RE: Calculating the Cost per Article in the Current Subscription Model

["Mcsean, Tony (ELS)" <T.Mcsean@elsevier.com>]

Can you cite evidence for the assertions in your opening paragraph,
particularly examples of corporates being willing to pay author fees
between 10x (Elsevier figures) and 60x (BMC's "all other journals" tarrif)
the not-for-profit rate to maintain the status quo?  Are your views
affected by the errors contained in Jan's message?

The OA debate needs to be evidence based and to address properly the
issues of detail in which the devil lurks so persistently and so often
such catastrophic effect.

Tony McSe�n
Director of Library Relations
Elsevier
+44 7795 960516
+44 1865 843630

-----Original Message-----
[mailto:owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of David Goodman
Sent: 07 January 2005 05:12
To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu; liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
Subject: RE: Calculating the Cost per Article in the Current Subscription
Model

I agree with Jan that the problem of industry users will not be a
practical difficulty.  The appropach I find obvious in a producer-pays
model is to arrange that they should pay substantially higher publication
charges.  This would be exactly analogous to the longstanding practice of
chargine them higher subscription and membership fees. Such a distinction
exists also in the copyright law, where the key fair use exemptions for
internal photocopying apply only to non-profit organizations.  They
willingly pay these fees, because they are the same as any other business
expense, and they expect the customer to pay in the end.

I agree with Heather that we must consider the use by non-research
libraries. These are the libraries that are the most underfunded, as
compared to research libraries. Unavoidable cancellation of subscriptions
to research journals by such libraries has been perhaps the key factor in
causing the positive feedback of journal price increases.  Faculty current
awareness and the small scale faculty-student research projects (usually
unpublished) are a major component of higher education. Education
authorities ought to recognize this, and contribute. If the funding
supporting education does not, then the funding supporting research will,
by necessity. It all comes from the tax revenue.

Phil has shown that some institutions would pay more under producer-pays
access. To the extent that the overall cost would be the same, this
necessarily implies that some would pay less. It is not a judgment about
which ones ought to pay more, or less, based on either ethical or
practical considerations.  This problem is not the responsibilities of the
libraries alone.

Dr. David Goodman
Associate Professor
Palmer School of Library and Information Science Long Island University
dgoodman@liu.edu