From: Sandy Thatcher <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2012 23:18:28 -0500

For a little historical perspective, one might study the early years
of the University of California Press, which was set up as a service
agency to publish the work of UC faculty. This is a model that
Kathleen Fitzpatrick, in Planned Obsolescence (NYU, 2011), wonders is
not the one to which universities should return, in tandem with a move
toward post-publication peer review.  It's an idea certainly worth
debating. She I believe she tunes into this listserv, she might want
to elaborate on the idea in her own words.

Sandy Thatcher


> From: <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Wed, 27 Jun 2012 10:59:25 +0000
>
> Isn't this becoming a debate about whether research institutions
> should take responsibility for publishing the research done by their
> staff? This is a big shift since, historically, institutions have
> largely left responsibility for publishing to their research staff.
>
> If we accept that institutions need to take over this responsibility
> from individual staff, then we need to ask the question: will
> institutions be any good at discharging this responsibility?
>
> Are there examples today of research institutions taking
> responsibility for their publishing? Well, yes. I should declare an
> interest because I work for one. OECD, like most international
> organizations (UN, World Bank, IMF et al), has always taken
> responsibility for publishing its research and data, as do many
> government departments. I'm sure there will be more in other areas.
>
> How well do institutions like the one I work for discharge this
> responsibility? Do they invest and allocate sufficient resources to
> create the services needed by readers? Does it work well from the
> point of view of readers both specialist and lay?
>
> There has been a lot of research and modeling on OA which has pushed
> the debate in the direction of organizational responsibility, so I
> wonder if an examination of some real-life case studies of
> institutions that do take responsibility for publishing might now be
> timely. What are the costs? What do the authors in these institutions
> feel about the institution having publishing responsibility? Do
> readers find it easy to discover and understand the research coming
> from these institutions? Do the institutions believe they get value
> for the money they spend on publishing? How do small institutions cope
> - does scale matter?
>
> Any volunteers?
>
> Toby Green
> Head of Publishing
> OECD
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Sally Morris <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Tue, 26 Jun 2012 12:35:28 +0100
>
> Subject: RE: The Finch Report: UCL's David Price Responds
>
> Those university presses, learned societies etc that have succeeded seem to
> attract much the same opprobrium as other publishers...
>
> Sally Morris
> Email:  [log in to unmask]
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Sandy Thatcher <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Sun, 24 Jun 2012 22:43:45 -0500
>
> It would also have been a more sensible option if universities had supported
> their own publishing infrastructure more in the first place and not allowed
> commercial publishers to establish such a dominant position in STM journal
> publishing. In the immediate postwar years that was still a live option.
> Administrative myopia helped create the conditions that Kevin deplores.
>
> Sandy Thatcher