No matter how nicely I try to format my camera-ready papers, occasionally I will get an email like this from the publisher: ...
[PS: Omitting detailed list of small typesetting errors.]
I cannot understand why the author has to deal with all these typesetting issues, if there is publisher involved in the process. Isn't typesetting something that the publisher does? Given that I have submitted my LaTeX sources and all the necessary files needed to compile the paper, it is trivially easy to fix all these issues....
[A]s publishers push more and more of their responsibilities to the authors, they increasingly make themselves irrelevant. There is no reason to pay a publisher to prepare proceedings or even journals when the publisher does not even want to take care of the most esoteric issues. In fact, there is no reason for a publisher to exist at all. What is the added value that a publisher offers? Open access and the web made already a significant part of the publisher's role obsolete; if publishers voluntarily make typesetting the task of their suppliers (authors), then they voluntarily make themselves a useless part of the workflow, ripe to be dropped completely in the near future.
Posted by
Peter Suber at 6/19/2007 10:01:00 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.
