From: Zac Rolnik <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Wed, 23 Oct 2013 12:06:27 -0400

I seem to recall that some of the earlier claims by publishers was
that the open access option for hybrid journals was going to result in
a price reduction of hybrid journals as more open access articles were
published with the author publication fees helping to lower
subscription prices.  Has this happened?  Has anyone looked into this?

Zac Rolnik
now publishers
po box 1024
hanover, ma 02339 usa
[log in to unmask]
www.nowpublishers.com

-----Original Message-----

From: Brian Simboli <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Tue, 22 Oct 2013 14:35:41 -0400

Perhaps some of you saw the following youtube.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5rVH1KGBCY

It seems to perpetuate the usual claim that OA will somehow ameliorate
the journal pricing problem.

The fact is that the OA movement hasn't done this.  Will it do so in
the future? That is anyone's guess. Perhaps it will in the long run;
after all, the rallying cry that "information wants to be free" may
reflect an economic dynamic that will eventually bring down prices.

But as Keynes famously noted, in the long run we're all dead or, in
this case, many of our subscriptions will have been cancelled.

There are many solid arguments for OA, and for asserting green access
rights, but one of them is not that--at least any time soon--OA will
challenge the oligopolistic price regime. After all, the
inelasticities of journal subscription pricing will just replicate
themselves in OA author or membership pricing.

I wish there were greater recognition of this fact.

--
Brian Simboli
Science Librarian
Library and Technology Services
E.W. Fairchild Martindale
8A East Packer Avenue
Bethlehem, PA 18015-3170