The "No Free Lunch" essay by John Ewing in the Chronicle of Higher Education http://chronicle.com/weekly/v48/i07/07b01401.htm is unfortunately yet another instance of the conflation of the essentials with the optional add-ons (frills).
Peer review is essential. Publishers' on-paper texts, PDF, indexing, reference links etc. are frills. The only way to test the true market value of those frills is to stop trying to hold the refereed full-text essentials hostage to them by force-wrapping them together into one "product." The issue is not high vs. low journal prices, not commercial vs. noncommercial publishers. It is about freeing the essentials from the add-on frills. See the thread: Distinguishing the Essentials from the Optional Add-Ons http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/1437.html and also: Harnad, S. (2001) Six Proposals for Freeing the Refereed Literature Ariadne 28 June 2001. http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue28/minotaur/#1 http://www.cogsci.s oton.ac.uk/~harnad/Tp/ariadne.htm -------------------------------------------------------------------- Stevan Harnad har...@cogsci.soton.ac.uk Professor of Cognitive Science har...@princeton.edu Department of Electronics and phone: +44 23-80 592-582 Computer Science fax: +44 23-80 592-865 University of Southampton http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/ Highfield, Southampton http://www.princeton.edu/~harnad/ SO17 1BJ UNITED KINGDOM NOTE: A complete archive of the ongoing discussion of providing free access to the refereed journal literature online is available at the American Scientist September Forum (98 & 99 & 00 & 01): http://amsci-forum.amsci.org/archives/American-Scientist-Open-Access-Forum.html or http://www.ecs.soton.ac.uk/~harnad/Hypermail/Amsci/index.html You may join the list at the amsci site. Discussion can be posted to: american-scientist-open-access-fo...@amsci.org