Scholarly Publishing Practice: the ALPSP report on academic journal publishers by John Cox and Laura Cox
ISBN: 0-907341-24-1
Publication: June 2003.
This report, from the
Association of Learned and Professional Society Publishers,
based on a survey of 275 journal publishers, covers everything from new journal launches and pricing to online availability and access to back issues.
One of the most interesting areas, though, is how journals are dealing with authors’ rights and copyright. These policies greatly affect libraries and their ability to select, acquire, organize, preserve, and provide access to scholarly materials. Among the findings listed in the executive summary:
83 per cent of publishers still require authors to transfer
copyright, although nearly 9 per cent would accept a formal licence to publish as
an alternative.
Most publishers allow published articles to be posted to web sites, though
medium-sized commercial companies are an exception.
Publishers are more inclined to allow posting published articles to the authorŐs
own site than their institutionŐs
The print version of the report costs US$200 for non-members, the online
Full report is available to members only for free, and an
Executive Summary is freely available.
An interesting thread on the liblicense-l discussion list in August comments on the survey and its implications.
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