From: Alex Holzman <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Sun, 28 Jul 2013 18:28:13 -0400

Wouldn't an appropriately funded OA model (perhaps partly via
something like the way Knowledge Unlatched will raise funds, partly
through the author's institution, occasionally via grant support)
solve this problem?  All libraries and scholars would have access to a
digital form of the undoubtedly more useful book rather than the raw
dissertation and university presses would have their costs covered.
I've always seen one benefit of open access being its potential as a
way to eliminate the free-rider problem in scholarly monograph
publishing and this might be a way to start down that road and benefit
students, faculty, libraries, and presses alike.  (Universities
providing financial support to their presses currently bear a cost
that universities without presses avoid--an unfairness not often
mentioned.)  Of course, to work this would mean the OA support covered
all university press costs including overheads. An interesting side
question is whether an OA monograph requires marketing.  I'd argue it
does--more cost--but perhaps others disagree.

BTW, my own press definitely considers revised dissertations, but the
final decision to publish or not can include the forecast sales.  And
while the decline in library sales for already-available electronic
dissertations may seem marginal to YBP, university presses these days
often have zero wiggle room.  That's part of a whole different problem
for discussion another time.

Alex Holzman
Temple Univ. Press


On Fri, Jul 26, 2013 at 9:28 AM, LIBLICENSE <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> [MODERATOR's NOTE:  Thanks to Chuck for this. In Rick Anderson's new
> posting on Scholarly Kitchen, he asks the question:  "How do we know
> that 'an increasing number of university presses are reluctant to
> offer a publishing contract to newly minted PhDs whose dissertations
> have been freely available via online sources'? I can understand the
> reasoning that might lead to this stance, but is there actual evidence
> to indicate that it is, in fact, an increasingly widespread one among
> publishers?"   Rick, the Conclusion of the article below answers that
> question.. the number of reluctant publishers has definitely increased
> in the last decade; the authors' recommendation is, therefore, at odds
> with their data?]
>
>
> From: "Charles E. Jones" <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Fri, 26 Jul 2013 11:30:24 +0000
>
> I sent this to Jim O'Donnell last evening, he encouraged me to send it
> to the list as well
>
> -Chuck Jones-
>
> Marisa L. Ramirez, Joan T. Dalton, Gail McMillan, Max Read, and Nancy
> H. Seamans, "Do Open Access Electronic Theses and Dissertations
> Diminish Publishing Opportunities in the Social Sciences and
> Humanities? Findings from a 2011 Survey of Academic Publishers." Coll.
> res. libr. July 2013 74:368-380
>
> http://crl.acrl.org/content/74/4/368.full.pdf+html