RE: Changing the game

[Sandy Thatcher <sgt3@psu.edu>]

You may be confusing AAUP-member presses with presses like the
University Press of America or Edwin Mellen Press. I know of no
examples of the kinds of upfront payments you cite required by
AAUP-member presses. We do, of course, at times require authors to
get subsidies from their parent universities, foundations, etc. At
Penn State Press, about 90% of our authors receive royalties from
sales.


>Are we comparing science publishing to humanities publishing?  I hate to write
>in "generalities" but...
>
>I have known professors in STM whose research is highly subsidized by
>universitites, corporations, the government, and other sources.  Without these
>sources their research would be far too expensive to carry out.  In exchange
>for the heavy subsidization they make very little, if any, money when their
>work is patented or published and generally the patent or copyright
>is owned by
>the university.  They, in turn, rarely have to pay to be published.
>
>On the other hand I have known humanities professors who have had to pay
>substantial amounts to have their work published in university presses,
>sometimes by agreeing to buy a certain number of copies of their texts or
>copies of other texts by these presses.  These presses in turn own the
>copyrights.  Rather than paying the university presses, why shouldn't they opt
>to pay their own OA fees and own their copyrights?
>