From: Rebecca Kennison <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wed, 25 Jun 2014 08:32:37 -0400

It is indeed about time (as Sandy says) that funding models for
scholarly communication be rethought, with the acknowledgement that
the “market” (i.e., academic libraries) can no longer support the
system — and that the humanities and social sciences are in especially
dire need. The AAU-ARL Prospectus looks to address precisely that
problem, even though its focus is entirely on first books.

Our own proposal “A Scalable and Sustainable Approach to Open Access
Publishing and Archiving for Humanities and Social Sciences”

http://knconsultants.org/toward-a-sustainable-approach-to-open-access-publishing-and-archiving/

is a complementary effort thought along similar lines, as both Raym
Crow (who wrote the AAU-ARL Prospectus) and Frances Pinter of
Knowledge Unlatched would readily acknowledge. We also look to the
institutions themselves to take a more active role in directly, rather
than indirectly, supporting the publication of the research output at
their colleges and universities. Where our proposal differs from
theirs is in the breadth of coverage, but our vision is a shared one.

These are worthy efforts. To succeed, they not only deserve but must
get the attention not only of library directors and deans, but even
more so of presidents and provosts.

Best regards,
Rebecca Kennison and Lisa Norberg


On Tue, Jun 24, 2014 at 11:12 PM, LIBLICENSE <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> From: Sandy Thatcher <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Tue, 24 Jun 2014 00:21:36 -0500
>
> All I can say is "amen" and "it's about time." Let me explain why.
>
> Back in the late 1960s Indiana librarian Bernard Fry and associates
> published an NSF-funded study of the allocation of resources in
> library acquisitions between books and journals, documenting a shift
> from great expenditures on the former to greater expenditures on the
> latter, which was an early recognition of what later came to be called
> "the serials crisis."
>
> Responding in part to this shift, but also for other reasons, several
> of my colleagues at Princeton University Press where I was then
> working  wrote a series of articles for the Journal of Scholarly
> Publishing about the "crisis in scholarly communication." Although the
> last of these articles was fairly optimistic about the effects of
> changes at presses that could shield them from some of the new
> economic pressures attributable to declining library sales of
> monographs, the problems continued to get worse over time.  Later in
> the 1970s several foundations cooperated to fund the National Enquiry
> into Scholarly Communication (housed at PUP), which produced a report
> in 1979 that recommended, among other things, a broader sharing of
> support for scholarly publishing among all universities, which this
> new AAU/ARL initiative is finally taking to heart:

[SNIP]

> The point of this brief history is to make it clear how long this kind
> of initiative has been in gestation, for at least two decades, if not
> even longer.  So, I say, indeed "it's about time." I welcome it with a
> hearty three cheers.  This can change the face of university press
> publishing forever, freeing it to pursue the mission of publishing the
> best scholarship irrespective of its market potential, while also
> allowing presses to continue publishing other works, like regional
> books, that still have a viable market.
>
> Sandy Thatcher
>
>
> > From: Jim O'Donnell <[log in to unmask]>
> > Date: Mon, 23 Jun 2014 20:42:33 -0400
> >
> > The Association of American Universities and the Association of
> > Research Libraries have an ongoing scholarly communications task
> > force, comprising provosts and librarians from leading institutions.
> > This group released just a few days ago a proposal to support a
> > critical early phase of scholarly publishing.  Given the source, this
> > is a project with very good prospects.
> >
> > "Prospectus for an Institutionally Funded First-book Subvention"
> >
> > http://www.arl.org/storage/documents/publications/aau-arl-prospectus-for-institutionally-funded-first-book-subvention-june2014.pdf
> >
> > Thoughts?
> >
> > Jim O'Donnell
> > Georgetown