My Name Is Ozymandias, King of Kings
There’s no such thing as “too big to fail,” and this applies to libraries as much as it does to car makers, steel companies, and search engines. My guess is that Ozymandias never saw it coming.
Quantifying the Costs of Open Access in the UK
A new report, commissioned by London Higher and SPARC Europe, tries to quantify the costs undertaken by UK higher education and public sector research institutions in complying with open access mandates. The resulting numbers are quite interesting.
Open Access: Meaning(s) and Goal(s)
Are we all talking about the same thing when we say “open access” — and do we all mean the same thing when we talk about an “open access future”? Short answers: “yes (kind of)” and “no way.”
Feeding the Goose: Thoughts on Fair Use and the GSU Decision
With the appellate court’s rejection of the district court’s decision in the Georgia State University fair-use case, we have yet another twist in this six-year-long saga of copyright litigation. It’s clearly a setback for GSU–but what about for fair use?
Quality and Relevance: A Matrix Model for Thinking about Scholarly Books and Libraries
Libraries do not have the luxury (or the mission) of selecting books solely based on their intrinsic quality. In order to do their work, the students and scholars served by the library need access to books that are highly relevant to their interests. How do the variables of quality and relevance interact with each other when it comes to library book purchasing?
Meet the New Economy of Letters, Same As the Old Economy of Letters
Last fall in the New Yorker, Jill Lapore bemoaned the current relationship between intellectuals and the general public, which she feels is “more vexed than ever” — in part because of a system that rewards academics for outrageousness and for lousy writing. Does she have a point?
Stick To Your Ribs: Library Budgets, Journals and Blood From A Stone
A look back at some of Rick Anderson’s insightful pieces on the economic realities of journal prices and library budgets.
Housecleaning at the Directory of Open Access Journals
The DOAJ is kicking out hundreds of predatory and scam publishers that found their way into the directory, and tightening standards to ensure that they don’t sneak back in. Which makes things a bit awkward for a community that, for years, has been insisting that predatory OA publishing isn’t a problem worth worrying about.
How Important Are University Press Books to the Library? One Case Study
How much of the book usage in a research library collection involves books from university presses? Findings from this case study suggests that the answers are complex and, to some degree, suprising.
Q&A with SAGE’s David Ross about PeerJ Investment
SAGE has announced its investment in PeerJ, an Open Access publisher with an unusual business model. SAGE’s David Ross answers some questions about the thinking behind this move and some of its implications for the future.
The Authors Guild Loses (Again), and HathiTrust Wins–But What Does It Mean?
The Authors Guild’s lawsuit against HathiTrust over the latter’s massive library of digitized print books has been dismissed by the Second Circuit Court. What does this mean for libraries, authors, and readers?
How Important Are Library Sales to the University Press? One Case Study
A study of sales data for 2012 imprints from the University of Chicago Press offers tantalizing hints about the importance (or lack thereof) of library sales to university presses — particularly with regard to scholarly monographs.
Author vs. Author: The Authors Guild and the Authors Alliance Set to Duke It Out?
The emergence of the Authors Alliance is causing consternation among some members of the traditional publishing community, most notably the Authors Guild, which has already issued a sharply-worded critique. But what is the Alliance actually going to do? They’re not really saying.
University Presses: "Under Fire" or Just Under the Gun (Like the Rest of Us)?
Are university presses really “under fire,” or are they simply experiencing the natural consequences of doing the wrong things at the wrong time in a marketplace that has evolved away from them?
A Modest Proposal for Scaled-up Open Access
A new white paper by K|N Consulting offers an intriguing blueprint for an Open Access journal publishing system at mass scale, one built on a three-way partnership between publishers, libraries, and higher-education institutions. It suggests interesting possibilities and raises equally interesting questions.