Are publishers getting rich publishing your research? A Bear-Stearns evaluation of Reed-Elsevier (one of the world's largest publishers of scholarly journals) recently rated the company, which earns profits of almost 40% annually, "a stockholder's dream." Should private publishers be getting rich selling information generated by research that is funded by academic institutions and the public? What's happening and how does it affect scholars at Emory?
The Problem
In 2001 Emory was paying $17,444 for an annual subscription to Brain, a multidisciplinary journal devoted to fundamental research in brain sciences. That same subscription costs $21,269 today. The price increases have been constant and alarming. According to data collected by the Association of Research Libraries (ARL), during the 15-year period between 1986 and 2001, scholarly journal prices jumped 215 per cent although the Consumer Price Index rose by just 64 percent. Journal prices actually grew twice as fast as health care costs during this period. The arrival of electronic journals has not stopped this trend. In fact, many publishers have been "bundling" their electronic journals, forcing libraries to subscribe to groups of titles in order to obtain any significant dollar savings.
Top tier journals continue to be concentrated in the hands of a relatively small group of commercial publishers. The top six companies now publish about 4,000 journals. This concentration drives up prices. Elsevier Science, the publishing arm of the Reed-Elsevier Group, is the largest publisher with more than 1800 titles and some of the highest costs. Many of the Elsevier titles are in the social sciences: International Journal of Educational Research ($1292), Journal of Criminal Research ($914), Journal of Econometrics ($2463), Personality and Individual Differences ($2018) and Social Science and Medicine ($4,174). World Development, an Elsevier title which cost about $250 in 1997, now costs $1887. In a time of tight university budgets, a crisis is building.
The continuing increase in journal pricing has led many academic institutions to boycott selected publishers. Harvard, Cornell and the University of California system have announced that they would no longer subscribe to Elsevier's ScienceDirect electronic journal service because of price increases and bundling requirements. In one of the latest developments, the provosts of Duke, North Carolina State and UNC-Chapel Hill have announced that the Triangle Research Libraries Network (TRLN) will also end their consortial contract with ScienceDirect. One consequence of this move will be the loss of electronic access to the body of titles shared throughout TRLN. It is estimated that access to 400-500 electronic titles will be lost on each campus beginning in 2004.
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While Elsevier figures prominently in discussions on serial price increases, the problem is widespread and is impacting numerous disciplines. And it is not just because of tight university budgets—it is caused in large part by exorbitant subscription price increases that universities are protesting by canceling subscriptions. In a recent article entitled "The Rise and Rise of Journal Prices in African Studies," author Hans Zell, writes that subscription prices for the 13 leading African Studies journals published in English have been sky rocketing. African Studies (Oxford University Press) has gone from $67 in 1997 to $230 in 2002/2003. Review of African Political Economy (Taylor & Francis), has gone from $190 in 1997 to $420 last year. It was only $28 in 1989!
Thrown into the mix is the decision of many publishers to begin charging for electronic copies of journals that used to be free with print subscriptions. Oxford University Press is the latest example of this trend.
The net results of escalating journal costs on university libraries are journal cancellations, decisions to stop duplicating formats (print or electronic), and spending less money on monographs.
At the University of Georgia, the University Librarian recently issued an open letter to all faculty notifying them that the Library would be converting all subscriptions held in print and electronic formats to online only. He also reported that this was a "stopgap measure" and UGA would be forced to cancel journal titles in the coming years.
In October 2003, the entire editorial board of Elsevier's Journal of Algorithms (JOA) resigned, citing the increasing inability of libraries to afford the prices that commercial publishers charge. The editors opted to work with the ACM to launch the new ACM Transactions on Algorithms (TALG).
Journals at Emory
Researchers at Emory generally have been lucky. The General Libraries has had reasonable budget increases and our consortial contract for Elsevier's electronic journals was negotiated early in 2003 at fairly favorable terms that will remain in effect until 2006. Still our budgets cannot keep up with current price escalations and the General Libraries have begun advocating the purchase/licensing of electronic over print whenever possible. It is no longer possible to pay twice for various formats of the same title.
Unlike the General Libraries, Emory's Health Sciences Library has had a flat budget for several years. This is in effect a budget cut since there are no funds to cover increases in journal costs. Continuing journal cancellations have resulted and the General Libraries has reallocated some of its own funds to cover costs for selected science and medical journals used throughout the campus.
Possible Solutions
As a reaction to the growing crisis in scholarly communication, new models for information dissemination are beginning to appear. Open access is the most revolutionary of these. In open access, publications are free for all users anywhere in the world and are archived permanently in well-established online repositories. Costs are paid by universities, foundations, federal agencies or others. Open access journals are primarily online journals. This allows authors to include audio, video, data, etc., as a part of their articles. Online publication also means that information reaches users in a more timely manner. Emory University is a charter member of the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources Coalition (SPARC), an organization dedicated to the promotion of scholarship through competitive alternatives to commercial publishing. Emory also holds institutional memberships with several other the open access publishers such as BioMed Central and the Public Library of Science (PloS).What do such initiatives mean to you?
- Public Library of Science (PLoS) is a non-profit initiative to publish open access journals led by Nobel Laureate and former director of the NIH, Harold Varmus. Its first goal, to publish a top-tier peer-reviewed science journal that will compete with titles such as Science, Nature, and Cell, was accomplished in October 2003 with the launch of PloS-Biology. PLoS plans to publish other open access journals in the future. (www.plos.org)
- BioMed Central publishes more than 100 peer-reviewed open access journals and hosts independent open access journals. Emory is an institutional member of BioMed Central which means that Emory authors can waive the article processing fees when they submit articles to BioMed Central journals.
Independent journals, often started by academics frustrated by the publishers and high prices of the journals they have been editing, are also trying to follow the open access model. Here at Emory, Drs. Nickerson and Boatright in the Department of Opthamalogy, started their own open access peer-reviewed online journal in 1995, Molecular Vision, that is now one of the top-rated journals in the field.
- Open access' biggest hurdle is convincing authors that its journals are (or will be) as prestigious as its for-profit competitors. With academic careers based on publication records, authors want to be sure their work appears in publications that will move their careers forward. Only by changing the model of academic publishing as well as the tenure/promotion policies at universities and research institutions can true reform occur. At UC Berkeley, faculty, librarians, administrators and graduate students agreed that the long-term interest in a better publishing system and better journals forever should be put it ahead of their short-term interest for journals next year.
Other Models
Scholarly societies, who publish journals in many fields, are also trying to address the crisis in scholarly communication. Many rely on journal subscriptions to help support their societies and therefore are trying to develop more efficient models for their publishing that don't necessarily go so far as to provide open access.
The American Anthropological Society (AAA) has recently changed its publishing model. It has slashed its journal prices, providing online access to all 29 of its journals (and their backfiles) to its members at no charge beyond membership dues, and making all its titles available to libraries for less than the present cost of its top five journals. All this will be available through the AAA's new web portal, Anthrosource, which will also provide access to things such as datasets and audio and visual material.
What Can You Do?
USE YOUR INFLUENCE! Scholars and scientists have the power to change the current situation. You are the producers and major consumers of scholarly information and only through your influence will change occur.
1) Carefully examine the pricing, copyright, and subscription licensing agreements of any journal you contribute to as an author, reviewer or editor.
2) Examine copyright agreements before publishing and modify them if possible to ensure your right to use your work or post it on a public archive.
Copyright transfer agreements often require you to transfer all of your copyrights exclusively to the publisher, thereby losing control of any subsequent public distribution of your work. Restrictions on use of your own work may prohibit personal distribution for teaching and research, as well as publicly posting your paper on publicly available websites and archives.
3) Where possible, publish in open access journals which employ funding models that do not charge readers or their institutions for access. Serve on editorial boards or review manuscripts for open access journals. (For a list of open access journals, see the Directory of Open Access Journals at www.doaj.org.)
4) Encourage your society to explore alternatives to contacting or selling its publications to a commercial publisher.
5) Start your own open access journal!
More Information
SPARC Open Access Newsletter(http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/lists.htm#actions) contains of list of recent actions by universities. The monthly newsletter follows the continuing controversy. In the April 004 issue(http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/newsletter/04-03-04.htm) the lead article discusses university reactions to high journal prices and includes a useful list of actions by U.S. universities since the fall of 2003. The list includes links to further readings about specific institutional responses, which will be updated on a regular basis. To quote from the April 2004 issue:
"It's notable how many of [these universities] public statements mention the need to cultivate alternative forms of scholarly communication, and open access in particular, as part of the overall solution. It's notable how many recommend that faculty withhold their labor as authors, referees, and editors from journals that aggravate the problem rather than advance the solution. It's notable how often faculty were persuaded to endorse the cancellations despite the harm it does to their research projects and careers. It's notable how often faculty, librarians, and administrators (and at Berkeley, also graduate students) agreed on their long-term interest (in a better publishing system and better journals forever) and put it ahead of their short-term interest (journals next year)."
The May 2004 issue (http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/newsletter/05-03-04.htm) discusses a Credit Suisse financial analysis of the STM journal industry by Simon Mays-Smith and four co-authors. It also makes a case for open access despite Google and other search engines.
Carnavale, Dan, "Libraries with Tight Budgets Renew Complaints about Elsevier's Online Pricing," Chronicle of Higher Education, Dec.1, 2003, Vol. 50 Issue 17, pA33. http://search.epnet.com/direct.asp?an=11842606&db=aph
Crispin Davis, chief executive of Reed Elsevier, defends the industry in the April 18, 2004 issue of The Observer, "Why the Sci-Mag Barons Are Right," http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,6903,1194065,00.html
Create Change: New Systems of Scholarly Communication. http://www.createchange.org
Edwards, Richard and Shulenburger, David, "The High Cost of Scholarly Journals (and What to Do About It)," Change, Nov/Dec 2003, Vol. 35 Issue 6, p.10. (N.B. Edwards is the senior vice chancellor at the University of Nebraska and Shulenburger is executive vice chancellor at the University of Kansas.) http://search.epnet.com/direct.asp?an=11275232&db=aph
Zell, Hans, "The Rise and Rise of Journal Prices in African Studies, " Africana Libraries Newsletter, June/Sept. 2003, p.7-9.
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