[Open-access] [open-science] Elsevier: some facts, by Tim Gowers

Wed Apr 30 06:24:12 UTC 2014

Yes, an assumption of USD 500,000,000 would seem to be unreasonable – as in unreasonably low.

Off the cuff: I did some calculations on Elsevier’s 2012 annual reports, this is cited from memory. There they reported operating profits of about 1.1 billon USD on their scientific publishing activities. This being a profit margin not far from 40 per cent, their income should be a bit higher than 2.5 billion USD – at least. How much of this is journal subscriptions? Probably more than half, so I think you could safely double your numbers. Trebling wouldn’t seem to be blatantly wrong, either.

Best,
Jan Erik

Jan Erik Frantsvåg
Open Access adviser
The University Library
UiT The Arctic University of Norway
phone +47 77 64 49 50
e-mail jan.e.frantsvag at uit.no<mailto:jan.e.frantsvag at uit.no>
http://en.uit.no/ansatte/organisasjon/ansatte/person?p_document_id=43618&p_dimension_id=88187
Publications: http://tinyurl.com/6rycjns

Fra: open-access [mailto:open-access-bounces at lists.okfn.org] På vegne av Ross Mounce
Sendt: 25. april 2014 14:12
Til: Rafael Pezzi
Kopi: open-science; open-access at lists.okfn.org; alangsmello at gmail.com
Emne: Re: [Open-access] [open-science] Elsevier: some facts, by Tim Gowers

Would it be unreasonable to suggest that a very minimum Elsevier get paid (globally) at least $500,000,000 USD for journal subscriptions, PER YEAR.

Their ScienceDirect platform only makes available access to ~12,500,000 articles (some of which are freely accessible anyway).

May I suggest a very rough back of the envelope calculation...

The length of Elsevier's copyright monopoly over scientific content they 'own' will be 70 years in most jurisdictions. This means they can continue to have the exclusive right to rent out content for 70 years after it's first production.
They get approximately $500,000,000 USD per year (globally) for renting digital access to this content. PLUS single article purchase fees typically at $40 USD per person.

70 years * $500,000,000 USD / 12,500,000 articles = $2800 USD over the subscription-lifetime per article

With a standard PLOS ONE APC of $1350 USD per paper, we'd get all the benefits of open access at less than half the lifetime cost relative to Elsevier's subscription model. Even cheaper with a SciELO*, or Journal of Machine Learning Research** (JMLR), Peer J*** , or Ubiquity Press **** style model.

It's clearer than ever to me that with a little bit of long-term thinking - RENTING access to research literature is extremely expensive, relative to 'buying' lifetime open access upfront for a one-off fee for the services provided.

I also can't hesitate to point out that publishers are constantly *increasing* the subscription prices they charge, at an above inflation level and have been doing so for years (google 'serials crisis'). Renting access to research has got to stop.

* $200 - $600 "The SciELO Open Access: A Gold Way from the South" (2010) p123 http://ojs.library.ubc.ca/index.php/cjhe/article/view/479/504
** http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/pamphlet/2012/03/06/an-efficient-journal/
*** https://peerj.com/pricing/
**** http://www.ubiquitypress.com/about

--
--
-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-
Dr Ross Mounce, postdoc
Fossils, Phylogeny and Macroevolution Research Group
University of Bath, 4 South Building, Lab 1.07
http://about.me/rossmounce
-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.okfn.org/pipermail/open-access/attachments/20140430/352fec67/attachment-0002.html>