[IP] ,otr on Scholarly Journals' Premier Status Is Diluted by Web
Begin forwarded message:
From: Bob Weber <Weber@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: May 23, 2005 5:32:52 PM EDT
To: dave@xxxxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: [IP] Scholarly Journals' Premier Status Is Diluted by Web
Dave, for IP if you wish.
I agree with Steve Crocker that tenure and imprimatur issues are also
important factors in the scholarly journal access debate.
In the 1990s I was a consultant to certain library associations and
to scholarly publishers trying to cope with rapidly rising journal
prices and the coming of the Internet as an alternative distribution
medium. At that time, a number of additional factors were often cited
by publishers as explanation, if not justification for higher
subscription prices and/or maintaining paper-based publishing programs:
1. The "twigging of science." Publishers pointed out that not only
had the amount of information being published globally was increasing
at what seemed like near exponential rates, but all or nearly all
disciplines were becoming more specialized and thus more narrow in
scope. The new journals that were coming to market reflected this
twigging of science. This had a couple of negative consequences.
Finding smaller and smaller audiences for increasingly more
specialized publications, publishers argued that rates had to go up
in response to lower sales volume. Libraries were caught in the
middle between smaller audiences and higher prices and the increase
in the number of journals being published.
2. Publishers also pointed out that in many disciplines publications
were increasingly relying on images that required color printing
which also drove up costs. Specialized journals dealing with medicine
and biology were frequently cited as examples.
3. Many scholarly associations maintain journal publishing programs
both as a service to their constituencies and as revenue generators.
The publications of the American Physical Society and the American
Institute of Physics are a couple of examples, but examples existed
in nearly every discipline. To make the journals electronic ran the
risk of killing their revenue because of copyright violations such as
pass-along.
4. Electronic publishing directly by the scholarly societies and
commercial publishers was also seen as competing with online search
companies who often had the exclusive (or non-exclusive) rights for
search, article delivery on paper, and for local printing on paper.
Although I have not looked closely at this industry in the past
several years, it would seem that many of these same points are made
by scholarly publishers today.
Although many hold digital rights management in low regard, it may be
the case that fee-based electronic publishing with digital rights
management to address copyright issues might be helpful to all sides.
One example of such a program is at the HarvardBusinessOnline at
Harvard Business School Press is using digital rights management
technologies from SealedMedia.com.
Best regards,
Bob Weber
Managing Director, Strategy Kinetics, LLC
50 Watertown Street, Ste 607
Watertown, MA 02472-2533
Voice: 617-308-3336 Fax: 617-812-0443
www.managingrights.com
www.strategykinetics.com
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