Rallying Cries vs. Reality: Profits and Publishing Meet Academics and Idealism

"My recent response to the Monbiot rant in the Guardian revealed a set of attitudes and beliefs in a segment of the unhappy lot who care about scholarly publishing. This post is an attempt to articulate a different point of view on the same issues often used as rallying cries by advocates of open access, free access, or similar changes to scholarly publishing. Like any ecosystem, radical change in one area can have major effects elsewhere. These effects can take unexpected or untoward directions if the system is poorly understood...."