Re: potential positive spiral in transition to open access

[Jan Szczepanski <jan.szczepanski@ub.gu.se>]

Spasmodically or not there are other ways to look at free
e-journals.

First: there are a world outside STM and peer reviewed journals.
The world's largest collection of free e-journals can be found at
Elektronische Zeitschriften- bibliothek (EZB) or in English
Electronic Journals Library

At the end of 2006 EZB had registred 13.071 open access journals.
That figure was in 2001, 2.312 green titles. About 600% more.

During the same time period the red titles have expanded from
8.184 to 16.059. About 100%. This is an indication that the
positive spiral is more postive towards open access.

In 2001 EZB had 78% red titles and 22% green ones. In 2006 56%
red titles and 44% green.

Of course You will find even more spasmodical journals in EZB but
the bigger picture is that green titles are growing faster and
will within ten years be the way people expects a journal to be.
Red titles will of course survive within the commercial
STM-ghetto but not outside, in the real world.

All figures are taken from the EZB Jahresbericht from 2006

http://rzblx1.uni-regensburg.de/ezeit/anwender/Jahresbericht_EZB_2006.pdf

Jan Szczepanski
Foerste bibliotekarie
Goteborgs universitetsbibliotek
Box 222
SE 405 30 Goteborg, SWEDEN
Tel: +46 31 773 1164 Fax: +46 31 163797
E-mail: Jan.Szczepanski@ub.gu.se



Sally Morris (Morris Associates) wrote:

> One has only to look at the DOAJ journals to see how many of them
> publish very spasmodically and may even have ceased entirely - I
> and a group of volunteers did an analysis of this last year
> (http://dx.doi.org/10.1087/095315106775122565)
>
> Sally Morris
> Email:  sally@morris-assocs.demon.co.uk
>
> -----Original Message-----
> [mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of Sandy Thatcher
> Sent: 28 June 2007 07:23
> To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
> Subject: re: potential positive spiral in transition to open access
>
> The fallacy here is the assumption that without a publisher's
> staff overseeing and organizing the "volunteer" work of
> academic editors, it will get done in a timely fashion and
> produce a steady stream of publishable articles. All of my
> experience in forty years of publishing suggests that few
> scholars have the self-discipline and motivation to do this
> kind of work without external pressures. We have difficulty
> keeping some of our journals on schedule even with a lot of
> oversight!
>
> Sandy Thatcher
> Penn State Press