RE: Certification and Dissemination

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

As I said, if both repository dissemination and peer review are 
being paid for by subscriptions, gold OA or some other method 
then I personally have no problem.  I don't know how I could have 
been clearer on this.

However, the Southampton University mandate (and by extension 
other similar mandates) is unfunded because the University has 
made no clear commitment to support the scholarly communication 
system by continuing to subscribe to journals; or to make a clear 
and unambiguous commitment to meet gold OA fees; or to come up 
with some other method of funding the system.

I think that you made the point about subscription revenue 
providing compensation for peer review because you misread or 
misunderstood my first paragraph.  If it is paid for by 
subscriptions as it has been for 350 years then, of course, no 
problem.  If you have an unfunded mandate like Southampton 
University's where: 1) authors have to deposit a version of the 
article after publishers have added value, but 2) the University 
has not made a commitment to cover gold OA fees, and 3) the 
University expects to make 'subscription savings' through 
cancellations then Southampton becomes a free rider on the rest 
of the system and with enough free riders the system will break 
down.

This argument is really a side show though as we simply don't 
know how the subscription journal / repository relationship will 
work although we have both agreed in the past that it will most 
likely result in journals going out of business.

As regards the output of publicly funded research:  No, I am 
sorry you are quite wrong.  If the output from the university was 
'peer-reviewed journal articles' then the system would never have 
needed publishers to organize the peer review.  I believe I 
answered in my original post why this is not 'free'. 
Incidentally, 'certification' is one of a number of areas where 
publishers add value and it really must be noted that 
certification is much more that simply running a peer review 
*process*.

Anyway, it seems to me that the issue would easily be solved if 
Southampton University makes a campus-wide commitment to meet 
gold OA fees.  Why hasn't it?

Ian

> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu [mailto:owner-liblicense-
> l@lists.yale.edu] On Behalf Of Stevan Harnad
> Sent: 28 April 2008 23:43
> To: liblicense-l@lists.yale.edu
> Subject: RE: Certification and Dissemination
>
> On Sun, 27 Apr 2008, Ian.Russell wrote:
>
>> But in order to have BOTH, you have to pay for BOTH and that 
>> means paying both for repository dissemination and for peer 
>> review either using the established subscription model, author 
>> side payment (gold) open access or some other method...
>
> And both *are* being paid for: About $3000 per paper published 
> (through institutional journal subscriptions) plus about $10 
> per paper archived.
>
> I don't quite understand what you are alluding to here.
>
>> You don't get both by imposing unfunded mandates like that 
>> announced by Southampton University.
>
> Subscribing institutions pay for journals by subscribing to 
> them.
>
> Institutions pay (the little they cost) for their Institutional 
> Repositories for the benefits they confer on the institution: 
> Inventorying, showcasing, archiving, monitoring and assessing 
> its own research output, as well as maximizing its visibility, 
> accessibility, usage and impact.
>
> The authors' 6 minutes of extra keystrokes per paper deposited 
> cost nothing. They are an investment in their research, just as 
> all the preceding keystrokes were.
>
> And here is what Southampton University has to say about its 
> "unfunded" mandate:
>
>       "The University of Southampton is to make all its
> 	academic and scientific research output freely available. 
>	A decision by the University to provide core funding for 
>	its Institutional Repository establishes it as a central 
>	part of its research infrastructure..."
> http://www.eprints.org/openaccess/policysignup/fullinfo.php?inst=University%20of%20Southampton%20
>
>> And this is my point:  Whilst I agree with the argument that 
>> the output of publicly funded research (or from a research 
>> institution) - which is the author's original article - should 
>> be freely available to the public, I do not believe that the 
>> 'refereed postprint' (to use your terminology, I prefer 
>> 'accepted manuscript') should necessarily be freely given 
>> away. That decision should be up to the organization that 
>> added the value by peer reviewing it and associating it with 
>> its brand.
>
> The output of publicly funded research is peer-reviewed journal 
> articles -- which the peers review for free for publishers, and 
> the authors give their publishers for free to sell for 
> subscription, in exchange for having administered the peer 
> review.
>
> If and when subscriptions become unsustainable, institutions 
> can publishers pay for the peer review of their own article 
> output out of a small portion of their annual windfall savings 
> from the cancelled journal subscriptions.
>
> Maximizing the usage and impact of their own peer-reviewed 
> research output is certainly not a decision institutions and 
> funders need to leave up to publishers, and that is what the 
> growing wave of Green OA self-archiving mandates is about. 
> http://www.eprints.org/openaccess/policysignup/
>
>> What right, exactly, do those imposing unfunded mandates have 
>> to stipulate that the value added in this way be given up for 
>> no compensation?
>
> Would you say that subscription revenue was no compensation?
>
>> Of course, the authors have the right to choose where to 
>> publish and long may that continue.
>>
>> In anticipation of arguments that peer review is done 'for 
>> free' I hasten to add that (i) this isn't the only value added 
>> (ii) operating peer review processes are very expensive and 
>> that (iii) referees have the choice whether or not to give 
>> their time and expertise to peer review articles (those 
>> investing in peer review are given no choice regarding whether 
>> or not to give away the fruits of their labours by unfunded 
>> mandates).
>
> The operating costs of administering peer review (and much 
> more) are paid for today by institutional subscription revenue. 
> If and when Green OA should ever make subscriptions 
> unsustainable, publishing will convert to Gold OA and 
> institutions will pay for the costs or administering peer 
> review (and no more) out of a portion of their subscription 
> savings.
>
> Publishers today have a choice: They can wait to see whether 
> universal Green OA eventually makes subscriptions 
> unsustainable, or they can convert to Gold OA right now, or 
> they can let their titles migrate to publishers that are happy 
> to wait, or convert, right now. Only one choice is not open to 
> publishers: To prevent authors and institutions from making the 
> choice to maximize the impact of their refereed research output 
> by self-archiving it.
>
> Stevan Harnad