Having run an open access herpetology journal for 6 years that has no page charges, no upload fees, is run entirely by volunteers, and is rapidly rising in stature with coverage by Journal Citation Reports and having many articles been widely covered by the media, I find the excessive fees asinine. Yes, I SAID EXCESSIVE. There is no reason any publisher need charge thousands of dollars to process a paper, period. This is nothing but greed to soak the investigator for as much as they can get.
I seriously advise all societies to consider taking back control of their online journals from mass publishers and do it themselves. IF you are running a website, running a journal is no more difficult. Make the page formatting simple, and there is essentially NO reason to pay out ridiculous fees for online publishers. Further, placing your articles in online pay databases is an equally unneeded way to do things. Just make pdfs of every article and place them on your website open access. You can even program your webpage to accept fees for download and make them REASONABLE download fees. The organization will make a huge profit by doing this. Malcolm On Tue, Sep 6, 2011 at 8:20 AM, Bryan <[email protected]> wrote: > As has been pointed out here and other places, the page fees for open access > journals is a barrier for many researchers. It is however in the long-term > economic best interest of home institutions for some of these researchers to > foot this bill since it reduces costs overall. That is a difficult sell as > well since these libraries are cutting staff as well as book orders. Paying > page costs this year will not reduce the costs of subscriptions for a long > time. As long as researchers publish in and read the expensive journals the > libraries will be pressured to subscribe to those journals. > > Bryan Heidorn, School of Information Resources and Library Science, > University of Arizona > -- Malcolm L. McCallum Oceania University of Medicine Managing Editor, Herpetological Conservation and Biology "Peer pressure is designed to contain anyone with a sense of drive" - Allan Nation 1880's: "There's lots of good fish in the sea" W.S. Gilbert 1990's: Many fish stocks depleted due to overfishing, habitat loss, and pollution. 2000: Marine reserves, ecosystem restoration, and pollution reduction MAY help restore populations. 2022: Soylent Green is People! The Seven Blunders of the World (Mohandas Gandhi) Wealth w/o work Pleasure w/o conscience Knowledge w/o character Commerce w/o morality Science w/o humanity Worship w/o sacrifice Politics w/o principle Confidentiality Notice: This e-mail message, including any attachments, is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender by reply e-mail and destroy all copies of the original message.
