Dr Philip Campbell, the Editor-in-Chief of 'Nature', gave a
presentation on November 29 at CAMBIA in Canberra (details
of
CAMBIA below) on the topic "Challenges of Openness in
Science
Communication and Publishing".
The seminar ,which may be of interest to this list, was
chaired
by Dr Richard Jefferson who has recently been the subject of
a
profile by Richard Poynder in 'Open and Shut', September 22.
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It was an interesting presentation from Campbell, an
influential
figure, who was progressive in his advocacy of
'supplementary'
science data collection, communication and manipulation but
was
more conservative in looking at the total research
publishing
field
Campbell said that he was speaking as an editor "not
threatened
by Open Access developments". He wondered if the
"author pays"
(always confusing term to an academic audience?) model was
sustainable, given that it required a "big
subsidy/investment
from the owner (eg BMC) or philanthropy (PLOS)". I
pointed out in
the question time that the current system which he seemed to
assume as a given, was based on the "philanthropy"
of the
university and research sector supporting many of the costs
of
the current system, for example through the university
library
budgets (Jan Velterop has made some cogent points in this
context
in his 'Parachute Blog' of 17 November,
http://theparachute
.blogspot.com/).
Campbell cited the non-mandatory policy of the US National
Institute of Health as a "critical moment" which
will "have been
seen to have affected the Open Access movement". He
cited "only
limited support from funding agencies" but omitted to
mention any
specific UK examples such as the Research Councils. He
stated,however, there was "a need to maintain political
and moral
pressures on funding agencies".
He believed that 'Nature' in its editorials/articles, etc
had
given a "balanced view of Open Access" and that
there was no
evidence so far of "lower quality thresholds in top
Open Access
journals". He cited in why "I dislike author
pays" as follows -
it puts downward pressure on the quality of the literature;
over-states the problems of public access; understates true
costs; and "I like being rewarded by lots of satisfied
readers
than by a few authors".
His "neutral" question was "is it possible to
have one model for
high selectivity journals and another, author pays, for the
rest?". He praised Hinari and Agora as having
"traction" but not
being very well known. He noted that while a time delay for
Open
Access had been accepted by some publishers, eg 'Science',
it had
not been accepted by the 'Nature' publishing group, although
it
allowed immediate free access to encrypted text for
computerised
data mining. Free access to "authors versions"
after a six month
delay was supported by NPG.
Campbell did not seem to be across the institutional
repository
advances in specific terms only citing "D-Base"
(sic)
developments at MIT. He did not mention any of Stevan
Harnad's
prolific output and advocacy in this context instead
focussing
largely on the OA journal route. He did say however, IRs
were
"here to stay" but indicated that he was uncertain
how open some
institutional IR content was. (Surely the vast majority
are?) He
also cited the development of central repositories as being
an
alternative to IRs.
Open peer review was "not for us at the moment"
and felt that
many academics would not engage in unsolicited peer
reviewing
unless there were incentives and motivations. Interestingly,
he
then went on to state that there would be a marked decline
in
people volunteering to peer review as the science market
place
became more competitive and selfish. Researchers would still
review for journals such as 'Cell' but not for the
"lower
journals" which he described as those with lower
citations.
Having said that, he indicated that he was not in favour of
surrogates such as citations being utilised for individual
and
collective assessments although he recognised this was an
increasing trend.
He spent considerable time on the 'Nature' developments in
the
collection of data, the importance of grey literature,
blogs,
wikis and the need for high value content to be recognised.
He
pondered whether quality blog commentators could be
enshrined in
evaluative value systems (but if RAEs and RQFs are going to
adopt
largely conservative metrics this may not be likely in the
short
term?)
He noted that perhaps the NIH is "not sure what it is
there for
in terms of databases". This support of data collection
and the
need for its acceptance within the scientific process was in
some
contrast to his implicit acceptance of the status quo of the
STM
market- "I'm not sure what 'Nature' can do to impact on
the big
STM publishers" - a sotto voce from a librarian at the
back said
"don't keep increasing 'Nature's' pricing models"!
He did state
later "that it was up to librarians to cancel journals
from high
cost publishers".
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It is interesting in this context that the UK Bookseller of
November 25th, quoted in 'The Guardian', reports as follows
"Families should stick together. That seems to be the
logic
behind academic publishing's latest mega-deal, the sale of
Blackwell Publishing to John Wiley & Sons. Both are
family
companies founded in the 19th century (although Blackwell
has
hardly been the happiest of clans in the recent years); both
have
built vast journal and book lists spanning scientific,
technical
and medical fields. And, crucially, both are facing the
challenge
of the digital era, with academics and professionals
increasingly
accessing information online.
"That means major investment or the threat of being
swallowed by
an even larger conglomerate. New York-based Wiley has forked
out
572 million pounds for Oxford's Blackwell - more than twice
what
Hachette paid for Time Warner Book Group earlier this year.
The
price is so high because businesses like Blackwell have
dependable revenues - its 835 journals are subscribed into
libraries and societies years in advance, while its 600 new
books
a year have guaranteed readerships. Its profit margins are
unimaginable to those publishers who depend on chance and
troubled bookshops. Yet ironically the deal may enable the
continued survival of some bookshops."
Universities,research institutions and their libraries thus
provide the safe underpinning of such "dependable
revenues"
****************************************
What is CAMBIA? http://w
ww.cambia.org/daisy/cambia/home.html
CAMBIA is an international, independent non-profit research
institute. For more than a decade, CAMBIA has been creating
new
enabling tools to foster innovation and a spirit of
collaboration
in the life sciences. In Spanish and Italian, CAMBIA means
"change". This meaning is at the very heart of
CAMBIA's mission.
CAMBIA's BIOS Initiative(tm) (Biological Innovation for Open
Society) is exploring new R&D paradigms, practices and
policies
to address neglected priorities of disadvantaged
communities.
How? By tapping the great potential of their own creativity.
Our
institutional ethos is built around an awareness of this
need and
opportunity: for local commitment to achieving lasting
solutions
to the challenges of food security, agricultural
productivity,
human and animal health and natural resource management.
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--
Colin Steele
Emeritus Fellow
The Australian National University
Canberra ACT 0200
Australia
Email: colin.steele anu.edu.au
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