RE: journal and publication costs, corrected figures

[Jan Velterop <jan@biomedcentral.com>]

Quite. But isn't that exactly what's wrong with the conventional model for
research publishing?

Jan Velterop

-----Original Message-----
From: espositoj@att.net
To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
Sent: 1/18/03 12:30 AM
Subject: Re: journal and publication costs, corrected figures

If it were true that journals were indeed priced by the article, there
might be something to this analysis, but journals are not priced that way,
any more than music CDs are priced by the song.  Nor are they priced as a
strict function of cost.  They are (mostly) priced as a function of
several factors, including costs, risk, invested capital, and market
opportunity.  The biggest expense is in finding customers--call this
marketing--which is very difficult in a world that is awash in published
research.

Joe Esposito