This post came up in Planet Cataloguing today, and although it has nothing to do with cataloguing, I wanted to talk about it anyway!
Jonathan Rochkind wrote in his blog “Bibliographic Wilderness” about the news that Harvard’s Faculty Advisory Council has made a statement related to rising journal costs. They are basically setting the stage for a push to Open Access publishing by their faculty as well as becoming an example to the rest of the academic community to push harder for the rates and policies of some journals to be reduced.
The question of ownership is a tricky one, as having current access to an e-publisher does not mean having access to any of those journals after canceling an account. You buy print journals, you can have them "forever"; you pay for e-access you have them until you don't pay anymore. Libraries pay for the use of electronic journals and possibly physical copies (when he talks about the Copyright Clearance Center or CCC, it all depends on what you pay for). I have no doubt that Harvard is questioning the big picture. This issue does not belong to journal publishers alone; law libraries many times have to carefully consider whether they can keep up with subscriptions to LexisNexis and Westlaw in the long run, as these publishers also raise their prices at an exorbitant percentage.
The question of cost is a big one and an important one. I, for one, feel that Harvard is on the right track. If talent is sent to OA sources, and peer review still happens, well, the rest of the academic community could fall in line. I come from a scientific background and peer review and general "distinction" reign supreme in popularizing journals. If Harvard leads this charge and other universities follow suit, it might actually make a dent. I, along with Mr. Rochkind, question the sustainability of pay per use, but I still think Harvard’s gesture is a well thrown gauntlet.
Here is a news article in The Guardian that I also liked on the topic.
Thoughts?
