RE: Wiley-Blackwell 2009 Subscription and Licensing Options

["Ian Russell" <ian.russell@cytherean.co.uk>]

The 'bottom-line' is, by definition, revenue minus costs so you 
can't talk about the 'bottom-line' without considering costs...

Incidentally, Fred, your logic is flawed and it is perfectly 
possible and indeed reasonable that the cost of producing print 
is a 90% base cost + 10% additional cost for print, the cost for 
online is a 90% base cost + 10% for online and that therefore the 
price for online and print is a 90% base price + 10% for print + 
10% for online = 110%.

In any case, the situation varies from publisher to publisher and 
different policies and practices have emerged and continue to 
evolve.  Please remember, Fred, that when journal publishers (who 
were at the vanguard of embracing and implementing the web) first 
put their content online they generally added this for free 
bundled with a print subscription even though the costs of doing 
so (especially when the technology was not mature) was great 
(thus reducing the 'bottom-line' and decreasing profitability).

Regarding your argument that Wiley-Blackwell are including the 
cost for print delivery in the online price, the actual 
distribution of the journal is a far smaller cost that the 'first 
copy' cost of printing the issue.  In comparison online delivery 
platforms, discovery tools, SEO etc represent a significant 
investment.

This price structure - or something very similar to it - is also 
common across many journal publishers so it's unfair to single 
out one publisher.

In fact, so much of large journal publishers' sales (and to some 
extent small ones too via things like the ALPSP Learned Journal 
Collection and BioOne) are to consortia or in the form of bundles 
as to make the discussion almost moot.

Ian Russell
ALPSP

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
[mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of "FrederickFriend"
Sent: 01 October 2008 23:27
To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
Subject: Re: Wiley-Blackwell 2009 Subscription and Licensing Options

Emily,

I am grateful to you for providing this information. I could not 
find the FAQs to which you referred; the page 
http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/librarians/faq.asp came up 
with "Error: the page you have requested cannot be found", and 
the closest I could find to a "Transition" site, viz. 
http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/Brand/id-35.html does not have any 
FAQs.

Of course I accept that the cost of producing the content will be 
the same whether the delivery is print or electronic, because you 
will be producing print copies from an electronic base. You 
appear then to be saying that the cost of delivering the content 
is the same whether it is electronic or print. This contradicts a 
view I have heard from a number of distinguished publishers over 
the years, that maintaining a print production line adds between 
20% and 30% to the cost of a journal. The argument put to me has 
always been that for customers to see the cost benefit from 
cancelling print, the print production line would have to be 
closed down completely, which is an argument I can understand. 
What Wiley-Blackwell appear to be doing now is including part of 
the cost for delivering print (i.e. the cost above the cost of 
producing the content) into the price paid by online only 
customers. This may make some customers think twice about moving 
to e-only.

The justification you put forward for the pricing of the online 
version is that the online version provides added value. I accept 
that the online version does provide features not available in 
the print version, but I am surprised that the cost of providing 
these features is equivalent to the cost of providing a print 
copy. And one of the added benefits included in the online 
version, i.e. perpetual access rights, appears to customers not 
to be an added benefit at all, because it is included 
automatically in the print copy.

Thomas Krichel wrote in response to my earlier post to Liblicense 
that "the issue for a publisher is to maximise profits, not align 
prices to costs". He may well be right. However, when publishers 
justify the prices they charge, they do so on the basis of costs. 
So what I am calling for from publishers is honesty: either be 
open about your costs, or else stop talking about costs and admit 
that all that matters to you is the "bottom-line".

Fred Friend
JISC Scholarly Communication Consultant
Honorary Director Scholarly Communication UCL