From: Joseph Esposito <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Thu, 26 Jul 2012 15:23:00 -0700

This is all very helpful.  And it supports the view that no number
about publishing can be taken at face value.

Now for another number:  Where in the world does that $19 billion
figure for worldwide STM journal sales come from?  That's a huge
number.  What could possibly be in there?  Add up the journals
businesses at Wiley, Elsevier, Springer, T&F--and throw in Kluwer,
Sage, ACS, and some others, and you don't get near that figure, or
near 50% of that figure.

Joe Esposito


On Thu, Jul 26, 2012 at 2:54 PM, LIBLICENSE <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> From: Sean Andrews <[log in to unmask]>
> Date: Wed, 25 Jul 2012 23:23:17 -0500
>
> On Wed, Jul 25, 2012 at 12:41 PM, Joe Esposito wrote:
>
> > From: Joseph Esposito <[log in to unmask]>
> > Date: Tue, 24 Jul 2012 20:33:00 -0700
> >
> > Nothing new in this article for members of this list, but rather
> > surprising for its length.
> >
> > Can anyone untangle the numbers?  Harvard's journals budget looks incredibly low.
>
> The $3.75 million is just a subset of the subscriptions (coming from
> "certain publishers") which they claim have risen especially high in
> recent years.  I can't figure the difference between "current serials"
> and "electronic serials" in the NCES database - and Harvard only has
> one year of numbers for e-serials (2010: $8.5 million) -  but
> according to the most recent numbers,  "Current Serials (which are for
> 2010, the year cited as the baseline, so not as much help) rose
> sharply and suddenly.  On the other hand, it appears they were getting
> a good bit more for their money overall. Middle number here is
> "Current serials" expenditures; bottom number is "current serials
> held"
>
> 2000 - $8,533,502 – 190,528
>
> 2002 - $9,735,872 – 106,869
>
> 2004 – $10,497,758 – 100,009
>
> 2006 - $9,911.521 – 98,988
>
> 2008 - $9,248,115 – 110,628
>
> 2010 - $15, 233,300 - 157854
>
> So certainly these were cheaper in 2000, but since then both the price
> and the number of serials has held steady, till 2010 when they bought
> about 40% more and paid about 60% more.  Again, this is for the period
> immediately preceding the baseline.  Not sure of the overall budget
> today.
>
> > Also, 50% of all journals are published by a small number of commercial publishers?  50% of the dollars, perhaps, but 50% of the titles?
>
> No you are right: it is likely dollars. It is a misreading of the
> source (handily linked and open access), which states that:
>
> > Worldwide, the scientific, technical, and medical (STM) segment of the academic journal publishing industry generates a little more than $19 billion in revenue, with the top ten publishers accounting for approximately 43% of that revenue, according to a recent market research report referenced by Library Journal
>
> It appears that both this and the LJ stat are specific to the STM
> field.  Though in that field, the article goes on to claim that,
> "Three giants dominate: Reed Elsevier, Springer and Wiley.  Estimates
> indicate that these three account for approximately 42% of all journal
> articles published."  But the citation for this is a report issued in
> 2002 by Morgan Stanley (i.e. now 10 years ago) on Reed's profitability
> and, so far as I can tell, it makes little mention of Springer.  So
> not sure where they got that number.
>
> Sean Johnson Andrews
> [log in to unmask]
> Assistant Professor of Cultural Studies
> Columbia College, Chicago
> 2011-2013 ACLS Public Fellow
> Program Officer
> The National Institute for Technology in Liberal Education
> http://www.nitle.org | tel. 703-597-6948 | fax 512 819-7684
> iChat: [log in to unmask] | skype: jnskolja | twitter: @skja76
>
>
> > On Tue, Jul 24, 2012 at 6:04 PM, LIBLICENSE <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> > > From: "B.G. Sloan" <[log in to unmask]>
> > > Date: Tue, 24 Jul 2012 12:16:53 -0700
> > >
> > > Some of you may be interested in this article from U.S. News & World Report:
> > >
> > > Owens, Simon. Is the Academic Publishing Industry on the Verge of Disruption?
> > >
> > > "As Harvard balks at subscription cost and others take a page from its
> > > book, open access publishers get a fresh look."
> > >
> > > Full text at: http://bit.ly/Ofn7kH
> > >
> > > Bernie Sloan