[Open-access] more open access particle physics

Tue Sep 25 15:22:16 UTC 2012

I agree with everything you said there, Peter, especially that change has
to come from the top (hopefully informed by pressure from academics and
OKFN). I don't think the destruction of the journal system is too much/ a
bridge too far though, Ross. It's probably the best way to break the
"quality" stranglehold that top-flight journals have.

I'm about to get evangelical, so please excuse me, but it wouldn't be that
hard for a publicly-funded organisation to replace the journal publishing
system with a better and much cheaper alternative/ alternatives that could
deal with the "impact factor determining article worth" problem.

Once the open access mandate comes in, independent online databases will be
able to copy and host a larger proportion of articles published. Hopefully
a database will arise (or Pubmed and its ilk will develop) to do so in a
new universal, better presented, format which includes a discussion system.
This would have an in-built advantage versus the current publishing model
in that it could bring single experiments from different publications that
address the same scientific question together so that they can easily be
compared and discussed online. It would need a good forum system with peer
moderation that positively selects the most interesting comments and
rewards people for making them (like the slashdot.org moderation system).
This would get people engaged in (/addicted to) the "game" of
participation, and hopefully keep them coming back to participate, and
would allow a large amount of editorial responsibility to be taken on by
the community, thus saving money. The databases would need a large
editorial staff, but there's no reason these could not be public employees
(of EMBL/EBI and NCBI in my field, for e.g.) and you'd still need a lot
fewer of them than the traditional system.

If such a system took off, glory could still come from citations, but the
journal in which articles were published would matter less as people would
start to use the universal database to access articles, just for the
discussion system. Hopefully "buzz" about articles would start to be
generated by the discussion rather than the journal's reputation, so that
eventually journals would be irrelevant and publication could be done
direct through the database.

I'm hoping it's just a matter of time, and I have a(nother) fantasy that it
could change the way science is done so that people will publish the
results of single experiments instead of waiting for a "narrative" to
develop, which would be left for reviews, but that's a whole other rant!

David

On 25 September 2012 14:14, Peter Murray-Rust <pm286 at cam.ac.uk> wrote:

> Excellent discussion. At least we can have one on this list - which is
> what it's for. (It's impossible to do this on the GOAL list - anyone not in
> the Green oligarchy gets blown out of the water.)
>
> IMO there are three things (please criticize) :
> * cost
> * price
> * value
>
> The COST is - in principle - measurable. Any publisher which simply
> provided a defined service could publish their costs and indicate whether
> they make a profit. But most publishers hide their costs both by secrecy
> and bundling products so the cost is rarely known. There are some
> indications that for a  journal that generally reviews a paper once and
> accepts most submissions the cost is around 250 USD. However for journals
> trhat have a high rejection rate the costs are higher. Nature has said that
> for an open access journal they would have to charge 6500 GBP == 10000 USD.
> I find it difficult to believe this is the cost, even with multiple
> rejections and reviews.
>
> The PRICE is what you pay the publisher. In most markets it is either set
> by market forces (competition, perceived value, etc) or by regulators or by
> some of both. However prices for subscriptions are often secret and
> librarians are forced to sign non-disclosure clauses.
>
> The VALUE is what the purchasers (whether authors - gold -or subscribers)
> feel the product is worth. A paper in Nature is valued more that one in
> J.Cheminformatics (on whose board I am). This is highly subjective and
> self-fulfilling.
>
> Normal market forces don't apply for a number of reasons:
> * leading brands can often charge whatever they like and people will pay
> it. Examples are mineral water, beauty products, fashions, foods, etc.
> Prices are are sometimes related to scarcity but seldom to cost.
> * people in universities are not normally paying with real money. Most
> libraries get subscription income from taxpayers or students. They don't
> have to go out on the streets and raise actual money . Academics are even
> more insulated - they aren't expected to pay for journal subscriptions out
> of their grants (the universities top-slice it).
> * publication supports a number of conflicting purposes. Communication,
> archival, peer-approval, etc. and also the label of glory in the field. The
> latter is what drives the apparent value.
> * it's not a zero-sum game. We are in a dysfunctional pseduo-equilibrium
> and any unilateral move costs extra for no return. Managed change can only
> come from the top. That's what RCUK is trying to do.
>
> My simplistic solution (it won't happen) would be to separate the glory
> awarding from the publication. Then communication, etc. could become
> commodities under normal market forces . It would also get the publication
> completely into the Open arena. And we could have an OSCAR-like process for
> deciding the superstars. It oculdn't be worse that what we do at present
> with Impact factors for journals decided by non-representative commercial
> companies.
>
> But at least we can discuss it freely here.
>
> P.
>
>
> --
> Peter Murray-Rust
> Reader in Molecular Informatics
> Unilever Centre, Dep. Of Chemistry
> University of Cambridge
> CB2 1EW, UK
> +44-1223-763069
>
> _______________________________________________
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> open-access at lists.okfn.org
> http://lists.okfn.org/mailman/listinfo/open-access
>
>
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