The Impact of Big Deals on the Research Ecosystem – IO: In The Open

"Earlier this month I read this article by Kenneth Frazier from D-Lib Magazine which argues that academic libraries should reconsider the value of so-called “big deals” from publishers. The core of the argument is that the downsides of these journal packages outweigh the benefits of convenience and an arguably lower cost per title. I say “arguably” about cost per title because, if one excludes the titles in a bundle that are rarely or never used when calculating per title cost, the value proposition is significantly different. The simple fact is that publisher bundling “deals” are larded with what, from the point of view of usage, is simply junk – obscure titles of little value that can only be sold by tying them to more desirable resources. If I want “Cell Biology” for my researchers, I also must buy “Dancing Times,” even if no one on my campus uses the latter.* At my institution, to give just one example, over 30% of the titles in our journal package from Wiley are “zero-use,” but it is still less expensive to buy the package than to subscribe, at list price, only to the titles that would get substantial use.  This tying of titles, and enforcing the bulk purchase by charging grossly-inflated “list prices” for title-by-title purchases, is highly coercive, as Frazier points out, but it also creates some perverse incentives for the publishers themselves, which led me to think about the potential consequences of big deals for things like peer review...."