[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
Perhaps Stevan, I should have added that our Document Delivery improves our level of use of OA too. The Document Delivery people make a check that the requested article is not available OA before they place a per-article order. They know all the tricks. If found to be OA the requester is advised of the location by email and enlightened about services such as DOAJ, BASE and Google Scholar. We don't then give them the article, but make them get it themselves. Thus we increase the skills and use of OA by our researchers (in reading articles) and hope some of this rubs off on author behaviour. It also automatically focuses on the more active researchers. I agree about your Green and Gold characterization, because clearly this is still in default a toll-access route, though a pay-per-article rather than a pay-per-journal or bundle subscription. In person I would argue with you about it being as much almost-OA as The Button, and certainly much more reliable. This is an important factor for researchers. However, I do not see any value in arguing that by email. You are of course absolutely correct that viewed from Australia and New Zealand (and China and Japan), Button requests are almost never instant because of time-zones. With only 3% of the world's scientific literature being Australian, it cannot be otherwise, even with 100% Green. However, I will note that the policy encourages online usage by researchers, and because it diverts money away from subscriptions towards the service, it contributes to make the 'Kuhnian revolution' that we all desire in the thinking of librarians and academics and the management of their budgets. The service is funded by extra cancellations, of course - we don't have any extra money. You can therefore rely that is run efficiently, of course. It is then a small step to using the same or similar funds for APCs, and the researchers need never notice! Well not much - they would have to forward the APC invoice to the Library to pay. We also begin to think more about article-quality rather than journal-quality, and that surely is a good thing, for research,, peer-review functions, scientometrics, and OA. Just thinking ahead, sensibly, really. A modest step, but it seems to work well. Arthur From: goal-boun...@eprints.org [mailto:goal-boun...@eprints.org] On Behalf Of Stevan Harnad Sent: Tuesday, 17 September 2013 2:25 PM To: Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci) Subject: [GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection On Mon, Sep 16, 2013 at 6:55 PM, Arthur Sale a...@ozemail.com.au wrote: At a severe risk of offending Stevan, I write to say that my University has practised an almost-OA policy for at least 15 years that falls into neither the Green nor Gold category we offer a free (to the researcher) automated document delivery service to any researcher... for an article we do not subscribe to. No offence at all! But individual article access via pay-to-view https://www.google.ca/?gws_rd=crei=q9A3UsyqMcjgyQHitICAAw#q=amsci+(subscri ption+license+pay-per-view)+harnad (e.g., interlibrary loan) -- like subscription access and license access -- are simply variants of the toll access, in contrast with which open access was coined and to remedy which the OA movement was launched. It's toll access no matter who is paying the access tolls. And OA means toll-free online access. There's nothing almost-OA about any kind of toll access. The button is almost-OA because although it may not be immediate, and although it may not be certain, it is certainly toll-free. But none of this has anything to do with the Green/Gold distinction, which is about whether the toll-free access is provided by the author (Green) or the journal (Gold). (I'm sure Arthur won't do it, but I hope no one else will come back with but the Gold OA APC is a toll, so Gold OA is toll-access too. For pedants we could write out toll-access as access-toll to the user or to the user's institution. When an author (or his institution) pays to publish (whether Gold-OA or non-OA) the payment is not a user access toll. Everyone agrees that the true expenses of publishing have to be paid by someone. But only subscription/licence/pay-per-view pays them via access tolls, denying access if the toll are not paid. Gold OA does not. And for Green OA, subscriptions -- while they remain sustainable -- have already paid the publication costs, so Green OA is just supplementary access, for those whose institutions can't afford the subscription toll. -- What the true expense of publishing is is another matter. By my lights, we won't know till universal Green OA has prevailed. And I'm betting they will turn out to be just the cost of implementing peer review.) There is a delay sure, but it is the same delay as the Request-A-Copy button, and more certain. Agreed that paid pay-per-view is more certain than the button (just as paid subscription access and paid licensed access are). Bur I would
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
I fully agree, There would be no great harm done in the longer perspective if some of the current major publishers dissapeared from the market, as long as the access to older article in their electronic holdings are secured. They would just be replaced by other. Academics need good journals for many reasons, partly because of recognition and evaluation reasons. Good and top journals have usually not been created through design but through a Darwinian selection process where authors, reviewers and academic editors flock to journals which become the leading ones in their fields, and these journals in many fields are not always more expensive to operate, since the major cost difference to lower prestige journals is in the amount of unpaid voluntary work going into the peer review part. And this is large managed by academic editors as well. I see no danger to the quality of scientific article publishing. People are still able to fly around the world even if many major airlines who haven't been able to adapt to changing market conditions have gone bankrupt. Best regards Bo-Christer 9/16/13 12:42 AM, Andrew A. Adams wrote: Journal cancellation rates are currently almost impossible to judge, at least for the big publishers because of the big deals. The big deal subscriptions mean that many libraries are subscribing either to whole publisher archives/fleets or at least to whole subjects. In those circumstances institutions cannot unsubscribe from individual journals until and unless sufficient journals could be included to drop the price of the remaining necessary journal subscriptions to below the big deal cost. All the cancellation (because of Green OA) talk is entirely speculative and pretty much impossible to model (because so many other things are also changing at the same time) that we must focus on cutting through the Gordian knot of transitions to sustainable publishing by mandating Green OA (Immediate Deposit/Optional Access where necessary) and let the disruptions to publishing take its course as it may. Some argue that publishing and journals are so important to academia that we must be careful not to undermine them. I make the opposite evaluation: journals and peer review are so important to academia that if Green OA (so far as we can tell from some pretty decent evidence quickly achievable by Mandates [and only by mandates]) causes significant disruption to journal publishing viability, that the relevant communities would quickly find a way to ensure the survival of the important avenues of communications by means other than the current subscription model. ___ GOAL mailing list GOAL@eprints.org http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
Stevan Harnad writes It does not, because it is both arbitrary and absurd to cancel a journal because it is Green rather than because their users no longer need it It is not. There simply is not the money to buy all subscriptions, and the more a journal's contents can be recovered from the web the more the need for subscribing to it declines. But more important than any of that is the gross disservice that gratuitous public librarian announcements like that do to the OA movement: Libraries are not there to serve the OA movement. to get the money the UK has foolishly elected to throw at Fool's Gold unilaterally, and preferentially. I agree. But the subscription model is even more foolish. Let toll-gating publishers have embargoes till kingdom come. If nobody reads the papers, authors, who need the attention of readers, will have to use the IR to place a version of the paper out. Scholars will find alternative ways to evaluate these papers. With friends like these, the OA movement hardly needs enemies. I'm all in favour of OA, but it will not happen until subscriptions decline. The more subscriptions decline the better for OA. -- Cheers, Thomas Krichel http://openlib.org/home/krichel skype:thomaskrichel ___ GOAL mailing list GOAL@eprints.org http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
Isn't the fact that The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction, due to the fact that there isn't sufficient data? I sense that we are going to have to live with (Green) OA and subscription journals for some time ... and that it is the subscription model for commercially published journals will be increasingly unsustainable in the short term. An example of what could soon be unsustainable, is the commercially published 'Journal of Comparative Neurology' ... that for 2012 cost its subscribers $30,860 and published only 234 articles. Dana L. Roth Caltech Library 1-32 1200 E. California Blvd. Pasadena, CA 91125 626-395-6423 fax 626-792-7540 dzr...@library.caltech.edumailto:dzr...@library.caltech.edu http://library.caltech.edu/collections/chemistry.htm From: goal-boun...@eprints.org [mailto:goal-boun...@eprints.org] On Behalf Of Stevan Harnad Sent: Friday, September 13, 2013 8:39 AM To: Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci) Subject: [GOAL] Disruption vs. Protection End of the gold rush? (Yvonne Morris, cilip)http://www.cilip.org.uk/cilip/news/end-gold-rush: In the interest of making research outputs publicly available; shorter and consistent or no embargo periods are the desired outcome. However, publishers... have argued that short embargo periods make librarians cancel subscriptions to their journals... The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction. I have long meant to comment on a frequent contradiction that keeps being voiced by OA advocates and opponents alike: I. Call for Disruption: Serial publications are overpriced and unaffordable; publisher profits are excessive; the subscription (license) model is unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be disrupted in order to force it to evolve toward Gold OA. II. Call for Protection: Serials publications are threatened by (Green) OA, which risks making the subscription model unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be protected in order to allow it to evolve toward Gold OA. Green OA mandates do two things: (a) They provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access, and (b) they disrupt the subscription model. Green OA embargoes do two things: (c) They withhold OA from all who cannot afford subscription access, and (d) they protect the subscription model from disruption. Why do those OA advocates who are working for (a) (i.e., to provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access) also feel beholden to promise (d) (i.e. to protect the subscription model from disruption)? University of Liègehttp://roarmap.eprints.org/56/ and FRSN Belgiumhttp://roarmap.eprints.org/850/ have adopted -- and HEFCEhttp://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/987-The-UKs-New-HEFCEREF-OA-Mandate-Proposal.html and BIShttp://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/1040-UK-BIS-Committee-2013-Report-on-Open-Access.html have both proposed adopting -- the compromise resolution to this contradiction: Mandate the immediate repository deposit of the final refereed draft of all articles immediately upon acceptance for publication, but if the author wishes to comply with a publisher embargo on Green OA, do not require access to the deposit to be made OA immediately: Let the deposit be made Closed Access during the allowable embargo period and let the repository's automated eprint-request Button tide over the needs of research and researchers by making it easy for users to request and authors to provide a copy for research purposes with one click each. This tides over research needs during the embargo. If it still disrupts serials publication and makes subscriptions unsustainable, chances are that it's time for publishers to phase out the products and services for which there is no longer a market in the online era and evolve instead toward something more in line with the real needs of the PostGutenberg research community. Evolution and adaptation never occur except under the (disruptive) pressure of necessity. Is there any reason to protect the journal publishing industry from evolutionary pressure, at the expense of research progress? Stevan Harnad ___ GOAL mailing list GOAL@eprints.org http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
It is not that there is not sufficient data, it is that the 'threat' does not exist. The only 'evidence' to support the claim that immediate green open access threatens the 'sustainability' (read: profit) of commercial publishers comes in the form of the exceptionally questionable ALPSP survey sent out early last year to librarians http://www.publishingresearch.net/documents/ALPSPPApotentialresultsofsixmonthembargofv.pdf . Heather Morrison wrote a piece on the methodological flaws with that survey http://poeticeconomics.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/publishers-association-survey-on.html And yet, when questioned earlier this year by Richard Poynder, this is what Springer referred to as their 'evidence' http://poynder.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/open-access-springer-tightens-rules-on.html . There are, however currently two clear opportunities for the industry to collect some actual evidence either way (as opposed to opinions on a badly expressed hypothetical): 1. Taylor Francis have decided to indefinitely expand their trial of immediate green permissions to articles in their Library Information Science journals. If they were to run a comparison of those titles against the titles in, say , three other disciplinary areas over two to three years they would be able to ascertain if this decision has made any difference to their subscription patterns. 2. Earlier this year (21 March) SAGE changed their policy to immediate green open access – again this offers a clean comparison between their subscription levels prior to and after the implementation of this policy. If it is the case that immediate green open access disrupts subscriptions (and I strongly suspect that it does not) then we can have that conversation when the evidence presents itself. Until then we are boxing at shadows. Danny Dr Danny Kingsley Executive Officer Australian Open Access Support Group e: e...@aoasg.org.aumailto:e...@aoasg.org.au p: +612 6125 6839 w: .aoasg.org.au t: @openaccess_oz From: Dana Roth dzr...@library.caltech.edumailto:dzr...@library.caltech.edu Reply-To: goal@eprints.orgmailto:goal@eprints.org goal@eprints.orgmailto:goal@eprints.org Date: Saturday, 14 September 2013 6:53 AM To: goal@eprints.orgmailto:goal@eprints.org goal@eprints.orgmailto:goal@eprints.org Subject: [GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection Isn’t the fact that “The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction,” due to the fact that there isn’t sufficient data? I sense that we are going to have to live with (Green) OA and subscription journals for some time … and that it is the subscription model for commercially published journals will be increasingly unsustainable in the short term. An example of what could soon be unsustainable, is the commercially published ‘Journal of Comparative Neurology’ … that for 2012 cost its subscribers $30,860 and published only 234 articles. Dana L. Roth Caltech Library 1-32 1200 E. California Blvd. Pasadena, CA 91125 626-395-6423 fax 626-792-7540 dzr...@library.caltech.edumailto:dzr...@library.caltech.edu http://library.caltech.edu/collections/chemistry.htm From: goal-boun...@eprints.orgmailto:goal-boun...@eprints.org [mailto:goal-boun...@eprints.org] On Behalf Of Stevan Harnad Sent: Friday, September 13, 2013 8:39 AM To: Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci) Subject: [GOAL] Disruption vs. Protection End of the gold rush? (Yvonne Morris, cilip)http://www.cilip.org.uk/cilip/news/end-gold-rush: In the interest of making research outputs publicly available; shorter and consistent or no embargo periods are the desired outcome. However, publishers… have argued that short embargo periods make librarians cancel subscriptions to their journals… The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction. I have long meant to comment on a frequent contradiction that keeps being voiced by OA advocates and opponents alike: I. Call for Disruption: Serial publications are overpriced and unaffordable; publisher profits are excessive; the subscription (license) model is unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be disrupted in order to force it to evolve toward Gold OA. II. Call for Protection: Serials publications are threatened by (Green) OA, which risks making the subscription model unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be protected in order to allow it to evolve toward Gold OA. Green OA mandates do two things: (a) They provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access, and (b) they disrupt the subscription model. Green OA embargoes do two things: (c) They withhold OA from all who cannot afford subscription access, and (d) they protect the subscription model from disruption. Why do those OA advocates who are working for (a) (i.e., to provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access) also feel beholden to promise (d) (i.e. to protect the subscription model from disruption
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
This is an excellent contribution from Danny Kingsley, and it would be interesting to have some real information about subscription loss from publishers, and not only from the two publishers she mentions. Very occasionally we do hear stories about a few journals ceasing publication, but the number appears very low by comparison with the total number of research journals published, and the causal link with repository deposit is obscure. A reduction in the quality of a journal (and I do not mean impact factor) or a reduction in library funding could be more influential factors than green open access. Presumably for commercial reasons publishers have not been willing to release information about subscription levels, but if they are to continue to use green open access as a threat they have to provide more evidence. Likewise if they expect to be believed, publishers have to provide more information about sustainability. They speak about repositories not being a sustainable model for research dissemination, by which they appear to mean that their journals will not be sustainable in a large-scale repository environment. Most institutional repositories are fully-sustainable, their sustainability derived from the sustainability of the university in which they are based. If any research journals are not sustainable, the reasons may have nothing to do with repositories. Those reasons are currently hidden within the big deal model, the weak journals surviving through the strength of other journals. Rather than blame any lack of sustainability upon green open access, perhaps publishers should take a harder look at the sustainability of some of their weaker journals. Repositories are sustainable; some journals may not be. Fred Friend Honorary Director Scholarly Communication UCL From: goal-boun...@eprints.org goal-boun...@eprints.org on behalf of Danny Kingsley danny.kings...@anu.edu.au Sent: 14 September 2013 08:39 To: Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci) Subject: [GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection It is not that there is not sufficient data, it is that the 'threat' does not exist. The only 'evidence' to support the claim that immediate green open access threatens the 'sustainability' (read: profit) of commercial publishers comes in the form of the exceptionally questionable ALPSP survey sent out early last year to librarians http://www.publishingresearch.net/documents/ALPSPPApotentialresultsofsixmonthembargofv.pdf . Heather Morrison wrote a piece on the methodological flaws with that survey http://poeticeconomics.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/publishers-association-survey-on.html And yet, when questioned earlier this year by Richard Poynder, this is what Springer referred to as their 'evidence' http://poynder.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/open-access-springer-tightens-rules-on.html . There are, however currently two clear opportunities for the industry to collect some actual evidence either way (as opposed to opinions on a badly expressed hypothetical): 1. Taylor Francis have decided to indefinitely expand their trial of immediate green permissions to articles in their Library Information Science journals. If they were to run a comparison of those titles against the titles in, say , three other disciplinary areas over two to three years they would be able to ascertain if this decision has made any difference to their subscription patterns. 2. Earlier this year (21 March) SAGE changed their policy to immediate green open access – again this offers a clean comparison between their subscription levels prior to and after the implementation of this policy. If it is the case that immediate green open access disrupts subscriptions (and I strongly suspect that it does not) then we can have that conversation when the evidence presents itself. Until then we are boxing at shadows. Danny Dr Danny Kingsley Executive Officer Australian Open Access Support Group e: e...@aoasg.org.aumailto:e...@aoasg.org.au p: +612 6125 6839 w: .aoasg.org.au t: @openaccess_oz From: Dana Roth dzr...@library.caltech.edumailto:dzr...@library.caltech.edu Reply-To: goal@eprints.orgmailto:goal@eprints.org goal@eprints.orgmailto:goal@eprints.org Date: Saturday, 14 September 2013 6:53 AM To: goal@eprints.orgmailto:goal@eprints.org goal@eprints.orgmailto:goal@eprints.org Subject: [GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection Isn’t the fact that “The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction,” due to the fact that there isn’t sufficient data? I sense that we are going to have to live with (Green) OA and subscription journals for some time … and that it is the subscription model for commercially published journals will be increasingly unsustainable in the short term. An example of what could soon be unsustainable, is the commercially published ‘Journal of Comparative Neurology’ … that for 2012 cost its subscribers $30,860 and published only 234
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
There seem to be two incompatible arguments about the effect of Green OA: 1. That Green OA presents no threat to subscription publishing - see this thread and frequent other posts.(DK: It is not that there is not sufficient data, it is that the 'threat' does not exist. ) 2. Stevan Harnad's goal that Green OA will destroy the subscription market ( http://poynder.blogspot.ch/2013/07/where-are-we-what-still-needs-to-be.html) SH Universal Green makes all articles OA, thereby making subscriptions unsustainable, forcing publishers to cut needless costs and downsize to managing peer review alone. No more demand for a print edition. No more demand for an online edition. All access-provision and archiving offloaded onto the global network of institutional OA repositories. and above: SHGreen OA mandates do two things: (a) They provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access, and (b) they disrupt the subscription model. I cannot reconcile these. One the one hand the advocates of Green OA seem to be telling the publishers please give us Green OA mandates[1] - they won't hurt you and on the other Green OA is going to disrupt your business. Why should any publisher provide for deposition of something that is designed to disrupt their business? (If they were smart they would design a different business that cuts out libraries altogether and I suspect that is what some will do). [1] Note that we require publisher consent to have Green OA deposition (having failed to convince universities and authors to withhold copyright transfer - which would solve the problem). On Sat, Sep 14, 2013 at 12:06 PM, Friend, Fred f.fri...@ucl.ac.uk wrote: This is an excellent contribution from Danny Kingsley, and it would be interesting to have some real information about subscription loss from publishers, and not only from the two publishers she mentions. Very occasionally we do hear stories about a few journals ceasing publication, but the number appears very low by comparison with the total number of research journals published, and the causal link with repository deposit is obscure. A reduction in the quality of a journal (and I do not mean impact factor) or a reduction in library funding could be more influential factors than green open access. Presumably for commercial reasons publishers have not been willing to release information about subscription levels, but if they are to continue to use green open access as a threat they have to provide more evidence. Likewise if they expect to be believed, publishers have to provide more information about sustainability. They speak about repositories not being a sustainable model for research dissemination, by which they appear to mean that their journals will not be sustainable in a large-scale repository environment. Most institutional repositories are fully-sustainable, their sustainability derived from the sustainability of the university in which they are based. If any research journals are not sustainable, the reasons may have nothing to do with repositories. Those reasons are currently hidden within the big deal model, the weak journals surviving through the strength of other journals. Rather than blame any lack of sustainability upon green open access, perhaps publishers should take a harder look at the sustainability of some of their weaker journals. Repositories are sustainable; some journals may not be. Fred Friend Honorary Director Scholarly Communication UCL -- *From:* goal-boun...@eprints.org goal-boun...@eprints.org on behalf of Danny Kingsley danny.kings...@anu.edu.au *Sent:* 14 September 2013 08:39 *To:* Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci) *Subject:* [GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection It is not that there is not sufficient data, it is that the 'threat' does not exist. The only 'evidence' to support the claim that immediate green open access threatens the 'sustainability' (read: profit) of commercial publishers comes in the form of the exceptionally questionable ALPSP survey sent out early last year to librarians http://www.publishingresearch.net/documents/ALPSPPApotentialresultsofsixmonthembargofv.pdf. Heather Morrison wrote a piece on the methodological flaws with that survey http://poeticeconomics.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/publishers-association-survey-on.html And yet, when questioned earlier this year by Richard Poynder, this is what Springer referred to as their 'evidence' http://poynder.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/open-access-springer-tightens-rules-on.html. There are, however currently two clear opportunities for the industry to collect some actual evidence either way (as opposed to opinions on a badly expressed hypothetical): 1. Taylor Francis have decided to indefinitely expand their trial of immediate green permissions to articles in their Library Information Science journals. If they were to run a comparison of those
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
A journal publishing 234 articles per year charging $30,860 for a subscription SHOULD be disrupted, on the basis of price. At this rate it would cost 7 times more to provide access to only the medical schools in North America than to provide open access to everyone, everywhere with an internet connection, even at the rates of a for-profit professional commercial publisher's very high impact journal. At the rates of The Journal of Machine Learning, aptly described by Shieber as an efficient journal, all of the articles published in this journal could be made open access for a total cost that is less than 10% of a single subscription. Details: The Association of American Medical Colleges accredits 141 medical schools in the U.S. and Canada alone. If each one of these schools purchased a subscription at $30,860, that would add up to revenue of $4.3 million per year. $4.3 million would be sufficient to pay open access article processing fees for 1,657 articles at the rates of the professional for-profit BioMedCentral's very-high-impact journal Genome Biology (U.S. $2,265). Shieber describes the approach and costs (average $10 per article) of the Journal of Machine Learning on his blog The Occasional Pamphlet: http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/pamphlet/2012/03/06/an-efficient-journal/ The question should be how we can protect and sustain high-quality scholarly publishing in an open access environment - not how to protect such mind-boggling inefficiency as journals that charge over $30,000 for a subscription! Those who think that it is important to sustain scholarly journals so that a surplus can assist with things like education might want to consider whether medical schools should immediately cancel this journal and offer a medical student a $30,000 scholarship instead. best, -- Dr. Heather Morrison Assistant Professor École des sciences de l'information / School of Information Studies University of Ottawa http://www.sis.uottawa.ca/faculty/hmorrison.html heather.morri...@uottawa.camailto:heather.morri...@uottawa.ca ALA Accreditation site visit scheduled for 30 Sept-1 Oct 2013 / Visite du comité externe pour l'accréditation par l'ALA est prévu le 30 sept-1 oct 2013 http://www.sis.uottawa.ca/accreditation.html http://www.esi.uottawa.ca/accreditation.html On 2013-09-13, at 4:53 PM, Dana Roth dzr...@library.caltech.edumailto:dzr...@library.caltech.edu wrote: Isn’t the fact that “The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction,” due to the fact that there isn’t sufficient data? I sense that we are going to have to live with (Green) OA and subscription journals for some time … and that it is the subscription model for commercially published journals will be increasingly unsustainable in the short term. An example of what could soon be unsustainable, is the commercially published ‘Journal of Comparative Neurology’ … that for 2012 cost its subscribers $30,860 and published only 234 articles. Dana L. Roth Caltech Library 1-32 1200 E. California Blvd. Pasadena, CA 91125 626-395-6423 fax 626-792-7540 dzr...@library.caltech.edumailto:dzr...@library.caltech.edu http://library.caltech.edu/collections/chemistry.htm From: goal-boun...@eprints.orgmailto:goal-boun...@eprints.org [mailto:goal-boun...@eprints.orgmailto:boun...@eprints.org] On Behalf Of Stevan Harnad Sent: Friday, September 13, 2013 8:39 AM To: Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci) Subject: [GOAL] Disruption vs. Protection End of the gold rush? (Yvonne Morris, cilip)http://www.cilip.org.uk/cilip/news/end-gold-rush: In the interest of making research outputs publicly available; shorter and consistent or no embargo periods are the desired outcome. However, publishers… have argued that short embargo periods make librarians cancel subscriptions to their journals… The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction. I have long meant to comment on a frequent contradiction that keeps being voiced by OA advocates and opponents alike: I. Call for Disruption: Serial publications are overpriced and unaffordable; publisher profits are excessive; the subscription (license) model is unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be disrupted in order to force it to evolve toward Gold OA. II. Call for Protection: Serials publications are threatened by (Green) OA, which risks making the subscription model unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be protected in order to allow it to evolve toward Gold OA. Green OA mandates do two things: (a) They provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access, and (b) they disrupt the subscription model. Green OA embargoes do two things: (c) They withhold OA from all who cannot afford subscription access, and (d) they protect the subscription model from disruption. Why do those OA advocates who are working for (a) (i.e., to provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access) also
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
On Sat, Sep 14, 2013 at 11:12 AM, Peter Murray-Rust pm...@cam.ac.uk wrote: *PM-R: *Stevan Harnad's goal [is] that Green OA will destroy the subscription market ( http://poynder.blogspot.ch/2013/07/where-are-we-what-still-needs-to-be.html) My only goal is (and always has been) 100% OA: no more, no less. The means of attaining that goal is Green OA mandates from funders and institutions. The mandates require authors (1) to deposit their final, refereed drafts in their institutional repositories immediately upon acceptance for publication and (2) to set access to the immediate-deposit as OA as soon as possible and (3) to rely on the repository's facilitated copy-request Button to provide Almost-OA during any embargo/ The rest (about disruption, etc.) is all conjecture. *PM-R: *On the one hand the advocates of Green OA seem to be telling the publishers please give us Green OA mandates - they won't hurt you and on the other Green OA is going to disrupt your business. No. Green OA advocates are asking *funders* and *institutions* please give us Green OA mandates. What is asked from publishers is to endorse setting access to the immediate-deposit as OA immediately -- -- as over 60% of publishershttp://www.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo/statistics.php?la=enfIDnum=|mode=simple already do-- rather than after an embargo. The rest (about disruption, etc.) is all conjecture. *PM-R: *Why should any publisher provide for deposition of something that is designed to disrupt their business? The immediate-deposit in the repository has nothing to do with the publisher. What is helpful from publishers is to endorse setting access to the immediate-deposit as OA immediately -- as over 60% of publishershttp://www.sherpa.ac.uk/romeo/statistics.php?la=enfIDnum=|mode=simplealready do. The rest (about disruption, etc.) is all conjecture. *Stevan Harnad* *From:* goal-boun...@eprints.org [mailto:goal-boun...@eprints.orggoal-boun...@eprints.org] *On Behalf Of *Stevan Harnad *Sent:* Friday, September 13, 2013 8:39 AM *To:* Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci) *Subject:* [GOAL] Disruption vs. Protection *End of the gold rush? (Yvonne Morris, cilip)http://www.cilip.org.uk/cilip/news/end-gold-rush :* *In the interest of making research outputs publicly available; shorter and consistent or no embargo periods are the desired outcome. However, publishers… have argued that short embargo periods make librarians cancel subscriptions to their journals… The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction.* -- I have long meant to comment on a frequent contradiction that keeps being voiced by OA advocates and opponents alike: *I. Call for Disruption:* Serial publications are overpriced and unaffordable; publisher profits are excessive; the subscription (license) model is unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be disrupted in order to force it to evolve toward Gold OA. *II. Call for Protection:* Serials publications are threatened by (Green) OA, which risks making the subscription model unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be protected in order to allow it to evolve toward Gold OA. Green OA mandates do two things: (a) They provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access, and (b) they disrupt the subscription model. Green OA embargoes do two things: (c) They withhold OA from all who cannot afford subscription access, and (d) they protect the subscription model from disruption. Why do those OA advocates who are working for (a) (i.e., to provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access) also feel beholden to promise (d) (i.e. to protect the subscription model from disruption)? University of Liège http://roarmap.eprints.org/56/ and FRSN Belgiumhttp://roarmap.eprints.org/850/ have adopted -- and HEFCEhttp://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/987-The-UKs-New-HEFCEREF-OA-Mandate-Proposal.html and BIShttp://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/1040-UK-BIS-Committee-2013-Report-on-Open-Access.html have both proposed adopting -- the compromise resolution to this contradiction: Mandate the immediate repository deposit of the final refereed draft of all articles immediately upon acceptance for publication, but if the author wishes to comply with a publisher embargo on Green OA, do not require access to the deposit to be made OA immediately: Let the deposit be made Closed Access during the allowable embargo period and let the repository's automated eprint-request Button tide over the needs of research and researchers by making it easy for users to request and authors to provide a copy for research purposes with one click each. This tides over research needs during the embargo. If it still disrupts serials publication and makes subscriptions unsustainable, chances are that it's time for publishers to phase out the products and services for which there is no longer
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
I find myself fully in full agreement with both Danny Kingsley and Fred Friend. In a previous message, I mentioned the PEER project funded by the European Commission. The final report is available at http://www.peerproject.eu/fileadmin/media/reports/20120618_PEER_Final_public_report_D9-13.pdf . One interesting report coming from this project to read is http://www.peerproject.eu/fileadmin/media/reports/PEER_Economics_Report.pdf. A bit strangely, it reintroduces the issue of Gold author-pay journals within a project that ostensibly aimed at judging the possible impact of repositories on the business models of publishers. That detail alone is symptomatic of the fact that publishers were intent on foregrounding author-pay, Gold, publishing at the expense of depositories, even though the real objective of the project was the study of repositories. Interestingly, the commercial publishers that were involved in PEER had apparently hoped to demonstrate what Dana Roth reflects in her message - namely a negative impact of repositories on their business models - but the outcome did not work out that way, and they proceeded to move away from the objective of the project and immediately revert to the author-pay gold model as the only viable road to Open Access. Since then, commercial publishers have strenuously tried to promote this flavour of OA publishing and have even tried to make it pass for the whole of Gold (thus excluding entities such as Scielo and Redalyc in latin America that are Gold, libre for readers and libre for readers).. And the conclusion remains: despite long and sometimes costly efforts, studies of repositories that involve all parties (librarians, publishers, etc.) strengthen the point that the feared consequences really belong to the realm of fantasies, not facts. The fears are psychological states among some players. They reflect the risk evaluation mentality of entrepreneurs, and not the realities of the world. Furthermore, while speaking of realities, one may wonder whether these fears are real, or whether they are rhetorical... Jean-Claude Guédon Le samedi 14 septembre 2013 à 11:06 +, Friend, Fred a écrit : This is an excellent contribution from Danny Kingsley, and it would be interesting to have some real information about subscription loss from publishers, and not only from the two publishers she mentions. Very occasionally we do hear stories about a few journals ceasing publication, but the number appears very low by comparison with the total number of research journals published, and the causal link with repository deposit is obscure. A reduction in the quality of a journal (and I do not mean impact factor) or a reduction in library funding could be more influential factors than green open access. Presumably for commercial reasons publishers have not been willing to release information about subscription levels, but if they are to continue to use green open access as a threat they have to provide more evidence. Likewise if they expect to be believed, publishers have to provide more information about sustainability. They speak about repositories not being a sustainable model for research dissemination, by which they appear to mean that their journals will not be sustainable in a large-scale repository environment. Most institutional repositories are fully-sustainable, their sustainability derived from the sustainability of the university in which they are based. If any research journals are not sustainable, the reasons may have nothing to do with repositories. Those reasons are currently hidden within the big deal model, the weak journals surviving through the strength of other journals. Rather than blame any lack of sustainability upon green open access, perhaps publishers should take a harder look at the sustainability of some of their weaker journals. Repositories are sustainable; some journals may not be. Fred Friend Honorary Director Scholarly Communication UCL __ From: goal-boun...@eprints.org goal-boun...@eprints.org on behalf of Danny Kingsley danny.kings...@anu.edu.au Sent: 14 September 2013 08:39 To: Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci) Subject: [GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection It is not that there is not sufficient data, it is that the 'threat' does not exist. The only 'evidence' to support the claim that immediate green open access threatens the 'sustainability' (read: profit) of commercial publishers comes in the form of the exceptionally questionable ALPSP survey sent out early last year to librarians http://www.publishingresearch.net/documents/ALPSPPApotentialresultsofsixmonthembargofv.pdf . Heather Morrison wrote a piece on the methodological flaws with that survey http://poeticeconomics.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/publishers-association-survey-on.html And yet, when questioned earlier
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
Peter Murray-Rust wrote: There seems to be two incompatible arguments about the effect of Green OA: 1. Green OA presents no threat to subscription publishing [...] 2. [...] Green OA will destroy the subscription market. I've been struggling with the same dilemma for a long time, and much more since I've launched a campaign to have my university adopt a Green OA deposit mandate, where this issue is regularly raised and has to be addressed. The truth is that we don't know what will happen. One can equally envision any scenario along a spectrum between: A. Green OA (actually ~20%) reaching an upper limit well below 100 % (mandates not generalizing), with limited TA to (Gold) OA conversion among journals, resulting in few subscription cancellations, and (possibly) a slight decrease of total costs to the community (ultimately the taxpayers) due to (1) OA publishing being inherently less expensive, and (2) market pressure (authors choosing an OA journal based in part on its impact/publishing fees ratio). B. Green OA reaching ~100% with total TA to OA conversion, and journals downsizing to peer-review providers (the other publication functions being overtaken by repositories), resulting in a huge overall cost decrease to the community. While the #2 end of the spectrum may certainly be seen as a threat to publishers, or at least to some of them, it's extremely hard to predict which scenario is likely to occur, and to what extent any specific scenario constitutes a real threat. One can easily imagine a scenario with 100% Green OA and journals (partially or totally converted to OA) keeping their actual functions. One problem is that some publishers seem to consider as a threat any pressure to change the still dominant dissemination (or business) model, whose inadequacy is now widely recognized among the scientific community (but not by the shareholders, of course). So, I think that nobody can honestly state either #1 or #2 above as is. But one could say that: - the scholarly publication world is due (and has begun) to change in a profound way; - that nobody knows exactly what this change will be, or what role Green OA will play in it; - that Green OA is a legitimate demand, made in the public interest by (among others) publicly paid and funded researchers giving, as authors and reviewers, their works and their time for free; - that those responsible for public policy (and use of taxpayers' money) are expected to put the public interest above that of private entities. Marc Couture ___ GOAL mailing list GOAL@eprints.org http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
I believe that Stevan is logically right on all counts, but one problem remains that is not addressed here: people decide upon the behaviour on the basis of a mixed bag of facts and conjectures. Facts are used to constrain conjectures within the general perimeter of a risk analysis. Each category of players (researchers, librarians, publishers) follows its own kind of risk analysis. In short, facts are distinct from conjectures, but acts also differ from adventures... How people decide to act or not cannot avoid risk analysis aka conjectures Stevan's analysis covers the logical side of the argument flawlessly; whether it covers the psychology of the players is a different matter. In particular, I worry that this starkly logical approach may not be the best way to convince people. If it were, we would no longer need rhetoric and life might be simpler, but this is an unrealistic assumption. Jean-Claude Guédon Le samedi 14 septembre 2013 à 15:09 -0400, Stevan Harnad a écrit : On Sat, Sep 14, 2013 at 11:12 AM, Peter Murray-Rust pm...@cam.ac.uk wrote: PM-R: Stevan Harnad's goal [is] that Green OA will destroy the subscription market (http://poynder.blogspot.ch/2013/07/where-are-we-what-still-needs-to-be.html ) My only goal is (and always has been) 100% OA: no more, no less. The means of attaining that goal is Green OA mandates from funders and institutions. The mandates require authors (1) to deposit their final, refereed drafts in their institutional repositories immediately upon acceptance for publication and (2) to set access to the immediate-deposit as OA as soon as possible and (3) to rely on the repository's facilitated copy-request Button to provide Almost-OA during any embargo/ The rest (about disruption, etc.) is all conjecture. PM-R: On the one hand the advocates of Green OA seem to be telling the publishers please give us Green OA mandates - they won't hurt you and on the other Green OA is going to disrupt your business. No. Green OA advocates are asking funders and institutions please give us Green OA mandates. What is asked from publishers is to endorse setting access to the immediate-deposit as OA immediately -- -- as over 60% of publishers already do-- rather than after an embargo. The rest (about disruption, etc.) is all conjecture. PM-R: Why should any publisher provide for deposition of something that is designed to disrupt their business? The immediate-deposit in the repository has nothing to do with the publisher. What is helpful from publishers is to endorse setting access to the immediate-deposit as OA immediately -- as over 60% of publishers already do. The rest (about disruption, etc.) is all conjecture. Stevan Harnad From:goal-boun...@eprints.org [mailto:goal-boun...@eprints.org] On Behalf Of Stevan Harnad Sent: Friday, September 13, 2013 8:39 AM To: Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci) Subject: [GOAL] Disruption vs. Protection End of the gold rush? (Yvonne Morris, cilip): In the interest of making research outputs publicly available; shorter and consistent or no embargo periods are the desired outcome. However, publishers… have argued that short embargo periods make librarians cancel subscriptions to their journals… The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction. __ I have long meant to comment on a frequent contradiction that keeps being voiced by OA advocates and opponents alike: I. Call for Disruption: Serial publications are overpriced and unaffordable; publisher profits are excessive; the subscription (license) model is unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be disrupted in order to force it to evolve toward Gold OA. II. Call for Protection: Serials publications are threatened by (Green) OA, which risks making the subscription model unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be protected in order to allow it to evolve toward Gold OA. Green OA mandates do two things: (a) They provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access, and (b) they disrupt the subscription model. Green OA embargoes do two things: (c) They withhold OA from all who cannot afford subscription access, and (d) they protect the subscription model from disruption. Why do those OA advocates who are working for (a) (i.e., to provide immediate OA for all
[GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection
My take on point I, Call for disruption would place a full stop after evolve and leave the whole statement at that. But disruption we certainly need, and both the Gold and Green roads can provide a fair bit of it. The gold road assumes that journals will always be needed. I hope they will not, and I doubt they will. But temporarily, both the Green and Gold (not the author-pay model) roads are needed As for II, we all know that that fear has never been properly documented by anyone. The PEER project in Europe appears (no pun intended) to have left large commercial publishers most unsatisfied. Jean-Claude Guédon Le vendredi 13 septembre 2013 à 11:38 -0400, Stevan Harnad a écrit : End of the gold rush? (Yvonne Morris, cilip): In the interest of making research outputs publicly available; shorter and consistent or no embargo periods are the desired outcome. However, publishers… have argued that short embargo periods make librarians cancel subscriptions to their journals… The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction. __ I have long meant to comment on a frequent contradiction that keeps being voiced by OA advocates and opponents alike: I. Call for Disruption: Serial publications are overpriced and unaffordable; publisher profits are excessive; the subscription (license) model is unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be disrupted in order to force it to evolve toward Gold OA. II. Call for Protection: Serials publications are threatened by (Green) OA, which risks making the subscription model unsustainable: the subscription model needs to be protected in order to allow it to evolve toward Gold OA. Green OA mandates do two things: (a) They provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access, and (b) they disrupt the subscription model. Green OA embargoes do two things: (c) They withhold OA from all who cannot afford subscription access, and (d) they protect the subscription model from disruption. Why do those OA advocates who are working for (a) (i.e., to provide immediate OA for all who cannot afford subscription access) also feel beholden to promise (d) (i.e. to protect the subscription model from disruption)? University of Liège and FRSN Belgium have adopted -- and HEFCE and BIS have both proposed adopting -- the compromise resolution to this contradiction: Mandate the immediate repository deposit of the final refereed draft of all articles immediately upon acceptance for publication, but if the author wishes to comply with a publisher embargo on Green OA, do not require access to the deposit to be made OA immediately: Let the deposit be made Closed Access during the allowable embargo period and let the repository's automated eprint-request Button tide over the needs of research and researchers by making it easy for users to request and authors to provide a copy for research purposes with one click each. This tides over research needs during the embargo. If it still disrupts serials publication and makes subscriptions unsustainable, chances are that it's time for publishers to phase out the products and services for which there is no longer a market in the online era and evolve instead toward something more in line with the real needs of the PostGutenberg research community. Evolution and adaptation never occur except under the (disruptive) pressure of necessity. Is there any reason to protect the journal publishing industry from evolutionary pressure, at the expense of research progress? Stevan Harnad ___ GOAL mailing list GOAL@eprints.org http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal -- Jean-Claude Guédon Professeur titulaire Littérature comparée Université de Montréal ___ GOAL mailing list GOAL@eprints.org http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
