Re: OA's Three Bogeymen
Alas, this whole discussion continues to assume that publishing must rest mainly on organizations that behave like businesses (hence the call for sustainability) and often are busineses. Why should they not be treated as services integral to the research cycle of activities (which should include publishing)? If so, they should simply be supported by public money. Research is supported by public money and publishing is an integral part of research. No one asks if research is sustainable, and they do not for a good reason: it is not! If publishing is an integral part of research, it follows that publishing should be supported by public money and not be submitted to market rules which, in any case, can only distort the great conversationof science and of scholarship more generally. The discussion below is also about one kind of Gold Publishing, the so-called author-pay model. Personally, I am very skeptical about this model, and increasingly so. It solves access for third world countries only through humiliating, piecemeal, requests, and it has opened the door to devious practices, some of which are precisely being discussed below. Yet,I believe the Gold Road is viable if constructed correctly. Once again, allow me to point to SciELO. To my mind, this is the best and most coherent strategy for the Gold road. It also coincides well with national science policies trying to promote science and, as SciELO's Abel Packer would say, provide a place in the sun for Third World scientists. This is why I support a public option for scientific and scholarly publishing, but this public option should be international in nature to avoid being too vulnerable to national politics. This said, I would rather be vulnerable to national politics than to Elsevier or any other large, private, publisher. I can vote in my country but I have no voice inside the Elsevier (or Springer, or ...) structure. Jean-Claude Guédon PS And, as a reminder, this statement is not in support of the Gold Road as the exclusive way to reach OA; it simply tries to tweak the Gold Road to make it more viable. This is also and exactly what I do when I try tweaking the Green Road by saying that repositories must get involved in the generation of symbolic value. Both roads are needed, but they must be conceived coherently and correctly. Van: American Scientist Open Access Forum namens Richard Poynder Verzonden: di 16-2-2010 11:59 Aan: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org Onderwerp: OA's Three Bogeymen I am inclined to agree with Keith. However, it needs to be acknowledged that researchers are not always very discerning when choosing a publisher. I have had some say to me, In an ideal world I would not opt to pay to publish with this or that particular publisher, but I need to get my work published urgently, so I am just going to bite the bullet. For that reason some OA publishers seem quite content not to be part of the OASPA community, and happy to operate by their own rules -- in the knowledge that there is a ready market for their services. So while one might argue that the research community can afford to ignore these companies and simply carry on using subscription publishers and Green OA, in the hope that the market will somehow create an optimal OA publishing ecosystem, I am less confident. From: American Scientist Open Access Forum [mailto:american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org] On Behalf Of keith.jeff...@stfc.ac.uk Sent: 16 February 2010 12:00 To: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org Subject: Interview with Open Access publisher In-Tech/Sciy All - Richard Poynder recently suggested that there were three bogeymen haunting the OA movement: (1) asking authors to pay to publish could turn scholarly publishing into a vanity press; (2) OA publishing will in any case inevitably lead to lax or even non-existent peer review; (3) OA publishing is not financially sustainable. http://poynder.blogspot.com/2010/02/oa-interviews-sciyo-aleksandar-lazinica.html In my opinion. There is already evidence of (1) with various publishers trying to scam payment for publishing (fortunately very few cases to date). As a consequence of (1), (2) inevitably happens - but hopefully only in the case of a small number of so-called journals. It may be that (3) is true; with all information to date indicating gold OA costs 3 to 4 times more than current subscription models (the figure of 3 comes from our own estimates at STFC, 4 comes from the recent posting on AMSCI concerning the ACM article). But of course if current subscription models (maintaining peer review) are backed up by green OA via IRs then everyone has the benefit of OA at a much reduced cost. In my opinion, the answer for academics - especially in these days of financial stringency - is to keep with the subscription model
Re: OA's Three Bogeymen
I agree with much of what Jean-Claude says, particularly his (implied?) suggestion that there is no obvious role for commercial publishers in an OA environment. That seems to me to be becoming more and more obvious each day that passes. However, I think Jean-Claude is more focussed on ?ought? than ?is?. True, he proposes an existing service (Brazil's SciELO) as a model for the future, but given the way that researchers are motivated by their institutions and their funders today, I suspect the model we are more likely to see emerge -- in the near term at least -- is the one that is apparently becoming common in China (http://tiny.cc/5a58S). Richard Poynder -Original Message- From: American Scientist Open Access Forum [mailto:american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org] On Behalf Of Guédon Jean-Claude Sent: 17 February 2010 06:25 To: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org Subject: Re: OA's Three Bogeymen Alas, this whole discussion continues to assume that publishing must rest mainly on organizations that behave like businesses (hence the call for sustainability) and often are busineses. Why should they not be treated as services integral to the research cycle of activities (which should include publishing)? If so, they should simply be supported by public money. Research is supported by public money and publishing is an integral part of research. No one asks if research is sustainable, and they do not for a good reason: it is not! If publishing is an integral part of research, it follows that publishing should be supported by public money and not be submitted to market rules which, in any case, can only distort the great conversationof science and of scholarship more generally. The discussion below is also about one kind of Gold Publishing, the so-called author-pay model. Personally, I am very skeptical about this model, and increasingly so. It solves access for third world countries only through humiliating, piecemeal, requests, and it has opened the door to devious practices, some of which are precisely being discussed below. Yet,I believe the Gold Road is viable if constructed correctly. Once again, allow me to point to SciELO. To my mind, this is the best and most coherent strategy for the Gold road. It also coincides well with national science policies trying to promote science and, as SciELO's Abel Packer would say, provide a place in the sun for Third World scientists. This is why I support a public option for scientific and scholarly publishing, but this public option should be international in nature to avoid being too vulnerable to national politics. This said, I would rather be vulnerable to national politics than to Elsevier or any other large, private, publisher. I can vote in my country but I have no voice inside the Elsevier (or Springer, or ...) structure. Jean-Claude Guédon PS And, as a reminder, this statement is not in support of the Gold Road as the exclusive way to reach OA; it simply tries to tweak the Gold Road to make it more viable. This is also and exactly what I do when I try tweaking the Green Road by saying that repositories must get involved in the generation of symbolic value. Both roads are needed, but they must be conceived coherently and correctly. Van: American Scientist Open Access Forum namens Richard Poynder Verzonden: di 16-2-2010 11:59 Aan: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org Onderwerp: OA's Three Bogeymen I am inclined to agree with Keith. However, it needs to be acknowledged that researchers are not always very discerning when choosing a publisher. I have had some say to me, In an ideal world I would not opt to pay to publish with this or that particular publisher, but I need to get my work published urgently, so I am just going to bite the bullet. For that reason some OA publishers seem quite content not to be part of the OASPA community, and happy to operate by their own rules -- in the knowledge that there is a ready market for their services. So while one might argue that the research community can afford to ignore these companies and simply carry on using subscription publishers and Green OA, in the hope that the market will somehow create an optimal OA publishing ecosystem, I am less confident. From: American Scientist Open Access Forum [mailto:american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org] On Behalf Of keith.jeff...@stfc.ac.uk Sent: 16 February 2010 12:00 To: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org Subject: Interview with Open Access publisher In-Tech/Sciy All - Richard Poynder recently suggested that there were three bogeymen haunting the OA movement: (1) asking authors to pay to publish could turn scholarly publishing into a vanity press; (2) OA publishing will in any case inevitably lead to lax or even non-existent peer review; (3) OA publishing is not financially sustainable. http
Re: OA's Three Bogeymen
I agree with Jean-Claude, let's make the axis of interest research-open access, and leave the business of publishing to others. Otherwise, we introduce a fourth OA bogeyman, confusion, of which there is already far more than needed. Much as I admire Richard's tenacious journalism, and an eye for a story, it does what such stories often do and takes an extreme case and tries to place it in the centre. This case isn't central to OA; if we look at it from the axis of interest above, it's not even about OA, it's about the publishing business. Another pro-OA case recently that became confused over publishing was Prof. Beaudouin-Lafon in CACM http://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2010/2/69353-open-access-to-scientific-publications/fulltext We have to simplify OA for everyone else. Steve Hitchcock IAM Group, Building 32 School of Electronics and Computer Science University of Southampton, SO17 1BJ, UK Email: sh...@ecs.soton.ac.uk Tel: +44 (0)23 8059 7698Fax: +44 (0)23 8059 2865 On 17 Feb 2010, at 11:24, Guédon Jean-Claude wrote: Alas, this whole discussion continues to assume that publishing must rest mainly on organizations that behave like businesses (hence the call for sustainability) and often are busineses. Why should they not be treated as services integral to the research cycle of activities (which should include publishing)? If so, they should simply be supported by public money. Research is supported by public money and publishing is an integral part of research. No one asks if research is sustainable, and they do not for a good reason: it is not! If publishing is an integral part of research, it follows that publishing should be supported by public money and not be submitted to market rules which, in any case, can only distort the great conversationof science and of scholarship more generally. The discussion below is also about one kind of Gold Publishing, the so-called author-pay model. Personally, I am very skeptical about this model, and increasingly so. It solves access for third world countries only through humiliating, piecemeal, requests, and it has opened the door to devious practices, some of which are precisely being discussed below. Yet,I believe the Gold Road is viable if constructed correctly. Once again, allow me to point to SciELO. To my mind, this is the best and most coherent strategy for the Gold road. It also coincides well with national science policies trying to promote science and, as SciELO's Abel Packer would say, provide a place in the sun for Third World scientists. This is why I support a public option for scientific and scholarly publishing, but this public option should be international in nature to avoid being too vulnerable to national politics. This said, I would rather be vulnerable to national politics than to Elsevier or any other large, private, publisher. I can vote in my country but I have no voice inside the Elsevier (or Springer, or ...) structure. Jean-Claude Guédon PS And, as a reminder, this statement is not in support of the Gold Road as the exclusive way to reach OA; it simply tries to tweak the Gold Road to make it more viable. This is also and exactly what I do when I try tweaking the Green Road by saying that repositories must get involved in the generation of symbolic value. Both roads are needed, but they must be conceived coherently and correctly. Van: American Scientist Open Access Forum namens Richard Poynder Verzonden: di 16-2-2010 11:59 Aan: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org Onderwerp: OA's Three Bogeymen I am inclined to agree with Keith. However, it needs to be acknowledged that researchers are not always very discerning when choosing a publisher. I have had some say to me, In an ideal world I would not opt to pay to publish with this or that particular publisher, but I need to get my work published urgently, so I am just going to bite the bullet. For that reason some OA publishers seem quite content not to be part of the OASPA community, and happy to operate by their own rules -- in the knowledge that there is a ready market for their services. So while one might argue that the research community can afford to ignore these companies and simply carry on using subscription publishers and Green OA, in the hope that the market will somehow create an optimal OA publishing ecosystem, I am less confident. From: American Scientist Open Access Forum [mailto:american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org] On Behalf Of keith.jeff...@stfc.ac.uk Sent: 16 February 2010 12:00 To: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org Subject: Interview with Open Access publisher In-Tech/Sciy All - Richard Poynder recently suggested that there were three bogeymen haunting the OA movement: (1) asking authors to pay to publish could
{Disarmed} Re: OA's Three Bogeymen
I am not so sure that I focus more on ought than is. Public money is already deeply integrated into scientific and scholarly publishing in a wide variety of ways: direct subsidies, in-kind subsidies through the use of publicly-supported facilities, tax breaks, etc. The SciELO model keeps recurring under my pen because it is by far the largest, oldest and best organized example I can come up with, but smaller, generally national, examples exist. What makes SciELO unique, however, is that they have also tackled the issue of evaluation and while they use all the existing, mainstream, means (SCI, Scopus, etc.), they also develop their own metrics and techniques of evaluation. This leads me directly to the second point: there is a direct link to be built between modes of evaluation and the dominant publishing structure. If you do a national evaluation exercise based on metrics derived from SCI, you immediately reinforce the position of SCI as the correct arbiter of what counts and does not count in science. And you immediately accept the validity of tools such impact factors, even when applied to the wrong entities. The article mentioned by Richard and pointing to the Chinese situation appears to be a good example when evaluation techniques become so extreme and mechanical that the only way to survive is to buy your way into the game. I suspect that, thanks to the presence of SciELO and its role as a guarantor of basic quality and professionalism, situations similar to China (as described in the article) will not develop so easily in Latin America. Jean-Claude Guédon Le mercredi 17 février 2010 à 09:19 -0500, Richard Poynder a écrit : I agree with much of what Jean-Claude says, particularly his (implied?) suggestion that there is no obvious role for commercial publishers in an OA environment. That seems to me to be becoming more and more obvious each day that passes. However, I think Jean-Claude is more focussed on ?ought? than ?is?. True, he proposes an existing service (Brazil's SciELO) as a model for the future, but given the way that researchers are motivated by their institutions and their funders today, I suspect the model we are more likely to see emerge -- in the near term at least -- is the one that is apparently becoming common in China (MailScanner has detected definite fraud in the website at tiny.cc. D o not trust this website: http://tiny.cc/5a58S). Richard Poynder -Original Message- From: American Scientist Open Access Forum [mailto:american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org] On Behalf Of Guédon Jean-Claude Sent: 17 February 2010 06:25 To: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@listserver.sigmaxi.org Subject: Re: OA's Three Bogeymen Alas, this whole discussion continues to assume that publishing must rest mainly on organizations that behave like businesses (hence the call for sustainability) and often are busineses. Why should they not be treated as services integral to the research cycle of activities (which should include publishing)? If so, they should simply be supported by public money. Research is supported by public money and publishing is an integral part of research. No one asks if research is sustainable, and they do not for a good reason: it is not! If publishing is an integral part of research, it follows that publishing should be supported by public money and not be submitted to market rules which, in any case, can only distort the great conversationof science and of scholarship more generally. The discussion below is also about one kind of Gold Publishing, the so-called author-pay model. Personally, I am very skeptical about this model, and increasingly so. It solves access for third world countries only through humiliating, piecemeal, requests, and it has opened the door to devious practices, some of which are precisely being discussed below. Yet,I believe the Gold Road is viable if constructed correctly. Once again, allow me to point to SciELO. To my mind, this is the best and most coherent strategy for the Gold road. It also coincides well with national science policies trying to promote science and, as SciELO's Abel Packer would say, provide a place in the sun for Third World scientists. This is why I support a public option for scientific and scholarly publishing, but this public option should be international in nature to avoid being too vulnerable to national politics. This said, I would rather be vulnerable to national politics than to Elsevier or any other large, private, publisher. I can vote in my country but I have no voice inside the Elsevier (or Springer, or ...) structure. Jean-Claude Guédon PS And, as a reminder, this statement is not in support of the Gold Road as the exclusive way to reach OA; it simply tries to tweak the Gold Road to make it more viable. This is also and exactly what I do when I try tweaking the Green Road by saying that repositories must get involved in the generation of symbolic value. Both roads
Re: OA's Three Bogeymen
On 17-Feb-10, at 6:19 AM, Richard Poynder wrote: However, I think Jean-Claude is more focussed on âoughtâ than âisâ. True, he proposes an existing service (Brazil's SciELO) as a model for the future, but given the way that researchers are motivated by their institutions and their funders today, I suspect the model we are more likely to see emerge -- in the near term at least -- is the one that is apparently becoming common in China (http://tiny.cc/5a58S). Comment: China is unique, in many respects. It is unlikely that this model would be replicated outside of China. It is also quite possible that China will rapidly assess and address the issues; the pace of change in general in China in recent years is astonishing. One aspect of the Chinese experience that is unique is the speed and scale of its modernization project, resulting in huge numbers of new scholars needing to publish, without an existing scholarly system for them to fit into. This is a situation that would be impossible to replicate elsewhere on anything like this scale. The other uncommon element for Chinese scholars is a government committed to tight control of information dissemination. Rapid adoption of, and support for, scholar-led open access publishing using tools such as OJS could very quickly eliminate the bottleneck described in the above article. Heather Morrison, MLIS PhD Student Simon Fraser University School of Communication The Imaginary Journal of Poetic Economics http://poeticeconomics.blogspot.com
