The Fallacy of ‘Sound’ Science
“Sound methodology” suggests an ideal match to a scientific question that never quite exists. So why do some publishers use it?
Can Highly Selective Journals Survive on APCs?
Are the APC levels set for high-end OA journals too low to be sustainable? Are there other ways that might help high-end OA journals pay their way?
The Pay It Forward Project: Confirming What We Already Knew About Open Access
A new study from the University of California system confirms much of what we already knew about open access, particularly the increased financial burden it places on productive universities.
Publishing, Politics and Reason
Robert Harington grapples with the lack of understanding by the publishing elites on all sides of shifting ideologies of an individual’s relationship to information on the web.
Scholarly-Communication Reform: Why Is it So Hard to Talk About, and Where are the Authors?
Why is it so frustrating and difficult to talk about scholarly-communication reform, and why do those conversations seem to involve virtually all members of the scholcomm ecosystem except for authors?
The Open Access Monograph
There are many programs now to create open access monographs, but the business models surrounding these efforts do not appear to be sufficiently robust to make the OA monograph sustainable. The problem is that the monograph is something that many people want, but few are willing to pay for.
Guest Post, Fred Dylla — Three Years after the OSTP Public Access Directive: A Progress Report
On the three year anniversary of the OSTP Public Access memo, AIP’s Fred Dylla takes a look at the significant progress made.
What Should We Make of Secret Open Access Deals?
A spate of open access “big deals” marks a shift from global offsetting to local offsetting. But the secretive nature of these deals makes them difficult to interpret.
The Dissertation Mess: Balancing Rights and Responsibilities
The broad online availability of theses and dissertations creates difficult tensions between the individual rights of authors, the rights of educational institutions, and the responsibilities that both have to global scholarship and the collective good. How can we resolve those tensions?
For Open Access Monographs, Peter Pays Paul. Who Pays Peter?
Gold open access for monographs is based on the notion that provosts will pay for what librarians will not. This seems like an improbable model for scholarly publishing. Publishing that is not based on end-user demand is not likely to have strong support in lean times.
Open Access at a Crossroads
There’s no denying the growth and increased acceptance of the concepts of open access in scholarly publishing. But the repercussions of the business models and methodologies chosen for OA are just beginning to be recognized.
Is Exposure Always a Good Thing?
A key element of open access is the notion that circulating information is de facto a positive good. Audiences benefit from access, and scholars benefit from exposure. But for the latter, at least, there is a case to be made for a […]
Return of the Big Brands: How Legacy Publishers Will Coopt Open Access
Open access publishing has gone through a number of stages. Though different people will classify these stages in diverse ways, one way to view this is to say that since the initial period of advocacy for open access, commercial interests have entered this market and are now prepared to augment their positions by leveraging their elite brands, using them, as it were, to draw manuscripts for a family of cascading products.
The Global Gold Open Access "Flip": A Realistic Plan or Magical Thinking?
Is a flip to a Gold OA world as easy as a recent paper suggests?
Deceptive Publishing: Why We Need a Blacklist, and Some Suggestions on How to Do It Right
Predatory publishing is a big and complex problem; so is calling out and shaming deceptive publishers by means of blacklisting. Is that something we should even do, and can it be done fairly, constructively, and helpfully? Yes, and here are some suggestions how.