What does $99 buy in terms of publication? Do we know yet? Does it get you more than putting the paper in a repository, for free?
The case for green is publish in your journal of choice, which could be a green or gold journal, and make the paper open access in a repository. So you could choose a high-rankng journal and still be OA. The drawbacks of green OA are that the version deposited is the final author version rather than the publisher-produced version, the possibility of an embargo, and that you can't apply CC easily because rights are shared with the publisher, which may be an issue for data-heavy papers in fields that want to exploit data mining. If you are concerned about embargoes or rights, don't compromise, just put the paper in a repository without a journal publisher, for free. True it is still only the author version and polished by a publisher, and it's not peer reviewed. But now let's ask the opening question again, and think about what can be added for that price. Of course, it's the peer review that is essential, so I don't advocate the repository-only no-publication route, but the comparison is instructive. In this context, it is hardly surprising we may be about to see the reemergence of overlay journals, that is, a peer review overlay on a repository. When overlay journals first appeared, in the mid-to-late 1990s, there were few e-journals. By the early 2000s they were competing with green, hybrid and a few gold journals. As those successful early journals grew so their costs grew, and they switched to become subscription journals. At that time the prospects for new overlay journals receded - why publish so cheaply when you could publish in the best journals with a range of options for OA? At $99 to publish OA, it's no surprise that the overlay journal may be back, even if they do have to learn from the early overlay pioneers if they to aren't to switch from OA. Are no-name journals and $99 the new benchmark? Of course there is plenty of Twitter noise to suggest so, but let the wider market of authors be the judge, unless the institutional publication fees committees that are emerging post-Finch turn out to be the real driver in the UK. While welcoming the $99 gold OA publication price by Sage, we can concede that if it manages to turn a no-name journal into a successful name journal then it could (will) reasonably increase that price. At least now we have some clear reference points in evaluating the value of the different routes to OA. Among them, the $99 price point is a chance to re-energise green OA. Steve On 25 Jan 2013, at 07:51, Sridhar Gutam wrote: > Dear All, > > It seems everyone is now slashing the prices for publication!!! Its all > result of the pressure from the OA advocates and Researchers? > > Its a welcome sign but as heather rightly said, if $99 is the price for > publication of an article? seeing the funding for the research and absolutely > no earmarked for payment to publish/processing, how would developing > countries and the country like India could afford to publish? > > Sridhar > __________________________________________________________ > Sridhar Gutam PhD, ARS, Patent Laws (NALSAR), IP & Biotech. (WIPO) > Senior Scientist (Plant Physiology) Central Institute for Subtropical > Horticulture > Joint Secretary, Agricultural Research Service Scientists' Forum > Convenor, Open Access India > Country Representative, YPARD > Rehmankhera, Kakori Post > Lucknow 227107, Uttar Pradesh, India > Phone: +91-522-2841022/23/24; Fax: +91-522-2841025 > Mobile:+91-9005760036/8005346136 > Publications: http://works.bepress.com/sridhar_gutam/ > > > > On 24 January 2013 23:12, Heather Morrison <hgmor...@sfu.ca> wrote: > Sage Open has reduced their open access article processing fee to $99 per > article. The announcement is posted here: > http://www.uk.sagepub.com/aboutus/press/2013/jan/24_jan.htm > > This is not the first OA publisher to come out with prices in this range. > PeerJ, established by Peter Binfield (formerly PLoS ONE), has open access > fees on a lifetime membership basis starting from $99. > > This raises some interesting questions. For example: > > What is the real cost of publishing in an open access online environment? > Sage OPEN and PeerJ are both commercial companies. If $99 is sufficient to > cover the costs of coordinating peer review and publication, why would anyone > pay even the $1,350 charged by PLoS ONE, never mind the $3,000 plus charged > by some of the traditional publishers under hybrid arrangements? > > Is this an indication that transitioning to open access will indeed open up > the inelastic market for scholarly journals to competition? > > best, > > Heather G. Morrison, PhD > Freedom for scholarship in the internet age > http://pages.cmns.sfu.ca/heather-morrison/2012/12/12/freedom-for-scholarship-in-the-internet-age-post-defence-version/ > _______________________________________________ > GOAL mailing list > GOAL@eprints.org > http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal > > _______________________________________________ > GOAL mailing list > GOAL@eprints.org > http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal _______________________________________________ GOAL mailing list GOAL@eprints.org http://mailman.ecs.soton.ac.uk/mailman/listinfo/goal
