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I find myself fully in full agreement with both Danny Kingsley and Fred Friend.<BR>
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In a previous message, I mentioned the PEER project funded by the European Commission. The final report is available at <A HREF="http://www.peerproject.eu/fileadmin/media/reports/20120618_PEER_Final_public_report_D9-13.pdf">http://www.peerproject.eu/fileadmin/media/reports/20120618_PEER_Final_public_report_D9-13.pdf</A> .<BR>
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One interesting report coming from this project to read is <A HREF="http://www.peerproject.eu/fileadmin/media/reports/PEER_Economics_Report.pdf.">http://www.peerproject.eu/fileadmin/media/reports/PEER_Economics_Report.pdf.</A> 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.<BR>
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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)..<BR>
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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... <BR>
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Jean-Claude Guédon<BR>
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Le samedi 14 septembre 2013 à 11:06 +0000, Friend, Fred a écrit :
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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.</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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.</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000"> </FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">Fred Friend</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">Honorary Director Scholarly Communication UCL </FONT><BR>
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<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">From:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"> goal-bounces@eprints.org <goal-bounces@eprints.org> on behalf of Danny Kingsley <Danny.Kingsley@anu.edu.au></FONT><BR>
<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">Sent:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"> 14 September 2013 08:39</FONT><BR>
<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">To:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"> Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci)</FONT><BR>
<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">Subject:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"> [GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection </FONT>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">It is not that there is not sufficient data, it is that the 'threat' does not exist. </FONT>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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 <A HREF="http://www.publishingresearch.net/documents/ALPSPPApotentialresultsofsixmonthembargofv.pdf">http://www.publishingresearch.net/documents/ALPSPPApotentialresultsofsixmonthembargofv.pdf</A> . Heather Morrison wrote a piece on the methodological flaws with that survey <A HREF="http://poeticeconomics.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/publishers-association-survey-on.html">http://poeticeconomics.blogspot.com.au/2012/06/publishers-association-survey-on.html</A> </FONT>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">And yet, when questioned earlier this year by Richard Poynder, this is what Springer referred to as their 'evidence' <A HREF="http://poynder.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/open-access-springer-tightens-rules-on.html">http://poynder.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/open-access-springer-tightens-rules-on.html</A> .</FONT>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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):</FONT>
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<LI TYPE=1 VALUE=1><FONT COLOR="#000000">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.</FONT>
<LI TYPE=1 VALUE=2><FONT COLOR="#000000">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.</FONT>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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.</FONT>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">Danny</FONT>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">Dr Danny Kingsley</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">Executive Officer</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">Australian Open Access Support Group</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">e: <A HREF="mailto:eo@aoasg.org.au">eo@aoasg.org.au</A></FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">p: +612 6125 6839</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">w: wwww.aoasg.org.au</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">t: @openaccess_oz</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">From: Dana Roth <<A HREF="mailto:dzrlib@library.caltech.edu">dzrlib@library.caltech.edu</A>></FONT><BR>
<FONT COLOR="#000000">Reply-To: "<A HREF="mailto:goal@eprints.org">goal@eprints.org</A>" <<A HREF="mailto:goal@eprints.org">goal@eprints.org</A>></FONT><BR>
<FONT COLOR="#000000">Date: Saturday, 14 September 2013 6:53 AM</FONT><BR>
<FONT COLOR="#000000">To: "<A HREF="mailto:goal@eprints.org">goal@eprints.org</A>" <<A HREF="mailto:goal@eprints.org">goal@eprints.org</A>></FONT><BR>
<FONT COLOR="#000000">Subject: [GOAL] Re: Disruption vs. Protection</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">Isn’t the fact that “</FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000"><I>The BIS report finds no evidence to support this distinction,” due to the fact that there isn’t sufficient data?</I></FONT><BR>
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<I><FONT COLOR="#000000">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.</FONT></I><BR>
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<I><FONT COLOR="#000000"> </FONT></I><BR>
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<I><FONT COLOR="#000000">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.</FONT></I><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000"> </FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">Dana L. Roth</FONT><BR>
<FONT COLOR="#000000">Caltech Library 1-32</FONT><BR>
<FONT COLOR="#000000">1200 E. California Blvd. Pasadena, CA 91125</FONT><BR>
<FONT COLOR="#000000">626-395-6423 fax 626-792-7540</FONT><BR>
<FONT COLOR="#000000"><A HREF="mailto:dzrlib@library.caltech.edu">dzrlib@library.caltech.edu</A></FONT><BR>
<FONT COLOR="#000000"><A HREF="http://library.caltech.edu/collections/chemistry.htm">http://library.caltech.edu/collections/chemistry.htm</A></FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000"> </FONT><BR>
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<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">From:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"><A HREF="mailto:goal-bounces@eprints.org">goal-bounces@eprints.org</A> [<A HREF="mailto:goal-bounces@eprints.org">mailto:goal-bounces@eprints.org</A>] </FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000"><B>On Behalf Of </B></FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000">Stevan Harnad</FONT><BR>
<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">Sent:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"> Friday, September 13, 2013 8:39 AM</FONT><BR>
<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">To:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"> Global Open Access List (Successor of AmSci)</FONT><BR>
<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">Subject:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"> [GOAL] Disruption vs. Protection</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000"> </FONT><BR>
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<B><FONT COLOR="#000000"><A HREF="http://www.cilip.org.uk/cilip/news/end-gold-rush">End of the gold rush? (Yvonne Morris, cilip)</A>:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"> </FONT><FONT COLOR="#000000"><I>"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></FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">I have long meant to comment on a frequent contradiction that keeps being voiced by OA advocates and opponents alike:</FONT><BR>
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<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">I. Call for Disruption:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"> 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.</FONT><BR>
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<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">II. Call for Protection:</FONT></B><FONT COLOR="#000000"> 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.</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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.</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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.</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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)?</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000"><A HREF="http://roarmap.eprints.org/56/">University of Liège</A> and <A HREF="http://roarmap.eprints.org/850/">FRSN Belgium</A> have adopted -- and <A HREF="http://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/987-The-UKs-New-HEFCEREF-OA-Mandate-Proposal.html">HEFCE</A> and <A HREF="http://openaccess.eprints.org/index.php?/archives/1040-UK-BIS-Committee-2013-Report-on-Open-Access.html">BIS</A> have both proposed adopting -- the compromise resolution to this contradiction:</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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. </FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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.</FONT><BR>
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<FONT COLOR="#000000">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?</FONT><BR>
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<B><FONT COLOR="#000000">Stevan Harnad</FONT></B><BR>
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Jean-Claude Guédon
Professeur titulaire
Littérature comparée
Université de Montréal
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