Date: Thu, 26 Apr 2012 20:30:29 -0700 (PDT)
From: Subbiah Arunachalam
Forwarded Message follows
-------------------------
Date: Tue, 24 Apr 2012 19:45:59 -0700
From: Carolina Rossini
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/apr/24/harvard-university-journal-pub...
[image: The Guardian home] http://www.guardiannews.com/
Harvard University says it can't afford journal publishers' prices
University wants scientists to make their research open access and resign
from publications that keep articles behind paywalls
- Ian Sample http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/iansample, science
correspondent
- guardian.co.uk http://www.guardian.co.uk/, Tuesday 24 April 2012
12.45 EDT
- Article
historyhttp://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/apr/24/harvard-university-journal-pub...
A memo from Harvard's faculty advisory council said major scientific
publishers had made scholarly communication 'fiscally unsustainable'.
Photograph: Corbis
Exasperated by rising subscription costs charged by academic
publishers, Harvard
University http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/harvard-university has
encouraged its faculty members to make their research freely available
through open access journals and to resign from publications that keep
articles behind paywalls.
A memo from Harvard
Libraryhttp://isites.harvard.edu/icb/icb.do?keyword=k77982&tabgroupid=icb.tabgroup143448
to
the university's 2,100 teaching and research staff called for action after
warning it could no longer afford the price hikes imposed by many large
journal publishers, which bill the library around $3.5m a year.
The extraordinary move thrusts one of the world's wealthiest and most
prestigious institutions into the centre of an increasingly fraught debate
over access to the results of academic research, much of which is funded by
the taxpayer.
The outcome of Harvard's decision to take on the publishers will be watched
closely by major universities around the world and is likely to prompt
others to follow suit.
The memo from Harvard's faculty advisory council said major publishers had
created an "untenable situation" at the university by making scholarly
interaction "fiscally unsustainable" and "academically restrictive", while
drawing profits of 35% or more. Prices for online access to articles from
two major publishers have increased 145% over the past six years, with some
journals costing as much as $40,000, the memo said.
More than 10,000 academics have already joined a boycott of
Elsevierhttp://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2012/apr/09/frustrated-blogpost-boycott-sc...,
the huge Dutch publisher, in protest at its journal pricing and access
policies. Many university libraries pay more than half of their journal
budgets to the publishers Elsevier, Springer and Wiley.
Robert Darnton http://history.fas.harvard.edu/people/faculty/darnton.php,
director of Harvard Library told the Guardian: "I hope that other
universities will take similar action. We all face the same paradox. We
faculty do the research, write the papers, referee papers by other
researchers, serve on editorial boards, all of it for free … and then we
buy back the results of our labour at outrageous prices.
"The system is absurd, and it is inflicting terrible damage on libraries.
One year's subscription to The Journal of Comparative
Neurologyhttp://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1002/(ISSN)1096-9861
costs
the same as 300 monographs. We simply cannot go on paying the increase in
subscription prices. In the long run, the answer will be open-access
journal publishing, but we need concerted effort to reach that goal."
In traditional journal publishing, researchers submit articles to editors
who send them out for peer review, a task that is usually unpaid. The final
versions of the articles are then formatted and sold back to university
libraries. Open access comes in various guises, but one model requires
authors to pay to have their articles published and made freely available
to anyone.
According to the Harvard memo, journal subscriptions are now so high that
to continue them "would seriously erode collection efforts in many other
areas, already compromised". The memo asks faculty members to encourage
their professional organisations to take control of scholarly publishing,
and to consider submitting their work to open access journals and resigning
from editorial boards of journals that are not open access.
It adds that the library must insist on transparent contracts that prevent
universities from discussing in public the fees they pay certain publishers.
In a statement to the Guardian, Elsevier said: "The Harvard Faculty
Advisory Council letter does not specify any specific publisher. We have a
good relationship with the Harvard libraries and have recently concluded an
agreement we believe works for them as it gives them the flexibility to
choose the titles they want.
"We do not believe that the facts in the letter which relate to price
increases pertain to Elsevier. Elsevier's average print list price
increases have consistently been among the lowest in the industry for the
past several years, averaging around 5%."
The statement concluded: "We believe Harvard will continue to see the value
in publishing in Elsevier journals, which include a range of access
options, and contributing as editors."
David Prosser http://www.rluk.ac.uk/node/371, executive director of
Research Libraries UK (RLUK), said: "Harvard has one of the richest
libraries in the world. If Harvard can't afford to purchase all the
journals their researchers need, what hope do the rest of us have?
"There's always been a problem with this being seen as a library budget
issue. The memo from Harvard makes clear that it's bigger than that. It's
at the heart of education and research. If you can't get access to the
literature, it hurts research."
RLUK negotiated new contracts with Elsevier and Wiley last year after the
group threatened to cancel large subscriptions to the publishers. The new
deal, organised on behalf of 30 member libraries, is expected to save UK
institutions more than £20m.
"The better deals have given us a little breathing space, but they don't
solve the problem. There is a long-term structural problem with this market
that isn't going to be solved that simply," Prosser said.
Heather Joseph http://www.arl.org/sparc/about/staff/joseph.shtml,
executive director of the Scholarly Publishing and Academic Resources
Coalition, a US-based international library membership organisation, said
other universities may follow Harvard's lead.
"Highlighting the role of the faculty is exactly what we need to do.
Libraries have been trying to ring the alarm bell about this for a while,
but it's the faculty members who are the producers and consumers of the
articles. They have got the keys to making significant change in this
market. Having Harvard call this out in front of the faculty is a very
significant move."
She added: "Other universities are likely to follow Harvard's example on
this. If it starts at a university with the stature of Harvard, they will
take a long hard look at whether this is something that makes sense for
them to do as well. People watch Harvard. There's no grey area there."
Heather Joseph
Executive Director, SPARC
21 Dupont Circle, Suite 800
Washington, DC 20036
+1 202 296 2296
heather@arl.org
www.arl.org/sparc
--
*Carolina Rossini*
Senior Fellow at GPOPAI
University of Sao Paulo
http://www.gpopai.usp.br/
and
Coordinator: OER-Brazil/REA-Brasil
www.rea.net.br
+ 1 6176979389
*carolina.rossini@gmail.com*
