[GOAL] Embargoes, evidence and all that jazz

[Dr D.A. Kingsley]

Hi all,

Gemma has identified several studies that talk about half life of articles
in different disciplines. There is no dispute that these are interesting
and probably accurate. However given there is **no causal arrow proven
between half life and cancellation of subscriptions**. The half life
furphy is irrelevant in the embargo discussion.

I went through all of this in my blog in October 2015: "Half-life is half
the story" <https://unlockingresearch.blog.lib.cam.ac.uk/?p=331


Now, let¹s turn our thoughts to the Œevidence¹ cited here:

I am a bit shocked that the frankly dodgy 'study¹ that was done in 2012 is
even being admitted to. This non peer reviewed Œstudy¹ consisted of one
(leading and poorly worded) question going out to an undisclosed list of
librarians around the world.  The researcher was the Chair of the ALPSP
Research Committee and was on the steering committee for the Publishers
Research Coalition, raising questions about her (and the study¹s)
objectivity. There are also major questions about the methodology of the
study - 
http://poeticeconomics.blogspot.ch/2012/06/publishers-association-survey-on
.html In addition this ¹study' is being cited about Œpotential¹ effects,
not actual effects. We are FIVE YEARS ON from this 'study¹, surely any
Œpotential¹ effects would have started manifesting?

The Journal of Clinical Investigation example. Hmmm. I also discussed this
in my blog. The issue referred to here has nothing to do with the half
life of research papers that are being made available open access through
a repository. This refers to a journal that went to a GOLD Open Access
model in 1996 (publishing open access and relying on non-subscription
revenue sources), but eventually decided they needed to impose a
subscription again in 2009. Not only is this example entirely unrelated to
the embargo issue for green Open Access, it happened EIGHT YEARS AGO.

In relation to the remaining three evidence of harm examples:

* "The Annals of Mathematics experiment in green open access² example is a
report from a workshop. Where is the actual study or link to support the
statement made in this report? Where is the data? That¹s a strong
statement and actual data would be useful. The way it is written seems to
me to conflate some issues. When they say "an experiment in Œgreen¹" what
does that mean? How closely does this relate to embargoes? It seems that a
whole heap of things are tied up into one statement without any supporting
data. This would not even pass first go of peer review in a paper. Or an
undergraduate essay.


* Is Elsevier willing to provide some actual data about the experience of
the American Journal of Pathology? Where is this experience written up and
published?


* Is this the Genetics journal you are referring to?
http://www.genetics.org/content/about-journal? Again, where is this
experience written up and published?

It is concerning that people working for the largest academic publisher in
the world seem to be ignorant of even basic logic within an argument and
of the necessity to provide supporting data for a claim that is being made.



We have here a hand picked tiny selection of Œexamples¹ (without
supporting evidence) that are propping up the argument that research
institutions around the world spend literally millions of
pounds/dollars/whatever in terms of staff time to ensure that embargo
periods are being observed across the entire corpus of publications.

Embargoes are a very big sledgehammer to try and crack a very small nut.
I¹d say the nut doesn¹t actually exist.

Danny

>
>Message: 2
>Date: Wed, 21 Jun 2017 07:59:14 +0000
>From: "Hersh, Gemma (ELS-CAM)" <g.hersh at elsevier.com>
>Subject: Re: [GOAL] GOAL Digest, Vol 67, Issue 13
>To: "Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci)" <goal at eprints.org>
>Message-ID:
>	<CY4PR08MB2838DDE2A0F737F9BFC1F6548FDA0 at CY4PR08MB2838.namprd08.prod.outlo
>ok.com>
>	
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1"
>
>Hi Danny
>
>
>
>This issue has been written about extensively and there have also been
>studies on this issue.  I believe I may have previously consolidated and
>emailed to you all of the available evidence I am aware of, but I would
>be happy to do so (again) if helpful.
>
>
>
>Here is a selection for others that may be interested:
>
>
>
>Studies
>
>  *   In 2016, The Royal Historical Society in Response to the Stern
>Review of the UK Research Excellence Framework (REF) estimates that true
>download half-life of a history article is at least 12 years. Read
>more<http://royalhistsoc.org/response-stern-review-ref/>
>  *   In 2014 Phil Davis published a study commissioned by the
>Association of American Publishers
>(Overview<http://www.publishers.org/usagestudy/>, Full
>Study<http://www.publishers.org/_attachments/docs/journalusagehalflife.pdf
>>) which demonstrates that journal article usage varies widely within and
>>across disciplines, and that only 3% of of journals have half-lives of
>>12 months or less.  Health sciences articles have the shortest median
>>half-life of the journals analyzed, but still more than 50% of health
>>science journals have usage half-lives longer than 24 months. In fields
>>with the longest usage half-lives, including mathematics and the
>>humanities, more than 50% of the journals have usage half-lives longer
>>than 48 months.
>
>
>
>Articles
>
>  *   Scholarly Kitchen
>article<http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2013/12/18/getting-open-access-
>embargoes-right-rational-policy-must-be-evidence-based/?utm_source=feedbur
>ner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ScholarlyKitchen+%28The+Scholarl
>y+Kitchen%29>, Getting Open Access Embargoes Right: Rational Policy Must
>Be Evidence-Based
>  *   Scholarly Kitchen article, What is the Lifespan of a Research
>Article<http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2013/12/18/what-is-the-lifespan
>-of-a-research-article/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaig
>n=Feed%3A+ScholarlyKitchen+%28The+Scholarly+Kitchen%29>?
>  *   In 2014 the British Academy published a Study on Open Access in the
>Humanities and Social Sciences (http://www.britac.ac.uk/openaccess/) -
>shows that article half-lives are likely longer than previously
>suggested. A 1:2 ratio for embargo period lengths is concluded to be
>appropriate, but the dividing point should not be STEM:HSS, rather given
>the actual usage patterns of articles, it should be Medicine (1): HSS,
>Physics, Mathematics, Chemistry and Life Sciences (2). Suggested embargo
>lengths are 12 months (Biomedicine) and 24 months (all other fields).
>
>
>Evidence of harm
>
>  *   Journal of Clinical Investigation - went open access with a 0 month
>embargo in 1996 and lost c. 40% of institutional subscriptions. It
>blighted the economics of the journal which was forced to return to the
>subscription model in 2009:
>http://scholarlykitchen.sspnet.org/2009/02/26/end-of-free-access/
>  *   The Annals of Mathematics experiment in green open access was a
>sobering lesson: libraries cancelled 34% of the subscriptions between
>2003 and 2008 when the journal was freely available online. The Annals is
>one of the very best journals in mathematics and one of the cheapest
>journals; and so it came as a surprise to many that some of the best-
>funded libraries in the US had decided to save on the subscription rather
>than support the experiment in widening access. A mathematics workshop
>suggested research community support for a 5 year embargo period in this
>field given that arXiv is also available. See
>http://www.msri.org/attachments/workshops/587/MSRIfinalreport.pdf
>  *   American Journal of Pathology lengthened its embargo period and
>began working with a commercial publisher because of the negative impact
>on subscriptions of a 6 month embargo.
>  *   Genetics has increased its embargo period from 3, then to 6, then
>to 12 months because of a negative impact on subscriptions. They have
>needed to balance a 12 month embargo with the addition of an author
>payment in order to make this embargo length work - even though they
>publish in the life sciences.
>
>
>Evidence for the potential effect of embargoes on cancellations
>
>  *   In 2012, was a simple one-question survey by ALPSP: "If the
>(majority of) content of research journals was freely available within 6
>months of publication, would you continue to subscribe?" The results
>"indicate that only 56% of those subscribing to journals in the STM field
>would definitely continue to subscribe. In AHSS, this drops to just 35%.
>" More information is available on the ALPSP site and in embedded links
>here<http://www.alpsp.org/ebusiness/AboutALPSP/ALPSPStatements/Statementde
>tails.aspx?ID=407>. This result builds on earlier, more nuanced studies
>undertaken for ALPSP in 2009 and 2006 and by PRC in 2006.
>
>
>
>Kind regards
>
>Gemma
>
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: goal-bounces at eprints.org [mailto:goal-bounces at eprints.org] On
>Behalf Of Dr D.A. Kingsley
>Sent: 20 June 2017 21:18
>To: goal at eprints.org
>Subject: Re: [GOAL] GOAL Digest, Vol 67, Issue 13
>
>
>
>*** External email: use caution ***
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>Gemma,
>
>
>
>Please provide evidence for your statement "an embargo period is needed
>to enable the subscription model to continue to operate, in the absence
>of a separate business model? other than it sounds like it *probably*
>should be true.
>
>
>
>We all thought cough medicine should work until someone tested it.
>
>
>
>Danny
>
>
>
>Dr Danny Kingsley
>
>Head, Office of Scholarly Communication
>
>Cambridge University LibraryWest Road, CB3 9DR
>
>e: dak45 at cam.ac.uk<mailto:dak45 at cam.ac.uk>
>
>p: 01223 747 437
>
>m: 07711 500 564
>
>t: @dannykay68
>
>w: www.osc.cam.ac.uk<http://www.osc.cam.ac.uk>
>
>b: https://unlocking research.blog.lib.cam.ac.uk
>
>o: orcid.org/0000-0002-3636-5939

Dr Danny Kingsley
Head, Office of Scholarly Communication
Cambridge University LibraryWest Road, CB3 9DR
e: dak45 at cam.ac.uk
p: 01223 747 437
m: 07711 500 564t: @dannykay68
w: www.osc.cam.ac.uk
b: https://unlocking research.blog.lib.cam.ac.uk
o: orcid.org/0000-0002-3636-5939