Re: journal and publication costs, corrected figures

["Heather Morrison" <hmorrison@ola.bc.ca>]

As David Goodman points out, there are many more system components to
consider in the economic picture if universities move to an author-pays
open access system.

One of these components is the cost to universities and their libraries of
limiting access:  all the hardware, software, and programming costs
involved in authentication systems.  For example, as we saw in December on
Liblicense, there are reasons to believe that current authentication
methods are not sufficient, given the current model of licensing of
information.

What will be the cost to universities everywhere to upgrade, and what will
be the end result?  Is it possible a great deal of time and money will go
into new systems that will once again prove inadequate as hackers learn
new tricks?  If systems investments of universities en masse were
redirected towards an author-pays, open access system, could the result be
both cost savings and greater access for all universities and their
libraries?  Not to mention more meaningful tasks for systems people...

Another component is interlibrary loan.  By making articles more
accessible on a broad scale, university libraries would have an
opportunity to save money because other libraries would be able to access
materials directly more often rather than through interlibrary loan.

Of course, it's good to know that cost savings would apply even before
considering these other components.

a personal view by,

Heather Grace Morrison
Project Coordinator
BC Electronic Library Network
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