RE: Journals, society activities and the zero-sum game

["Rick Anderson" <rickand@unr.edu>]

> Societies, as indeed any other publishers, could see mandatory OA as a
> stimulus, rather than as a threat.

A stimulus to what?  A society that was once able to sell its journal to
subscribers is now told that it may no longer do so.  What exactly will
this stimulate the society to do?

Jan does make a valid point, though, by saying that where OA is mandatory
across the board, societies should be able to get revenues from authors
instead of from subscribers (since authors will, in theory anyway, be
charged no matter what publisher they turn to).  This leads to an
important question, though: in an environment where OA is mandatory, will
author charges be standardized as well?  If not we'll be sure to see
journals competing for authors in exactly that arena. Imagine the sales
pitches to authors: "Professors!  Why spend $1,500 to publish in PLoS when
you can publish at Joe's OA Clearinghouse for $595? We guarantee full
compliance with all major international OA protocols! Act now - this offer
is only good this semester!"  

(I'm being a bit facetious here, since obviously Joe's OA Clearinghouse
wouldn't offer authors much in the way of prestige.  The underlying issue
is real, though: where OA is mandatory but author charges are not dictated
from above, there will be a powerful incentive for publishers to compete
for authors by lowering charges.  Eventually the only journals to survive
would be those that can subsidize their costs from other sources.  And
then aren't we back where we started?)

----
Rick Anderson
rickand@unr.edu