A story about academic publishing
Why is the system broken, and how can it be fixed?
The Academic Publishing Lifecycle
- The research is funded by grants and subsidies from universities, governments and corporations.
- The Academic does not get remunerated for their work.
- The Academic Journals facilitate the editing, reviewing and re-submission procedure.
- The academic editors usually only earn symbolic pay, and most of the quality control and fact-checking is done through peer review, which is free.
- Publishers, like Elsevier and Springer Science print and distribute the journals.
- They then charge universities hefty subscription fees to grant access to the research papers they publish.
- Because these publishers do not incur any large costs they are able to maintain extraordinarily high profit margins.
- After a period of time called a moving wall, the publishing houses sell the rights to their journal issues to academic search engines like JSTOR.
- To recoup infrastructure, energy and content costs, JSTOR sells institutional subscriptions at enormous costs
- Universities and institutions now have to pay outrageously high subscription fees, just to access the research articles that arguably were funded and facilitated by them in the first place.
- The research is funded by grants and subsidies from universities, governments and corporations.
- The Academic does not get remunerated for their work.
- The Academic Journals facilitate the editing, reviewing and re-submission procedure.
- The academic editors usually only earn symbolic pay, and most of the quality control and fact-checking is done through peer review, which is free.
- Publishers, like Elsevier and Springer Science print and distribute the journals.
- They then charge universities hefty subscription fees to grant access to the research papers they publish.
- Because these publishers do not incur any large costs they are able to maintain extraordinarily high profit margins.
- After a period of time called a moving wall, the publishing houses sell the rights to their journal issues to academic search engines like JSTOR.
- To recoup infrastructure, energy and content costs, JSTOR sells institutional subscriptions at enormous costs
- Universities and institutions now have to pay outrageously high subscription fees, just to access the research articles that arguably were funded and facilitated by them in the first place.
What is wrong with the current publishing model?
The gift exchange
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, established in 1665, holds the distinction of being the world's oldest scientific journal. The Royal Society championed the notion that scientific progress relies on an open and transparent exchange of ideas supported by empirical evidence, despite this concept being unpopular at the time.
As a result, a remarkable system called the "gift exchange" prevailed for nearly three centuries. Under this system, nearly all scholarly works, with the exception of proprietary research, were made freely accessible to the public. This commitment to sharing knowledge fostered a culture of openness, enabling widespread access to groundbreaking scientific discoveries and facilitating intellectual advancement.
Commercialising academic research
Unfortunately, this system is no longer in place today. In the 1960s and 1970s, commercial publishers recognised the commercial viability of academic publishing and began selectively acquiring high-quality journals owned by nonprofit academic societies. They perceived an opportunity to capitalise on the distribution of publicly funded research. Due to the relatively inelastic demand for academic journals, particularly within university libraries, publishers were able to significantly raise prices, resulting in astronomical profit margins.
As of 2020, four major publishers—Elsevier, Springer, Wiley, and Taylor & Francis—control a staggering 55% of the academic journal market. These influential publishing giants have a track record of merging, acquiring, and launching new journals to diversify their journal portfolios. Modern academic publishing operates on a distinctive economic model in which all the necessary publishing inputs are provided free of charge. Academics, as integral participants in the scholarly pursuit, contribute a crucial economic input that is subsequently monetised by publishers during the dissemination process.
The Serials Crisis
Between 1975 and 1995, commercial journal publishers in the United States implemented a staggering 310% increase in prices. In contrast, university library budgets typically only experienced growth in line with the Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation rate, which stood at 183% during the same period. Consequently, the emergence of the serials crisis took place in the 1990s as an escalating number of university library budgets found themselves unable to keep pace with the escalating costs of journals.
The ramifications were far-reaching, with the ratio of journal expenditures to total library materials expenditures surging from 53% in 1986 to 73% in 2011. This trend was accompanied by a notable decline of 21% in expenditure on other resource categories, such as monographs.
The Big Deal
'The Big Deal' marked a pivotal moment in the history of academic publishing. Rather than selling journals individually to university libraries, publishers introduced bundle deals, offering access to complete journal collections in exchange for an annual subscription fee. This strategic approach ensured that libraries either had access to the entire collection or none of it, providing publishers with a significant advantage. The result was a boost in profitability, as evidenced by Elsevier's remarkable performance. Between 1991 and 2013, Elsevier's operating profits skyrocketed by over 400%. Notably, the company maintained a consistently high-profit margin of no less than 30% throughout this period.
Taking a stand
In response to a dispute regarding access to research publications, Norway, Sweden, and several universities from various countries terminated their contracts with publishers like Elsevier. This move aimed to facilitate a sustainable shift toward Open Access (OA) publishing. However, the OA movement itself has encountered challenges, as commercial publishers have sought to appease public scrutiny by offering hybrid journals, combining subscription-based and open-access models. Unfortunately, these hybrid journals have often charged higher prices on average compared to standalone open-access journals.
To address the unsustainable price increases, the academic community has devised various solutions, one of which involves library-press partnerships. Libraries have assumed a new role in scholarly publishing by collaborating with university presses. These partnerships encourage universities to develop comprehensive publishing strategies that leverage the expertise and resources of multiple departments, including the library, press, and academic computing centre.
In a more radical realm, Sci-Hub has emerged as a platform that bypasses paywalls and provides free access to paid scientific publications from major publishers. Sci-Hub operates under the belief that granting copyrights to scientific works and imposing paywalls hinders societal progress.
Given this premise, the development of Aaron’s Kit was created to complement society’s actions by decentralising scholarly work to ensure censorship resistance to fight back and honour Aaron Swartz Guerilla Open Access Manifesto “You have a duty to share it with the world”.
What is Open Access?
Open Access (OA) represents a global movement aimed at providing unrestricted and immediate online access to academic research outputs, including journal articles, books, and data. It stands in contrast to the traditional subscription-based publishing model, where access to scholarly information is granted through purchased subscriptions, typically facilitated by libraries.
A publication is deemed open access when it is freely accessible without any financial, legal, or technical barriers. This means that anyone, under the terms of the licensing agreements, can read, download, copy, search, and utilize the publication in any manner. Many journals now offer various models resembling Open Access, wherein researchers are charged a one-time fee to ensure the free accessibility of their scholarly outputs.
While Open Access has gained significant popularity in recent years and is generally regarded as a positive development, it is not without its drawbacks:
Article Processing Charges (APCs)
Researchers often have to pay substantial costs to journals to make their research freely available. APC charges vary, and cost on average $1626, where the most prestigious journals charge upwards of $5000, and even as high as $11 400.
Scarse Open Access journals
The number of Open Access or hybrid journals vary greatly across disciplines. Some disciplines have very few and often not enough.
Predatory publishing
The presence of predatory journals, which refers to journals of questionable quality and legitimacy, poses a hindrance to the progress of the open access movement. The relentless spamming tactics employed by these predatory journals can negatively impact researchers' perceptions of open access as a whole.
What role will Aaron's Kit play?
Aaron's Kit is a pioneering endeavour aiming to become the world's foremost repository of complete journals currently locked behind paywalls, granting free access to the public. We firmly believe that scholarship, synonymous with knowledge, is a public good. Consequently, the content within scholarly journals should also be freely accessible, just like any other public good.
We embody the visionary spirit of Aaron Swartz. This project is not just ours; it's yours too. By uniting our efforts, we can carry forward Aaron's profound legacy — to revolutionise the outdated academic publishing system and foster an inclusive Open Access community.
Join us in this transformative journey as we work towards dismantling barriers and enabling universal access to scholarly knowledge. Together, we can shape the future of academic publishing.