Help for challenged readers

["Joseph J. Esposito" <espositoj@worldnet.att.net>]

To a hypothetical situation sketched by Brian Simboli, a world with
"universal open access to the results of research," Stevan Harnad writes
that "it will be a world in which the traditional journal still exists."
Some of us are slower than others.  Will someone please tell me why
librarians would continue to subscribe to journals whose content is
available for free elsewhere?  Isn't one of the reasons that many
librarians are advocating OA that it would reduce costs to libraries?  
And if libraries stop purchasing subscriptions, please explain to me why
publishers, at least commercial publishers, would continue to invest money
in publishing journals.  

If libraries would continue to purchase subscriptions not because of the
content itself but because of added value (added linking, perhaps, or
search mechanisms) that journals publishers bring to the content, would
the publishers not then move their investment away from the creation of
content to the development of tools that make content more valuable (in
other words, every publisher becomes a rival to Google)?  So in what sense
does the traditional journal still exist?

I think OA is a wonderful idea, but I don't think I am alone in wondering
what else will change in the world if and when it happens.

Joe Esposito