Stephanie Kirchgaessner, New leaf for chief of Springer, Financial Times, August 5, 2004. On Derk Haank's move from Elsevier to Springer. Excerpt: "Like other academic publishers, some of Springer's biggest customers the libraries that purchase its journals are facing increasing budget pressure. A vocal minority of libraries and academics are also calling for a revamp of the traditional 'user pays' publishing model, which they claim is too costly for the end user. Instead, some are promoting a so-called open access model in which an author or sponsoring institution pays to have articles published that are then widely disseminated. Mr Haank says the debate, which has pitted some open-access upstarts against the industry leaders, has taken on an 'unhelpful', 'almost religious' emotional element. Nevertheless, Springer has responded to the call from some academics by offering journal authors a choice: publish using the traditional method or pay Springer $3,000 once an article has been accepted and it will be disseminated for free. 'The responses have been very positive, because people appreciate we are listening to the market,' Mr Haank says. But one rival says Springer's plan represents little more than a 'public relations initiative'. It is an accusation Mr Haank would likely deny, although he does appear to relish the challenge he is presenting to some academics to put their money where their protests are. 'Let's see how serious they really are...we expect that not more than 10 per cent will be interested in this option,' he says."
(PS: Haank sounds as if his plan is designed more to generate low uptake, and ground a rebuke to OA advocates, than to test the waters in good faith. However, as I argued in SOAN for 8/2/04, the Springer processing fee is so high, and the resulting access so restrictive compared to true OA, that "[i]f Springer gets very few takers, no one will not be able to conclude that authors don't desire free online access for their work, especially when publishers offering full OA at lower prices are thriving.")
Posted by
Peter Suber at 8/06/2004 09:49:00 AM.
The open access movement:
Putting peer-reviewed scientific and scholarly literature
on the internet. Making it available free of charge and
free of most copyright and licensing restrictions.
Removing the barriers to serious research.
