I am the Managing Director and Publisher at the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE). I have also served as the Journals Director and the Production Director at ASCE. I was Managing Editor of Cancer and Cancer Cytopathology at the American Cancer Society. I am the president-elect of the Society for Scholarly Publishing and the past president of the Council of Science Editors. My views on The Scholarly Kitchen are my own and do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer.
Publishers of subscription and open access scholarly content are facing downward pressures on pricing. Angela Cochran explores some of the hidden costs associated with a professional publishing operation and asks whether some of the tasks currently done by publishers should be absorbed elsewhere.
Authors want their papers published quickly while also expecting high-quality reviews. Reviewers want reasonable deadlines. These two groups come from the same communities so why the disconnect? This post by Angela Cochran looks at the numbers and offers suggestions for closing the gap.
Invisible to most readers of scholarly content is the editing process. In this post, Angela Cochran and Karin Wulf explore the role and processes for journal editors from two very different disciplines– History and Civil Engineering.
Civil Engineers rely on data from a multitude of sources. Angela Cochran shares what ASCE has learned in the process of setting up Data Availability Statements as well as insights from a recent Ithaka S+R study on the subject.
If ever there was a time for society publishers to start advocating for themselves, that time is now. In this post, Angela Cochran challenges society publishers to find their voice in affecting policy decisions that relate to their programs.
Plan S, Science Europe’s plan to accelerate open access, includes strict technical requirements that may be too costly or practical for some OA journals, platforms, and repositories. Chef Angela Cochran reviews the challenges of the requirements and posits that the plan is really about Gold OA.
Mixing subscription content and open access content in hybrid journals has done little to accelerate the flip from subscription to OA. Angela Cochran explores the creation of mirror journals to comply with new OA mandates and supply a more sustainable model for moving toward OA.
With the news last week that Elsevier made another strategic purchase with the acquisition of Aries System, owner of Editorial Manager submission and peer review systems, Angela Cochran looks at what happens to societies and smaller publishers when the big competing publishers buy up the previously publisher agnostic service providers.
A new kind of predator is taking advantage of unsuspecting authors. In this post, Angela Cochran discusses the forged acceptance letters received and what publishers can do to help authors avoid this costly and embarrassing pitfall.
New changes at COPE seem to move the organization further away from standards and closer to suggested behavior. At the same time, a new policy on member expulsions was announced. Is it clear exactly what members are agreeing to?