This new work addresses the challenges of electronic publishing and puts issues of collection development into perspective, providing a broad understanding of the collection development process. The book covers all phases of collection development-from needs assessment, policies, and the selection process (theory and practice) to publishers, serials, protection, legal issues, and censorship and intellectual freedom.This work addresses the challenges of electronic publishing and puts issues of collection development into perspective, providing students and practitioners of library and information science with a broad understanding of the collection development process. The book covers all phases of collection development-from needs assessment, policies, and the selection process (theory and practice) to publishers, serials, protection, legal issues, and censorship and intellectual freedom. Each chapter has been expanded and updated with new material and reading lists. In addition, a chapter that is new to this edition deals with e-serials; and two appendixes contain samples of policies related to electronic concerns. It is an excellent survey of the state of the art of collection development and a comprehensive text.