Elsevier's hybrid or sponsored-article journals promise to reduce their subscription prices in proportion to author uptake of the OA option. ("We do not plan to charge subscribers for author sponsored content.") But at the same time they raise their subscription prices every year, as usual. How does this net out?
William Walsh has put together a very useful table showing that Elsevier's hybrid OA journals raised their subscription prices by 6.39% last year, even more than the 5.5% increase at Elsevier journals overall. The company did not reveal the rate of author uptake for the hybrid journals.
Comment. Can Elsevier verify that it actually reduced prices in proportion to author uptake? Can it explain why the hybrid journal prices nevertheless rose faster than the company average? Will subscribers press the company to answer these questions before renewing again?
Posted by
Peter Suber at 4/29/2007 10:06:00 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.
I recommend the OA tracking project (OATP) as the best way to stay on top of new OA developments. You can read the OATP feed on a blog-like web page or subscribe to it by RSS, email, or Twitter. You can also help build the feed by tagging new developments you encounter.
