Declaring Independence: A Guide to Creating Community-Controlled Science Journals

peter.suber's bookmarks 2015-11-06

Summary:

"I speak from first-hand experience of what happens when profits take over. In 1986, I started a journal in the field of evolutionary ecology. The initial subscription price was $35 per year for individuals, $100 for libraries. Within a twelveyear period, during which the journal changed ownership twice, the price for libraries had grown to nearly $800 per year, an average annual increase of 19%. I did the math. I estimated that my publisher pocketed profit of between $170,000 and $220,000 annually, a mark-up of about 275% and a profit margin of nearly 75%. After the second change in ownership, my editorial board and I launched our own independent, competitive journal, Evolutionary Ecology Research. Using common sense and prudent management, we have been able to set reasonable prices, use technology to speed up the review and publication process, and attract the leading lights of the field to our new journal. We did it, and you can too...."

Link:

http://sparc.arl.org/sites/default/files/Declaring_Independence.pdf

From feeds:

Open Access Tracking Project (OATP) ยป peter.suber's bookmarks

Tags:

oa.journals oa.publishers oa.conversions oa.prices

Date tagged:

11/06/2015, 15:07

Date published:

11/06/2015, 10:07