True, although some of them rely heavily on overseas subscriptions to
exist (to pay for "direct" costs such as printing, online hosting,
etc. which some institutions will not fund). The amounts of income
from these may look small to us, but may be indispensible to the
journals. In some regions ( e.g. some of the African countries) there
is a real fear of losing these subscriptions when the material
becomes available "free". In some of these cases the journals are
turning to European/American commercial publishers to retain these
lines of revenue - it is a shame that a different model cannot be
found to enable the journals to go OA (and improve their visibility
and impact) whilst retaining valuable income.
pippa
On 22/11/2007, Sally Morris (Morris Associates)
<sally_at_morris-assocs.demon.co.uk> wrote:
As I understand it, many scholarly journals from less
developed countries
are not financially viable through subscriptions and are,
as a result,
heavily subsidized by their institutions and thus -
ultimately - by their
governments. In these circumstances, a no-charge OA
model makes a great
deal of sense - many more bangs for exactly the same
bucks!
Sally
Sally Morris
Consultant, Morris Associates (Publishing Consultancy)
South House, The Street
Clapham, Worthing, West Sussex BN13 3UU, UK
Tel: +44(0)1903 871286
Fax: +44(0)8701 202806
Email: sally_at_morris-assocs.demon.co.uk
-----Original Message-----
From: American Scientist Open Access Forum
[mailto:
AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG]
On
Behalf Of Guédon Jean-Claude
Sent: 16 November 2007 09:07
To:
AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
Subject: RE : OA in developing countries
I quite agree with Mike Smith and his concerns about the
Third World.
Open Access is the only way for Third World countries to
see their journals
recognized and integrated in the international
bibliographies. As a result,
Third World scientists will be able to publish on topics
of interest to
their situation (while responding to the universal
criteria of excellence).
The Web of Science is notoriously deficient on Third
World coverage. The
International Bibliography of the Social Sciences is
quite as bad. Their
coverage is 70% in English in disciplines where national
and local languages
are still extremely important). People close to the
SciELO project in Latin
America, Spain and Portugal have published on this topic
and are beginning
to take measure to counteract these biases. Recently, the
people responsible
for the Shanghai ranking of universities have decided to
use Scopus rather
than the Web of Science because the coverage of journals
was wider in
Scopus. I will not delve on the irony of the situation;
neither will I
analyze the validity of the Shanghai rankings, but I
welcome the
multiplication of evaluation and ranking services as they
serve to dilute
the judgmental monopoly of the (recent) past.
Yes, Open Access will help Third World countries greatly,
and not only in
placing the articles of Third World scientists in
suitable repositories.
Jean-Claude Guédon
-------- Message d'origine--------
De: American Scientist Open Access Forum de la part de
Michael Smith
Date: jeu. 15/11/2007 10:22
À:
AMERICAN-SCIENTIST-OPEN-ACCESS-FORUM_at_LISTSERVER.SIGMAXI.ORG
Objet : OA in developing countries
It is good to know that there is considerable interest
and work on OA in
developing countries, and this is not at all surprising.
The intention
of my brief post was NOT to say "nobody cares about or is
doing anything
about OA in developing countries" (and I certainly did
not intend to
insult anyone). Rather, my intention was to point out
what seemed to be
a bias in much of the talk and writing on OA: issues are
typically
framed solely in terms of the US and Europe. I follow the
OA literature
at a distance, and this bias seems pretty clear in things
that I come
across.
Mike Smith
Dr. Michael E. Smith
Professor of Anthropology
School of Human Evolution & Social Change
Arizona State University
www.public.asu.edu/~mesmith9
http://publishingarchaeology.blogspot.com/
http://calixtlahuaca.blogspot.com/
--
Pippa Smart
Research Communication and Publishing Consultant
PSP Consulting - www.pspconsulting.org
3 Park Lane, Appleton, Oxon OX13 5JT,UK
Tel: +44 1865 864255
Mob: +44 7775 627688
Skype: pippasmart
pippa.smart_at_gmail.com
****
Received on Fri Nov 23 2007 - 11:24:38 GMT