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oligopsony(N.B. - this got some good pushback in the comments, specfically pointing out that the major publishing companies aren't doing much and that the situation may not last for long, depending on who wins what copyright battles)
The complaints about academic publishing are diverse, so I'm only here to speculateYesterday's xkcd inspired a quick thought, which has probably been had before:
Namely: what if academic publishing is fairly effective public goods provision disguised as an dysfunctional market?
The obvious absurdity of the market (at least on the consumption side - I'm going to leave the production side of it alone for now) shows up whenever Elsevier offers you 24-hour access to an article for $29.99.
I don't want to say that no one has ever been rich, clueless, and also genuinely scientifically curious enough to pay for one of these. A close friend of mine has published a lot of articles in a scientific field and learned about SciHub only recently (though even she wasn't paying for articles, just going the long way of actually logging in through her uni/workplace and personally emailing researchers when that didn't work.) Rather, academic libraries and I guess institutions like pharmaceutical companies are paying for what must be close to 100% of Elsevier's income. Then Elsevier uses this to produce public goods, by sponsoring the production of journal articles that they nominally charge $29.99 for but that are also immediately uploaded to their actual distribution mechanism, arXiv/SciHub/Book4You.
Presumably universities could defect from this equilibrium by just not bothering with the part where they pretend to pay for the library coverage. Partially of course that could land them in trouble (I know of professors who have gotten disciplined or fired for being overly honest about how to actually access textbooks and other materials, which is tragic,) even when no one is getting punished for pirating academic materials as a private individual (leaving aside other tragic cases that weren't really as "private individuals," like Aaron Schwarz.) But also probably having a subscription to the right suite of journals is just the kind of prestige purchase that major universities like to make (or even are required for credentialing, which would make the public goods provisioning aspect even more explicit. "You want to be in the Elks Club, you better pay your maintenance fees.") In this sense, if Elsevier's shareholders are skimming off the top of this process that could maybe be provided more efficiently (relying on lots of volunteer labor driven by intra-guild prestige considerations, etc) then that's possibly just another instance of administrative bloat. If pharma companies are paying for subscriptions, then that's likewise just another instance of them contributing to what they should be paying for anyway.
I am less informed on these topics than I should be, however - especially as someone who will soon be shopping a book around to academic publishers. (No investigation, no right to speak, but I'm speaking anyway.) So I welcome corrections to my likely numerous errors.
The complaints about academic publishing are diverse, so I'm only here to speculateYesterday's xkcd inspired a quick thought, which has probably been had before:
Namely: what if academic publishing is fairly effective public goods provision disguised as an dysfunctional market?
The obvious absurdity of the market (at least on the consumption side - I'm going to leave the production side of it alone for now) shows up whenever Elsevier offers you 24-hour access to an article for $29.99.
I don't want to say that no one has ever been rich, clueless, and also genuinely scientifically curious enough to pay for one of these. A close friend of mine has published a lot of articles in a scientific field and learned about SciHub only recently (though even she wasn't paying for articles, just going the long way of actually logging in through her uni/workplace and personally emailing researchers when that didn't work.) Rather, academic libraries and I guess institutions like pharmaceutical companies are paying for what must be close to 100% of Elsevier's income. Then Elsevier uses this to produce public goods, by sponsoring the production of journal articles that they nominally charge $29.99 for but that are also immediately uploaded to their actual distribution mechanism, arXiv/SciHub/Book4You.
Presumably universities could defect from this equilibrium by just not bothering with the part where they pretend to pay for the library coverage. Partially of course that could land them in trouble (I know of professors who have gotten disciplined or fired for being overly honest about how to actually access textbooks and other materials, which is tragic,) even when no one is getting punished for pirating academic materials as a private individual (leaving aside other tragic cases that weren't really as "private individuals," like Aaron Schwarz.) But also probably having a subscription to the right suite of journals is just the kind of prestige purchase that major universities like to make (or even are required for credentialing, which would make the public goods provisioning aspect even more explicit. "You want to be in the Elks Club, you better pay your maintenance fees.") In this sense, if Elsevier's shareholders are skimming off the top of this process that could maybe be provided more efficiently (relying on lots of volunteer labor driven by intra-guild prestige considerations, etc) then that's possibly just another instance of administrative bloat. If pharma companies are paying for subscriptions, then that's likewise just another instance of them contributing to what they should be paying for anyway.
I am less informed on these topics than I should be, however - especially as someone who will soon be shopping a book around to academic publishers. (No investigation, no right to speak, but I'm speaking anyway.) So I welcome corrections to my likely numerous errors.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-17 02:45 am (UTC)