An individual might purchase a generalized subscription if their library does not purchase enough of this type of product for their use. Individual generalized subscriptions are comprised of fewer articles than institutional bundles and also carry additional discounts as additional bundles are purchased. This situation is similar to interlibrary loan, where a library obtains a photocopy of an article for a user, and the article is then available only to that user. This product would work best when an individual does not anticipate purchasing enough articles to make a generalized subscription cost-effective. For example, the user might select the desired article and fill out a request form.
Specific details regarding the process continue to be developed.
There are several instances in which an individual might want to purchase a traditional subscription. For example, if his library does not have a subscription to a journal that a person uses heavily, then a traditional subscription might make sense. Or, even if an individual's library subscribes to a journal title, but only in print, the user may find it more time and cost-effective to subscribe to an electronic version of the journal due to the added convenience of obtaining articles. This last scenario is perhaps unlikely due to the low cost to libraries of obtaining an electronic subscription to Elsevier titles already received in print. An individual directly pays for products by entering their credit card information on-line through PEAK's secure system.