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October 16, 2007
The Economics of Ecology Journals
"The Economics of Ecology Journals" was published nearly a year ago, but it is still timely and relevant to the scholarly publishing discussion. The article may also be somewhat noteworthy because it was NOT written by librarians.
The authors are scientists who present detailed results from their research into how much prices for on-line access to scholarly publications have risen over the last decade.
"Why is monopoly pricing sustainable? Why are new entrants, charging lower subscription prices, not more readily able to attract authors and subscribers away from overpriced incumbents? Why do authors persist in submitting their papers to high-priced journals?"
These are some of the questions the authors attempt to answer. They discuss the feasibility of a coordinated effort on the part of scholars to seek to publish their works in lower-priced, non-profit journals. They also point out that scholars benefit from wide distribution of their work. Since more libraries can afford to subscribe to the lower-priced, non-profit journals, publishing in these journals would increase exposure.
A full-text version of the article is available (without charge) at http://octavia.zoology.washington.edu/publications/BergstromAndBergstrom06.pdf
---Posted by Kay Mann
Posted by colldev at October 16, 2007 09:22 PM