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RE: Homer Simpson at the NIH

And perhaps, just perhaps, universities might be more willing to pay for author-fees going to journals published by university presses, and maybe even society publishers, than to commercially published journals. I wouldn't bet my life on it, however.

But for most university presses that publish journals, they are in the humanities and social sciences, not the sciences, and scholars in the liberal arts do not get grants including page charges and other publication subsidies. So, either granting agencies will have to change their practices, or authors (or their departments) will have to get used to paying themselves, for open access to work. Again, don't count on it. A lot would have to change in the traditional culture of academia to make that come about. Also don't count on those library savings from cancelled subscriptions going in any direct manner, if at all, to provide author-fees.

Unlike scholarly books, which for university presses overall lose money and have to be subsidized in one way or another, their journals can in the aggregate at least turn a profit. That makes them ripe for stealing by commercial publishers in a way that commercial publishers likely will never be interested in going after the kinds of books university presses publish, to any greater extent than some do now (Sage, Palgrave Macmillan, Rowman and Littlefield, etc.).

Thus, the scenario that Joe alludes to with the consolidation of journal publishing under a few giants as has happened in textbook publishing seems much more probable to me. The move of the anthropology journals to Wiley-Blackwell from UC Press, which is only one of the most highly publicized such transactions that have happened on multiple occasions in recent years, is a trend worth watching closely for just this reason.

If the giants scoop up all the best known journals with the highest reputations, that will leave the OA movement playing a role at the margins.

One reason this may not happen completely, though, is that some university press journals are actually owned by the presses, not by societies or other external entities. We own nine of the eleven journals we publish at Penn State, and they aren't for sale!

--Sandy Thatcher
Penn State Press


Joe

If we take open access out of the picture for the moment, your view of larger players taking an increasing proportion of a non-expanding market is a frightening one for the smaller, society publishers. It matches with the view that I have taken of the 'big squeeze' for the smaller players and suggests that if nothing changes in the market then the diversity of publishers (including not-for-profits and university presses) that we all want to see maintained is at risk.

Now let's reintroduce the idea of open access. Unfortunately, through what we might call a prism of misunderstanding, open access has been seen as a great threat to the smaller publishers. My suggestion is that handled well it could actually provide a survival mechanism for them. Society publishers and university presses have a number of great advantages that could help them thrive in a publication-charge open access journal environment - they often have high-quality journals with excellent author services and they have close connections with their communities (a bonus when searching for referees).

I can't imagine that to date any society publisher has lost its independence due to open access. Some have lost their independence due to an inability to compete in the big deal environment. As you suggest, the subscription market is not going to get any easier for the small publishers. That's why it makes sense to take a good look at open access.

David

-----Original Message-----
[mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of Joseph J. Esposito
Sent: 22 August 2007 18:43
To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
Subject: Re: Homer Simpson at the NIH

David,

If there is less money in the system, the bigger players are better positioned to survive; if there is more money in the system, the bigger players are better positioned to survive. The issue is not the size of the market; it is the maturity of the market. Publishing is close to a no-growth business. In no-growth markets, consolidation is a likely, if not inevitable, strategy.

The only reason that academic journals are published by such a huge number of publishers--unlike, say, college texts (6 players in the U.S. have 85% of the market)--is that the not-for-profit status of many of the players makes them resistant to some aspects of the marketplace. That is neither good nor bad; it is what it is. If all journals publishers were publicly traded and thus subject to Wall Street's stern review, consolidation would come quickly; we would be down to three publishers in 5 years.

The large players (most of whom are commercial) have learned to work with the restrictions on growth. They develop budget allocation strategies (the Big Deal) and solicit professional society publications. Their growth (NOT the market's growth, which is nill) is slowed down by the NFPs, but it is not stopped.

Incidentally, I can't help remarking that this long thread has as its subject line "Homer Simpson at the NIH."

Joe Esposito

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Prosser" <david.prosser@bodley.ox.ac.uk>
To: <liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, August 21, 2007 11:21 AM
Subject: RE: Homer Simpson at the NIH

 I'm happy to use publishers other than the American Physical
 Society as examples.  The trouble is that few publishers
 (commercial or non-commercial) have been as open as the APS in
 giving their revenue per article.  However, if you would
 rather then let's use the example of Optics Express which I
 understand makes a surplus (and is open access, incidentally)
 on a publication charge of $1,200 or so (dependent on the
 length of the paper).

 Joe contends that if there is less money in the system it is
 the big players who are best placed to survive.  I'm just
 wondering if that necessarily true as some (not all, some)
 smaller publishers (both commercial and non-commercial) appear
 to operate on less revenue per paper.

 David C Prosser PhD
 Director
 SPARC Europe
 E-mail:  david.prosser@bodley.ox.ac.uk