Re: In the news (Georgia State)

[David Groenewegen <david.groenewegen@lib.monash.edu.au>]

An anecdotal response - last year I shared a taxi ride with an 
academic. He loved arXiv. It was the place he went to to follow 
research in his field, and to find out the latest. However, when 
he cited what he read, he cited the journal version, because for 
him that was the version of record (and he generally checked that 
the journal version was the same as the preprint first). And in 
his own CV he cited the journal version, even though he submitted 
all his preprints to arXiv as well. Both had a value to him, in 
different ways. He trusted arXiv, but recognised that the journal 
name was important to others. I wonder how would he react if his 
library cancelled his journal subscriptions? Would he care as 
long as the citation information was till available for free 
anyway? Not sure.

If I was in charge of the library budget (which I'm not) I'd find 
it very hard to justify handing university money over to 
societies. Which one would I sponsor anyway? How?

David Groenewegen
ARROW Project Manager & ARCHER Project Director
Monash University Library
Victoria 3800
AUSTRALIA
David.Groenewegen@lib.monash.edu.au


Ian.Russell wrote:

> Thomas' reply raises some further questions:
>
> 1) Strictly speaking, arXiv is an electronic preprint server so 
> the papers there may not be the published version.  Are 
> researchers in physics happy to use that version?  Would 
> researchers in human medicine be happy to use a version of 
> unknown providence?  Would librarians be happy with that 
> situation?
>
> 2) The content that I am familiar with on arXiv almost always 
> associates a posted article with a journal.  Authors very 
> quickly add 'submitted to Physical Review E' or 'Published in 
> Classical and Quantum Gravity' (or whatever journal) to their 
> preprint. Why?  Well to get the authority / credibility / 
> imprimatur / brand identity of the journal.  This is tied to - 
> but not exclusively gained by - the peer review process of the 
> journal. It is very important to note that for many, many years 
> (going back to pre-web) journals have NOT been the method of 
> primary dissemination in some subjects. arXiv may provide 
> access to content, but trustworthiness and authority - for the 
> time being at least - still comes from journals (whatever 
> business model is used).  What would happen to academia if the 
> primary mechanism of identifying trustworthy content and 
> assessing the order in which to read papers was taken away?
>
> 3) As someone who represents society publishers I find Thomas' 
> final point very interesting.  I would be even more interested 
> to hear any ideas for mechanisms to facilitate the flow of 
> money away from library acquisition budgets to scholarly 
> societies. Any ideas?
>
> Ian Russell
> CEO, ALPSP
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu [mailto:owner-liblicense-
>> l@lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of Thomas Krichel
>> Sent: 23 April 2008 00:05
>> To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
>> Subject: Re: In the news (Georgia State)
>>
>> Ian.Russell writes
>>
>>> So presumably this is one of the journals that Thomas
>>> recommends librarians to cancel?
>> Yes, because it is in Physics, where there is already a lot of
>> open access. Presumably most papers in JHEP can be found on
>> arXiv. The funds saved from cancellations should be used to
>> sponsor scholarly societies or groups to set up open access
>> resources.
>>
>> Cheers,
>>
>> Thomas Krichel                    http://openlib.org/home/krichel
>>                                RePEc:per:1965-06-05:thomas_krichel
>> phone: +7 383 330 6813                       skype: thomaskrichel