, or speeches; in
addition, instead of "10000 Magazines" it turns out to be 10000
ARTICLES.  The big numbers they recite are just segments of larger
works, chapters, scenes, articles.  How could having a selected (by
whom?) number of SCENES by say, Shaw, replace any one play in its
entirety?  Which chapters are chosen, and why would this be useful?
Am I misunderstanding this?  We tried to find  A Comedy of Errors,
and only came up with 150 articles, most published by Monarch Notes.
If indeed the Complete Works of William Shakespeare are available, it
is not apparant how best to access them.   It seems to be a large but
fairly random collection of information that may or may not hold the
answer to someone's question.

How do other libraries use this?  Could it be dependable enough to
allow one to stop subscriptions of other databases?  If a student
(or teacher)is looking for a particular article in a particular
magazine, will Electric Library definately have it?  Do they say they
have every article in, say, History Today, back to X year?

Obviously, my question is:  how comprehensive is this resource?  It
may help answer random reference questions, but is it useful in more
thorough research projects or in specific article requests?

I'm grateful for any clarifications anyone may send me.  I'm hoping I
just haven't found the trick of using EB yet, but then, that isn't
the most encouraging thing either.

Thanks--

Shannon Acedo
Assistant Librarian
Marlborough School
Los Angeles CA
acedos@marlborough.la.ca.us

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