Academic Publishing
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Graphs from "The Oligopoly of Academic Publishers in the Digital Era"
Five academic publishing companies, Reed-Elsevier, Springer, Sage, Wiley-Blackwell, and Taylor & Francis control a large portion of the academic publishing market, owning the journals where over 50% of articles are published.
This oligarchical model means that some have reported that Academic Publishing is one of the most profitable industries to be in, with profit margins that come close to or exceed 40% for these five publishers. Specialized demand, high status, and mediated institutional access through academic libraries have been cited as potential factors contributing to a crisis in cost and access.
At one time, the shift to online electronic access seemed to promise real savings in costs; for printing, distribution, and storage of information. These savings have not materialized, or have not been passed on to subscribers. Libraries routinely pay "institutional" subscription rates as much as ten times the cost of an individual personal subscription, without institutional usage to support that price. Publishers have found it lucrative to offer a package of all of their periodicals or eBooks, known as a "Big Deal" or bundle, at a price that looks reasonable on a cost-per-article-published basis. But these bundles have proven to be a tremendous and growing expense, which is ultimately not sustainable.
The cost of resources increases each year. Unfortunately, library budgets are rarely able to match these increases. These new technological tools and methods of dissemination have opened up new opportunities for how we can share and access research. But the possibilities of a more open and more equitable information landscape have largely gone unrealized. How do we, individually and collectively conceptualize our role as creators and users of information? How can we develop the tools and opportunities we have to try to help shift the publishing world towards one that is more deeply aligned with the values that drew many of us towards research and education? These are questions that academics and librarians have started to ask themselves and take action on.
The answers and our shared future are still being developed, but we encourage you to take a moment to see what other institutions are doing, learn about some of the ways that these publishers promote values that may be in conflict with your own ideals, and identify what possibilities exist and what steps we might take.
How colleges and universities are responding
Bucknell is not alone in navigating the problems of the academic publishing world. All colleges and universities have been trying to adapt to best support faculty and students in a world of growing costs. Here are some examples of the ways colleges and universities are responding to this situation
Walking away from "Big Deal" subscriptions
- Perhaps the most headline-grabbing example of this was when the University of California system walked away from negotiations with publisher Elsevier, due to the price increases Elsevier was demanding in return for making all future publications from UC authors open access. Before walking away, University of California had an $11 million "big deal"
- The University of Florida, University of Delaware, and many others have also canceled similar "big deals" with Elsevier, and other publishers such as Springer.
Creating Open Access policies or mandates and digital commons
- Bucknell has a digital commons where you can self-archive your work to make it openly available (depending on copyright agreements with your publishers).
- Bucknell also has an Open Access Policy, which was passed by the faculty in 2011, encouraging faculty to pursue publishing routes and contracts that allow their work to be made 'open' and upload their research to the digital commons. We are not alone this commitment.
Developing Open science programs or task forces
- Schools like McGill and Carnegie Mellon have interwoven open science practices into one or more of their schools, centers, and programs. This commitment to access includes not just the final project, but transparency for different parts of the research process to encourage reproducibility.
- MIT's open access task force reviewed the policies and practices of the university community to better understand the practices and understanding of information creation and access on campus, especially in relation to open access ideals.
Providing increased resources for student information literacy development
- At the end of the day, we are not conducting research and doing our work in a bubble. The growing open access movement can be connected to the educational movement to support student information literacy and research skills that will support their schoolwork, careers, and life as people. (Though this research is sometimes, ironically published behind paywalls...)
- As appropriate, a growing number of librarians now teach class sessions that include information about the open access movement. These sessions can include elements of critical information literacy, encouraging students to ask questions and analyze social, political, and economic factors related to information access, privilege, and exclusion.
