From: Rich Dodenhoff <[log in to unmask]> Date: Wed, 2 May 2012 18:55:39 +0000 Alex, Commercial publishers are good at expressing an interest in working with society journals, and they are the publishers society leaders tend to know. I can’t remember being approached by a university press at any of the societies where I have worked. Rich Richard Dodenhoff Journals Director American Society for Pharmacology & Experimental Therapeutics 9650 Rockville Pike, Bethesda, MD 20814 (t) 301-634-7997 ************** From: LibLicense-L Discussion Forum [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Alex Holzman Sent: Monday, April 30, 2012 9:10 PM Subject: Re: The politics of journal publishing (music education edition) Yes, but if not financial motive, why not a university press? There are university presses with journals programs in most subjects, including most of the sciences. This includes some very large presses unlikely to be at risk of going out of business. (I say this as a press without a journals program so this isn't blatant self-interest.) Intended or not, the behavior of learned societies in outsourcing journals can make it very difficult for the same people to argue against high commercial press pricing in a different context. I worked in university press journals for a number of years and saw more than one instance of a journal or suite of journals going to a commercial press solely because the money was better. How do I know? The journal owners admitted it quite freely. And no, taking the money doesn't always connote greed. If a home university that previously offered support withdrew all or part of that support, what was the journal supposed to do to meet costs, from editorial office expenses to subscription maintainence to marketing? Whenever university-affiliated folks in any department start to cast aspersions about the commercial publishing world sucking the university dry, I think of Shakespeare--"The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars but in ourselves." Alex Holzman Director Temple University Press **** On Mon, Apr 30, 2012 at 7:06 PM, LIBLICENSE <[log in to unmask]> wrote: From: Anthony Watkinson <[log in to unmask]> Date: Mon, 30 Apr 2012 09:08:31 +0100 I totally agree with Rich on these two points. I would also add the financial benefit, not necessarily for more income, but for a reliable income because a feature of these deals is a guaranteed minimum income. Anthony -----Original Message----- From: Rich Dodenhoff <[log in to unmask]> Date: Fri, 27 Apr 2012 13:40:58 +0000 Societies may outsource their journals for many reasons. Some have only one or two journals, and it isn't cost effective to self-publish. There is also the often justified fear among society publishers with a small number of journals that they are being squeezed out of the market by large package deals from commercial publishers. Titles from small nonprofit publishers are often passed over, no matter how low their price or how high their impact factors, because there isn't much money left after a library purchases big deals. Nonprofit society publishers may move to a commercial publisher because they feel that's the only way their journals will survive. Richard Dodenhoff Journals Director American Society for Pharmacology & Experimental Therapeutics