Re: Pricing of Journals

On 26 Jan 1999, Frank Columbus <novascience[_at_]earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> As an STM publisher for 30 years, I echo your thoughts as espressed
> in the email correspondence which I have read. I didn't see note
> in your comment about the negative effect computers have had on
> library collections although I am sure that it is there.

I have no particular complaint about the effects of computers. It is the unsupported promises of huge savings that irritate me. It is particularly gnawing when it comes from organizations that complain bitterly about publishers' profits when they have increased their own surplus revenues by picking the pockets of scholars, librarians, students, and publishers.

Like the "paperless office," the electronic publication was touted far and wide to excuse budget cuts long before technology can be implemented.

The plain paper copier, which promised resource sharing and library fair use in the Copyright Act of 1976, also has its good points. However, in terms of scholarly communication the promise backfired when university managers prematurely cut collection development even before the law was in place. The savings went to increased administrative spending and surplus revenues.

What about effectiveness of education and research?

The referee process was undermined by the decimation of collections. In the 1960s, a referee could go to the stacks to check a cite. Now that referee must fill out a form and wait more than two weeks on average, according to a study by Association of Research Libraries. If that referee is required to sign off within two weeks .... Well, you can see how the quality of research -- at the proposal stage -- and published findings were compromised.

Thirty years after the introduction of the Xerox 914, and twenty years after university beancounters decided to sacrifice collections and to go with resource sharing, we are enmired in unfulfilled promises.

As a businessman, you are probably aware that investments in new technology require more money, not less, before savings -- if any -- can be generated. Computers have their good points, obviously, or we would not be able to enjoy this exchange and other advantages.

> Also I would like to add that several publishers increased prices
> some years ago by 200-300 percent in a single year in a pure greed
> move having nothing to do with costs. The worst in this case was
> the powerful Elsevier. The effect was tremendously squeezed library
> budgets which have never recovered.

Statistics from Association of Research Libraries, National Science Board and National Center for Education Statistics show that the library budgets were squeezed first -- around 1970. Huge numbers of cancellations were recorded in the early 1970s. Because prices of journals are set well before renewals are booked, publishers were caught by surprise. Pergamon (where I worked at the time) finally caught on around 1974. Others did likewise. I remember the atmosphere of that year very well.

Then in 1986-87 all higher education institutions spent less money on their libraries than they did the year before, according to the National Center of Education Statistics. Their surplus revenues rose that year, probably because of the sacrifice of library quality.

Library budgets were also devestated in the 1980s by the devauation of the U.S. dollar. It seems to me IEEE replaced its entire journals management team around 1992 in part because prices had not kept pace with unit costs. They hired people who had worked at Pergamon, just as AIP has done. No librarian complained of IEEE's huge price rise (according to a speaker at the Charleston Conference) because they were preoccupied with cancellations and the stylish fad of blaming Robert Maxwell for all libraries' problems.

Meanwhile, university managers were busy counting their money, no doubt, and laughing at the diversionary tempest they had created.

> I wouldn't know about universities hoarding funds although I wouldn't
> doubt it, you might want to check the massive slush funds of the
> professional societies like the IEEE and AIP generated by outlandish
> prices and tax free status. These haven't helped librarians out either.

I believe that publishers are entitled to reasonable profits, just like any other business. The profit motive, after all, created the research journal, the computer, the copying machine, the database, etc., etc.

I don't see librarians attacking IBM, DEC, H-P, or the telephone company. As a matter of fact, I would not be surprised if university endowments owned shares of STM journal publishers.

I have a problem with universities that sacrifice knowledge in order to increase already unreasonable surplus revenues. In many cases, you see surpluses exceed ten times the entire library budget while faculty senates go begging.

I suspect university presidents and other managers are being given the wrong goals, as if excellence in research and education will take care of itself.

Since when is the mission of the university to make money?

Albert Henderson
Editor, PUBLISHING RESEARCH QUARTERLY
<70244.1532[_at_]compuserve.com> Received on Wed Jan 27 1999 - 15:27:37 GMT